K I Woo
May 12, 2015
Last year, Alibaba’s New York Stock Exchange IPO broke all records and made its major shareholders among the world’s wealthiest people.
Recently, one of Alibaba’s first western employees, Porter Erisman published “Alibaba’s World – how a remarkable Chinese company is changing the face of global business”.
Erisman, an American who left Ogilvy and Mather in Beijing to join Jack Ma’s start-up in 2000 saw the company grow from a small Hangzhou apartment to a sprawling campus that served more than 300 million customers on its web-sites.
“In 15 years China’s e-commerce infrastructure leap-frogged its Western counterparts and is introducing entirely new ways of doing business.”
Jack’s vision
According to Erisman, Ma’s vision was to build a market place connecting the world’s small and medium sized businesses engaged in global trade – the “widget economy” made up of manufacturers, trading companies and wholesalers comprising the global supply chain.
”Alibaba.com was meant to allow these small businesses access to the riches that only the internet could unlock.”
Moreover, Erisman said Ma built Alibaba without a revenue model. “Once our members make money, we will make money. Alibaba puts “customers first, employees second and shareholders third.”
Believe in your dreams
From day one, Jack Ma told his initial shareholders that Alibaba had three main goals.
“We want Alibaba to be one of the top ten websites in the world. We want Alibaba to be a partner to all businesspeople, and we want to build a company to last 80 years.”
Ma also used his strong vision and mission to beat well-financed foreign rival E-Bay that had a head start in China.
“Believe in your dreams, find good people, and make sure the customer is happy. I see a lot of US companies sending professional managers to China. They are making their boss in the US happy but not the Chinese customer.”
Erisman said Ma consistently exhorted his staff to always focus on Chinese consumers and develop what they needed rather than copy what had worked in the United States.
Today Alibaba executes about 80 per cent of China’s e-commerce transactions and its market capitalization now Amazon and E-Bay combined.
Father a pingtan performer
After its record breaking New York Stock Exchange initial public offering, Ma has become China’s wealthiest man and perhaps more importantly, a much sought-after and entertaining business speaker.
Erisman said Ma may have learned much of his presentation skills from his father, a Pingtan performer, who performed a traditional folk art combining music with story-telling.
Ma’s message, he said was one of empowerment wherein the magic of the internet allowed small businesses to compete with the largest multinationals.
The message had a strong appeal in country where entrepreneurs valued independence and believed that “It is better to be the head of a chicken that the tail of a phoenix.”
Alibaba’s business lessons
Although the book provides an exciting history of Alibaba’s development, its greatest value may derive from what Erisman learned in his eight years at Alibaba.
“Working inside Alibaba taught me a lot about business and life.”
His experiences challenged many of his US learned assumptions.At Alibaba, he realized that ordinary people with no special backgrounds are capable of accomplishing great things, if they are working in the right conditions.
He recalls many business lessons learned from the Alibaba story including the following:
1. On chasing dreams – dream big really big
2. Remember: the bigger the problem, the greater the
opportunity
3. Today is tough but the day after tomorrow is
beautiful
4. Focus on the customer and the rest will follow
5. Learn from competitors but never copy them
6. It’s more important to be best than first
7. Find opportunity in crisis
8. Use your competitors strength against it
9. Don’t dwell on mistakes
10. Have the team work for the goal, not the boss
