Amazon: The inaugural Student Trek of 2014/15

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25 September 2014

A queue outside the door at 8.30am in the first week of term is a rare sight. But it happened at the Student Development Office, such was the enthusiasm to get a place on the first Student Trek of the year.

First, let’s get one thing straight. Student treks don’t involve hiking (although the 24 who took the trip to Amazon may disagree!). Quite simply, they are an opportunity to engage with industry and business professionals in their own environments. We run about 4-5 per semester across a range of different sectors and industries. Read on, to find out what Madhav Mittal from our MSc Finance and Investment had to say about the inaugural trek of 2014/15.

17 September 2014: The visit to the largest Amazon fulfilment centre in Europe located in Dunfermline was a rather enriching experience. Looking at the long waiting list, the trek started with the 24 of us feeling privileged that we managed to secure a seat for ourselves and after about a 25 odd minute bus ride, all cameras were up and about, amazed by the sheer size of the complex.

This facility at Dunfermline has close to 700 permanent employees catering to thousands of daily orders, but the extent of automation in all of their processes was astonishing. Each employee had an individual handheld machine that gave him/ her instructions by the minute and made sure that timelines were adhered to. While we were being guided through the complex, looking at the way the products were stacked I was reminded of a popular anecdote: “There is absolute organisation in this unorganisation.” The system knew exactly where which product was stacked and calculated the estimated time for that product to move to the packaging department and then get dispatched, the basis of which it gave the customer the expected date of delivery.

Fun Fact: Apparently you would walk 14 miles going from one end of the complex to another, and the employees wouldn’t be surprised if a person lost their way.

In a nutshell, Amazon is a technology company which is highly process oriented and its processes reflected the principle of ‘Customer is king’. We had the opportunity to interact with the General Manager (despite the fact he’d only started the job 4 days earlier!) and ask him a variety of different questions as well as witness how well Amazon represents ‘Economies of scale’ and its goal of being the world’s most customer centric company.”

For more information about Student Treks, go to the Opportunities section for your programme.