Amazon calls token counts a "deeply flawed" measure of engineers' AI use

Amazon published an internal memo on Tuesday that warns engineers against tokenmaxxing, running AI heavily to push up usage numbers. Its author, Terk Terkowitz, a vice president and distinguished engineer in Worldwide Amazon Stores, names usage, AI tool adoption and code-change counts as "deeply flawed" metrics that raise cost and complexity when teams treat them as targets A. Staff first received it in September, alongside an updated role guideline for software engineers B.

The memo still expects AI to be central to the job. Managers are told to study the bottom 10% of teams by adoption, check whether the top 10% actually ship more, and make sure leaders can name one task where AI helped and one where it did not B. Amazon shut an internal token leaderboard in May after employees gamed it. SourcesA B B

Sources

AAmazon software engineer role guideline (Amazon)aboutamazon.com
BAmazon warns its engineers against tokenmaxxing (TNW)thenextweb.com
BAmazon warns engineers against tokenmaxxing (eWeek)eweek.com

This story ran in the Afternoon Brief of October 28th 2026.

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