Madiha Yaqoob
With a net worth of $36.6 billion, Jack Ma is the richest man in China. He founded Alibaba in 1999 when there was a trend of state-owned companies and entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship was not a common thing but with his success at Alibaba, he has made many public appearances and shares his wisdom and gives valuable advice to young business people.
He was recently confronted for his views about 996 work hours though he also voices his opinion about the future where people will work 4 hours a day.
Ma is 54, he does not have any technical experience and does not know much about computers and has openly talked about it. Because of his wisdom and risk-taking ability, Alibaba today has over 60,000 full-time employees.
Talking about one huge mistake startups make, Ma says:
“I think the number one mistake that most of the startups make is say, “I don’t have money’. If I have money I am going to solve this problem”,” he told CNBC-TV18 in an interview.
He believes the lack of money is never a problem. Instead, it’s the lack of resourcefulness that is the real problem meaning you do not have a good team to execute your plans.
It’s difficult to find the team who believe in the dream and work together and execute little every day.
This is why he focuses on hiring people who are smarter than him. He believes that smart people can take the company’s vision to the next level. It is very important to have the right resource for the right job.
The article originally appeared on CNBC
