Getty/Chip Somodevilla

• Amazon introduced its "Pivot" program for underperforming employees last year. Now, some employees are resentful that the program process is unfair.

• Workplace experts say it's concerning that the peer jury that evaluates underperforming employees isn't necessarily familiar with that specific employee's work — or experienced in HR decisions.

• One workplace expert said the program is beneficial because it gives employees more of a chance to improve than if they were simply let go.

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Last year, Amazon launched a program called "Pivot," designed to help underperforming employees improve their work.

It's been eighteen months since Pivot was introduced and, as Bloomberg's Spencer Soper and Business Insider's Prachi Bhardwaj reported, some employees are protesting that the hearing process isn't fair.

Under the Pivot program, employees who are put on a performance-improvement plan have three options, Bhardwaj reported:

1. Quit and receive severance pay

2. Spend the next couple of months proving their worth by meeting certain performance goals set by the manager

3. Face a panel of peers in a courtroom-style videoconference, in which the employee and his or her boss present arguments about whether the employee should stay in the Pivot program

An Amazon spokesperson confirmed the panel is made up of global coworkers who have similar jobs at Amazon.

Seventy percent of employees lose the trials, meaning they must choose between the first and second options above. If the employee wins the trial, they are removed from Pivot and have the choice to return to their current team or be placed on another team.

Business Insider spoke to three workplace experts about the value and potential implications of the Pivot program. All three agreed that the program was "innovative" in the world of people management.

Yet the experts were also concerned that these panelists, possibly unversed in the world of HR decisions, would get to shape the future of someone's career.

Under the Pivot program, employees choose either one manager or three non-managers as their jury, Bloomberg reported. They're also allowed to dismiss some panelists if they think the panelists will be unsympathetic to their case, according to Bloomberg. But overall, the employee doesn't get to select the jurors.

"Someone's career is such a deeply personal thing," said Jaime Klein, founder and CEO of Inspire Human Resources. "It is such a massive responsibility to determine the fate of someone's career."