Alibaba: The House That Jack Ma Built pdfdrive com

Company Campus and Culture
Jack’s imprint can also be seen in the design of Alibaba’s 2.6-million-square-
foot Wetlands headquarters campus. From the main south gate visitors enter a
massive complex of futuristic glass towers. At the base of the office towers lie a
large gym, Starbucks, and a country-style store stocked with organic fruit and
vegetables that could be straight out of Silicon Valley. Farther to the north lies a
huge, man-made lake. Dotted with lotuses and lily pads and bordered with reeds,
the lake is overlooked on one side by a cluster of elegant, white-walled villas
topped with curved, black-tiled roofs, a scene reminiscent of Jack’s much-loved
classical novels, like the sixteenth-century work 
The Water Margin
.
The lake reflects Jack’s newfound passion for environmental protection.
When asked by President Obama in Manila what spurred his interest in the
environment, Jack told the story of a lake in which he had last swam when he
was twelve years old. “I went to swim in a lake and almost died in the lake
because the water was so deep, much deeper than I thought. Five years ago I
went to the lake, the total lake was dry.”
On a visit in the spring of 2015 to the campus, I had to step gingerly to
avoid squashing the tiny baby frogs that had hopped out of the man-made lake
onto the walkway leading to the office towers. On my way I also stopped by
Alibaba’s large library and bookstore. Jack is a keen reader, particularly of titles
by the Hong Kong–born martial arts writer (Louis) Cha Leung-yung, known in
China by his pen name Jin Yong. His works are featured in the library along
with classical works and the latest books on management theory or Silicon
Valley icons like Steve Jobs and Elon Musk.
But beyond the design of the campus, it is in the culture of Alibaba that we
can most clearly see the influence of its principal founder. To zip around the
Wetlands headquarters complex, Alibaba’s employees make frequent use of the
free bicycles the company provides, a perk no doubt inspired by Google’s fleet,
which is decked out in the U.S. giant’s signature blue, yellow, green, and red
colors. The bicycles at Alibaba are orange and include tandems: the two seats
illustrating the company’s emphasis on teamwork above individual achievement.
A sense of subjugating one’s own needs for the interest of the customer is a
cornerstone of Alibaba’s corporate culture. Just as Disney refers to all of its
executives and employees as “cast members,” Alibaba places a big emphasis on
camaraderie and a commitment to the greater good.
Every May 10, around the time of the annual “Aliday,” a company

---

anniversary that celebrates the spirit of teamwork shown by the company’s
employees as they emerged from the spectre of the SARS virus, Jack presides as
chief witness over a ceremony to celebrate recent weddings of company
employees. Alibaba covers the lodging and meal expenses of the immediate
family members who are invited to join. The photos of a hundred plus couples
celebrating their matrimonials together at one company has inevitably invited
comparisons to cults such as Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church. But
Alibaba takes pains to point out that the event is just a celebration, not a
replacement, of the couples’ official marriage registrations.
A more tangible benefit for the couples and other Alibaba employees is the
interest-free loan of up to $50,000 offered to finance the down payment on a
new apartment, an increasingly valued perk for staff members working in high-
cost cities like Hangzhou and Beijing. Thousands of employees have taken
advantage of the loans, amounting to several hundred millions dollars today.
Alibaba encourages a sense of informality at work. Every employee is
asked to adopt a nickname. The practice is so widespread that it can invite
confusion when they have to search to find out the actual names of their
colleagues to communicate to people outside the company. Initially, the
nicknames were drawn from characters in the novels of Jin Yong or other stories
of martial arts and bygone eras. As Alibaba grew this pool of names was soon
exhausted. Using their nicknames, employees post comments about the
company’s products or culture on Aliway, the company’s internal bulletin board.
They can even initiate polls or invite the support of their colleagues to dispute
assessments or management decisions, and address suggestions or complaints
directly to Feng Qingyang. That is the name of Jack’s online persona, a
swordsman from one of his favorite martial arts novels.
Employees are discouraged from ever complaining—a pet peeve of Jack’s
—and encouraged instead to shoulder personal responsibility, carrying out or
delegating tasks rather than waiting for orders from on high.
Military terms crop up a lot at Alibaba. Top-performing individuals at
Alibaba are known as King of Soldiers (
bing wang
). Fictional character Xu
Sanduo is sometimes used to illustrate management’s message. In the 2007 TV
drama 
Soldier’s Sortie,
Xu, a shy village boy, rises despite the odds to become
an elite soldier in the People’s Liberation Army.

---