Jack Ma is a Chinese internet entrepreneur who founded Alibaba. He started the company in 1999 with 18 friends out of his humble apartment in Hangzhou, China and today, Alibaba has become one of the world’s biggest e-Commerce companies. His business empire has made him one of the world’s billionaires and he’s the first Chinese entrepreneur from the mainland to appear on the cover of Forbes Magazine. He was named the Financial Times’ 2013 Person of the Year for his being the ‘godfather of China’s scrappy entrepreneurial spirit.’
Early this year, the Vulcan Post translated his interview about his wealth of experiences that was originally published in an online Chinese publication. Here’s a list of his best quotes on entrepreneurship from the interview.
- I believe in two principles: Your attitude is more important than your capabilities. Similarly, your decision is more important than your capabilities!
- A leader should have higher endurance and ability to accept and embrace failure.
- What is failure: Giving up is the greatest failure.
- A real businessman or entrepreneur has no enemies. Once he understands this, the sky’s the limit.
- The world will not remember what you say, but it will certainly not forget what you have done.
- Rather than having small smart tricks to get by, focus on holding on and persevering.
- A great opportunity is often hard to be explained clearly; things that can be explained clearly are often not the best opportunities.
- You should find someone who has complementary skills to start a company with. You shouldn’t necessarily look for someone successful. Find the right people, not the best people.
- If you have a different mindset, you will have a different outcome: if you make different choices from your peers, your life will then be different from your peers.
- If 90% of the crowd is saying “Yes” to approve a proposal, I will surely dispose of the proposal in the bin.
Read the full article here.
Success in a Cup 