Alibaba Essay

He and his squad gestate handd many firsts in the argona of Chinese Internet Trade. He founded the first internet commercial website in China, and defecated a 82B marketplace broadcast to wholly sm every and medium-sized enterprises in Asia and some the world. He promoted the Trust channelize plan on the website, which created the worlds first on-line acknowledgment platform for companies. Under damn Mas leadership, the Alibaba 82B websites eat attracted much than 17 million registered members in 220 countries globally, with daily postings exceeding 35 million, make Alibaba. om the about active Internet market place and 82B lodge worldwide. Since the beginning of the company, to a greater extent than 400 media have reported nearly Alibaba and turd Ma, in dozens of languages. In addition to numerous awards presented to Alibaba. com, crap Ma was lso selected by the World sparing Forum as mavin of the 100 child ilk Global Leaders in 2001 was named job Leader of 20 01 by Asia commercialism Association of USA and was featured on the covers of Forbes Magazine, Nikkei Magazine, and Fortune (China) Magazine. In 2004, Jack Ma was honored as matchless of the Top 10 Economic Personas of the Year by CCTV.In 2005, Fortune Magazine ranked him one of the 25 Most Powerful Business commonwealth in Asia and this year Business 2. 0 ranked him 1 5th among 50 Who Matter without delay and Silicon. com ranked him 1 lth among its top 50 Agenda Setters 2006. company, Alibaba. om builds its vexation achi of all beat and rapid rearth on entrepreneurship, innovation, and service. Says Jack Ma The company go forth remain a start-up no dramaction how long it has been in existence. What ever has been st adequate, I will disrupt that stability. The company indispensabilitys to continue to enter and sprain. I want the employees to commit that we atomic number 18 a small company, no matter how big we demand.I believe we send word create a system and kit chen-gardening to perpetuate this goal of entrepreneurial and start-up spirit. To fuel the entrepreneurial and innovative spirit, along with a service attitude, Jack Ma is sounding for commonwealth with the add uping characteristics 1) passel with a dream. Dont permit your colleagues school for you. They need to formulate for their dreams If people take for grantedt believe in the dream and marriage the company purely for money, they wont stay long (refer to Appendix 2 for Alibabas vision, mission, and set). 2) tribe with overlap set. The value system is precise important at Alibaba. We be barbaric for itIn China, we might be the only crazy company who so unwaveringly advances our value system. slew who take overt fit our values rout out non survive in the company. (Alibabas six ore values are customer comes first, teamwork and cooperation, embracing change, integrity, passion, and honoring your Job). 3) People with a smile. When we hire people, we look for people who are naturally optimistic and happy. In the start-up process we will play off with difficulties and challenges. Optimistic and happy people female genital organ better deal with these challenges and succeed. Its hard to make a happy person unhappy, besides its even harder to make an unhappy person happy.I am open to tell whether a person is on our staff by their smile. 4) People who eff work and can turn stress and challenges into innovation. Employees must(prenominal)iness(prenominal) be able to handle force per unit area and challenges, and turn them into positive energy for innovation, not negative energy for depression. 5) People who work in concert. We dont experience people who think they are smart because they may think they are above early(a)s. This industry is so new that it really doesnt have any real givingss. The people who are real talents probably dont know they are talents. Everyone has tremendous potential.We all use different peoples streng ths to overcome our weaknesses We are all ordinary people, merely our goals are extraordinary. bandage Alibaba estimateks people with strong rofessional skills, these characteristics are even more important in deciding whether a person will Join, stay, and enjoy work in the company. 2 Alibabas Unique Value hypnotism a Smiling friendship with a Dream While Alibaba is egest about what kind of talent they need for business success, the question is how can the company attract, retain, and engage much(prenominal) talent, especially in the startup stage, when Alibaba had circumscribed resources?The answer is a dream, a dream to make a conflict in the way people do business, and a dream to create wealth together. During the start-up stage of Alibaba, Jack Ma often told those nterested in on the job(p) for Alibaba, not of the great working conditions or the high pay, of what they could earn elsewhere. Alibaba as well as strives to provide a community, where employees can have fun to work together to pursue their dreams with minimal bureaucracy and politics. Ma recently painted a vivid image of his ideal work environment for his employees as follows dreary Sky Processes, systems, and decisions need to be open and transparent.Theres no liaison that should be hidden from employees. We should be transparent. Solid Ground Everything we do should be honest, ethical and contribute to the welfare of the ociety. The company should be on unwavering financial ground so employees wont worry about the financial future of the company. Free-flowing Ocean Talent must be allowed to turn Jobs across subsidiaries and departments. Green Forest (R Conducive conditions for continued innovation. Harmonious Community Peers with shared values and simple interpersonal relationships.The ultimate objective of such a community is to offer employees a work environment to grow, contribute, and cash in ones chips out their dreams. Bureaucracy, secrecy, and stagnation are all attri butes that inhibit employees, and the company must actively seek out these ehaviors and destroy them. Alibaba from the Eyes of Employees To what extent do employees at Alibaba experience what the company intends to offer? Why do they Join the company and how do they feel as employees working there? Our nidus group discussion with employees in antithetical functions and levels confirms that Alibaba is indeed a extraordinary company to work with.The following themes and direct quotations capture their experiences and the feeling of working at Alibaba A leader with charisma and credibility Jack Ma is the magnet that draws people into the company and provides them with a credible dream. When I verbalise with Jack Ma, I was impressed with his vision and business model. I had been in the internet business for a while but had not seen a successful model like the one Alibaba is employing. Tang Zhenrong, International Website engineering science Department, and one year with the compan y. Although the objectives for each year seem to be very high, more or lesshow we have ever so managed to come across those objectives. With past success, we have build up confidence that were able to chance on the objectives no matter what they are. Lili Li, Sales Research Department, six years with the company.The passion of Alibaba is from within and radiates outward-bound to others. We can see that they truly believe in the company and the culture of Alibaba is make from there, not by programs or processes. Echo Lu, conductor of governing and People Development. The company is true to its values at all levels. When Jack Ma talks to focal point about hiring, he told us that we must hire people With the same sense. Zhang Yu, Director of Marketing, Taobao. com Changes, challenges, and harvesting People grow under tremendous pres incontestable to change and grow. The speed of change is third to four times that of other organizations.The objectives are crazy, but when we reach and cudgel the targets, we then have a profound sense of accomplishment. With the constant pressure and changes, were also forced to evaluate how we do our own Jobs and how we work as a team. Is it sufficient to accomplish the new objectives? Do we need to look at the challenge differently and try different things? Zhang Yu, Director of Marketing, Taobao. om 4 Communication and transparency Jack will meet with all new employees in a group setting, has meetings with management at least(prenominal) quarterly, and bi-annual staff meetings with all employees.On the intranet, theres a bulletin board that allows staff to post their thoughts and opinions. Jack often interacts with staff on the notice board in an open and casual way. Echo Lu, Director of Organization and People Development A company that cares about employees During the SARS crisis, because of one venture case, Alibaba made the decision in one day to have all employees work from home and to pass the required is olation period. As a result of this quick action, we contained any possible outbreak, May.Employees continued to perform Jobs tremendously well at home. We encouraged each other through BBS, telephony calls, and e-mails. Lili L, Sales Research Department The most positive thing to result from the SARS crisis was an enormous amount of pride for employees who went through this crisis together. They built a strong bond through experiencing this event together. Its excuse a much talked about event in the company. In fact, some employees have named the day that staff were sent home to contain the outbreak, Alibaba Day, to immortalize the event.The spirit of Alibaba came alive on that day. Echo Lu, Director of Organization and People Development Leadership and Management Practices that Create the Unique Value proposal of marriage Leadership priority As CEO, Jack Ma invests most of his time in common chord areas vision/ mission/strategy, customers, and employees. By clearly articul ating and continuously communicating the vision and mission of the company, he creates the most important insane asylum in attracting outstanding talent. Dont let your colleague work for you, but work for their dreams Also, it is important to deeply understand customer needs, not competitors actions. Understanding customer needs can do Alibaba develop concrete business plans and focus on realizing its dream. Finally, it is also fine to realistically assess the competencies of employees. It will decide how fast, how far, and how the company can execute its business strategy and targets in the coming year and coterminous three years. His attentiveness to talent is reflected in two management practices.First, in the monthly senior management meeting, the first question he always asked is How is your team doing? instead of How many sales has your team made? Second, he always spends a lot of time alking around different business units and departments to smell how the people are do ing there. If he smells something wrong, he will right off talk to the unit head to identify problems and improve the situation. As a matter of fact, all senior executives at VP level and above must develop such smelling skills at Alibaba, to make sure that people are being managed properly. Value alignment Strong shared values are essential in building a harmonious community where people feel comfortable working together and in ensuring that decisions and behaviors are aligned with company direction. Alibaba has gone the extra mile to make sure that people share the same values. When Alibaba hires people, they look for people with the same smellpeople who are optimistic, happy, team oriented, hard working, and willing to invest their lives to achieve an ideal. When employees Join the company, they attend at least 10 days of orientation, commission primarily on the companys vision, mission, and values.When the company assesses the performance of employees, 50% is tied to values an d 50% is tied to business results. When employees demonstrate behaviors obdurate to company core alues, they are asked to leave no matter how strong their business results are, or very important at Alibaba. People who dont fit into our values cannot survive in the company. Stretch opportunities and challenges While Alibaba offers different training programs for different levels of employees in both technical and management areas, people grow rapidly by achieving impossible targets year after(prenominal) year. Although the objectives for each year seem high and unreasonable, somehow, we have always managed to accomplish those objectives. With past success we have built up the onfidence that we are able to achieve the objectives, no matter what they are, says Lili Li, of the Sales Research Department. At Alibaba I have been stretched and challenged. I have seen myself grow more than in my antecedent Jobs, says Zhang Yu from Taobao. com. Indeed, Jack Ma believes that all people hav e potential that can be unleashed in the right environment, allowing them to stretch and challenge themselves.Ma quoted one of his favorite examples, Several years ago when I looked at the authoritative COO Li Qi, there was no way he looked like a COO. Nowadays, from all different angles, he really looks like a COO. Talent has tremendous potential to grow. However, in order for people to grow under challenges, three elements are important. First is teamwork. Alibaba uses teamwork to complement individual strengths and weaknesses to achieve extraordinary goals. Second are the right people, who enjoy challenges and have fun working.Third are line managers who are accountable for personal growth within their teams. Jack Ma remarked that all line managers at Alibaba are entrusted with two scarce resources (capital and talent) to create value for the company. In addition to ensuring trade good financial returns, they lso need to create value for their talent in call of their growth a nd retention. Thats why Jack Ma also walks around the company to smell how people are being managed in different departments, and why he always asks business leaders how their teams are doing in the monthly CEO review.Wealth creation and sharing All employees of Alibaba prevail stock options, and in effect are owners of the organization. At Alibaba, stock options are not a tool for retention but for reward sharing. From fiver cents per share to five dollars per share in 6 years, many employees have not only shown tremendous pride in the company but also shared the fruits of their collective success for the well-being of both the golf-club and themselves. Transparency and communication Communication is an important practice within Alibaba that helps maintain a culture of transparency to all employees.Employees have easy vex to all executives, including Jack Ma, through the use of email, BBS, and face-to-face meetings (monthly, quarterly or bi-annual staff meetings). Jack Ma sets a high standard for his executives to follow by regularly interacting with employees. All decisions are transparent, and people can see how they are made. This transparency is getting somewhat lost as we get bigger, but were still given a lot of study when possible. Our trust in the leaders has helped us to overcome this change in transparency. Communication is always good and strong from Sales Research Department.Advice to other CEOs When asked about what advice he would like to offer to other CEOs in China, Jack Ma suggested four 1) Always believe people are the most important asset, and capital comes second. 2) It is not necessary to find the best talent but the talent that best fits your company. 3) Find and groom the talent inside(a) our company rather than keep searching for talent from outside. The best talent is home-groomed people who fit our company culture. It always takes at least three years before people become fully immersed into our company culture 4) Believe in th e potential of talent.