HARI SREENIVASAN: After two decades in business, Amazon.com is the world's largest Internet retailer, with a stock value that has increased tenfold since 2008. That success is driven by a work force motivated by data-driven managers who stick to principles laid down by company founder Jeff Bezos.

That's part of the takeaway from today's New York Times story, “Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace.” Based on more than 100 interviews, the story depicts a corporate culture where employees are pushed to the limit.

David Streitfeld is one of the authors. He joins me now from San Francisco.

So, what is the culture that you found?

DAVID STREITFELD, The New York Times: It is a very intense culture, a very hardworking culture, a culture where people feel they want to push themselves as far as they can, and they do.

HARI SREENIVASAN: So far, none of that, what you just said, sounds like a bad thing for a company.

DAVID STREITFELD: No, it's a great thing for a company.

If you have a company of type-A performers, and they're always performing at the limits of what they can do, you can do amazing things, which Amazon indeed has.

HARI SREENIVASAN: What do you find unique about what's happening inside Amazon's work culture?

DAVID STREITFELD: The unique thing was just how well they maintained that culture of endurance and excellence.

Start-ups do that sort of thing. They work all the time. And people are completely devoted to the company, and the rest of their life falls away. The unique thing with Amazon is, they had preserved, to a large extent, that start-up culture, to a company that was employing tens of thousands of people. And that's a remarkable thing to do. And I don't know of many other companies, if any, that have managed to do it.

HARI SREENIVASAN: Some of the anecdotes you write about are almost in direct opposition to the other stories about tech life that we hear, that Netflix has a yearlong maternity or paternity leave policy that they want to institute, and Google has fabulous free food everywhere.

That's not what you get when you walk into Amazon's offices.

DAVID STREITFELD: That's true. Amazon is much more severe.

It in — it has a lot of technology, but, in some ways, its self-image is not of a tech company. Its self-image is as a retailer. And in the retail business, margins are very thin and benefits are comparatively less.

HARI SREENIVASAN: And you describe a situation at the — what is it, the end of every year, where they essentially cut back their employees, depending — or their lowest performers?

DAVID STREITFELD: Yes, Amazon uses a technique which was relatively widespread in corporate America maybe 10 years ago — and some companies, other companies still use it now — called — the crudest name for it, which companies do not use, is rank and yank.

You decide where everyone fits, and those at the bottom, those that rank the lowest, you either encourage to leave or you could just release them.

HARI SREENIVASAN: What did Amazon say to this as you were reporting?

DAVID STREITFELD: Amazon has always prided itself on being a very tough place to work.

They have said this from the very beginning. As Jeff Bezos said very early on to new employees, it's not easy to work here. And without it being — without those high standards, you probably never would have heard of Amazon. It — it would not exist now.

The question is, for employees who are diverted by crises, what happens to them?

HARI SREENIVASAN: David Streitfeld, one of the co-authors of the piece from The New York Times, thanks so much.

DAVID STREITFELD: Thank you.