'Please turn it off.' Amazon's push to automate warehouse staffing runs into human resistance.

An Amazon fulfillment center Bloomberg/Getty Images Amazon is trying out warehouse software that automatically makes staffing recommendations. Pilot tests show managers repeatedly overriding or disabling the automated features. Amazon plans stricter enforcement to reduce manual staffing decisions in warehouses. Amazon is testing software to decide where warehouse workers should go. Some managers keep ignoring it. Internal planning documents show the tech giant intends to expand these labor-management systems across dozens of its North American fulfillment centers and sort centers, where they could save hundreds of millions of dollars a year. However, some warehouse managers have been overriding the software recommendations, asking engineers to disable automated features, and finding other ways around the systems, according to internal Slack conversations and the documents from earlier this year. The pushback has been enough for Amazon to conclude that software recommendations alone aren't enough to get the new technology working as designed.