2005年NPR美国国家公共电台七月-China Profiles: Jack Ma, Internet CEO

From NPR news, this is All Things Considered. I'm Michelle Noris. and I am Robert Seagull.

China has been in the news a lot lately. Its economy is booming. Its military is modernizing 1. But some of the country's most important changes are taking place within the minds of its people. This week NPR's Rob Gifford will introduce us to five Chinese people who are breaking out of old Chinese mindsets. More and more they are making choices for themselves. Our series is called " A Nation of Individuals" and today we begin with Jack 2 Ma. He's founder 3 of a website called Alibaba.

Jack Ma runs a business-to-business or B2B online trading company called Alibaba. He says he's the CEO, but says that stands for Chief Educational Officer. A former English teacher, Ma certainly seems to have some lessons to share as he shows visitors around his fancy new offices in the eastern city of Hangzhou, a few hours' drive from Shanghai.

Usually in China , the boss is on the top. Most of the companies put the CEO on the tenth floor, but I think on the top floor should be our customers, should be our employees and colleagues so I stand on the lowest floor. That is the sixth floor so they are my bosses and my favorite floor is No.10th and No.9 where the people are talking to the customers. I always drop there and listen to them.

Ma is not just turning office fengshui(风水) on its head, he's trying to turn Chinese business upside down, too. If China is to become the economic superpower that many say it could be, people like Jack Ma maybe the most important in shaping it. Of course, China's thousands and thousands of industrial revolution style factories will continue to churn out almost everything the world wants to buy, but people like Jack Ma say that stepping out of the old way of thinking maybe just as important as utilizing 4 cheap labor 5 and raising factory productivities.

62304924 ma

The company's shining new offices hum with life,2300 people ,mostly in their twenties, taking and making calls. Alibaba's business is putting purchasers around the world in touch with producers. Factories pay a fee to have their product descriptions translated into English and listed on the Alibaba website. And anyone around the world can then go online and find the producer directly, thus cutting out the middle men and the middle costs. Traditionally, doing business in China is all about the middle men or the well-connected officials through whom many business transactions must go. This makes for corruption 6 on a massive scale that angers the general population and hinders China's growth. Jack Ma is trying nothing less ambitious than changing Chinese corporate 7 culture, especially among the small and medium-sized enterprises or SMEs.

Making this company be different, making this company great. I think we are changing the Chinese business people doing business, especial the small, medium-sized kind. We give them opportunities on the Internet. We also teach them how to do business. How to hire people, fire people. We are changing the SME.SME small medium sized companies and private companies would be the engine of China's economy.

It's a huge task but Ma is making progress and making some money too. Alibaba has 5.6 million companies registered through its Chinese website and 1.8 million through its international website. Ma says more than 11,000 new companies are joining each day.

Jack Ma's attempt to overturn 55 years of Communist commercial practice, not to mention two and a half millennium 8 of hierarchical Confucianism, begins with the training sessions for his new employees.You rarely hear clapping and laughing like this in traditional Chinese companies,but the employees here are encouraged to express themselves in training sessions.And they are drilled in the company values of integrity,honesty,passion and teamwork.Alibaba also brings customers from all over China, especially far inland to its headquarters in Hangzhou to train them in online business, accounting 9 transparency and efficiency. Ma says the small town businessmen see him and his success and realize the Internet really is leveling the business playing field.

You know, I just came back,upstairs, meeting some of our customers and they say well they respect us, especially respect me. One of the points is that I don't have any background, strong background, like my father is a government officer or is a rich guy.You know, we are from a very normal family in China. And I am not a super smart guy. But if we can make it, they think ,well, they also can make it.

Employees ,too, like Sabrina Pang 10 of Alibaba's website development and Julie Han of the B2B auction 11 department, say working for Jack Ma is a breath of fresh air compared to other hierarchical bureaucratic 12 Chinese companies.

Before Alibaba, he's a teacher, you know, so maybe I think he brings some culture of the school to the company. That's more simple and more passion.

In the traditional companies, most people do just as his boss ask him to do. Do not discuss. In Alibaba, we can discuss with our boss and mostly we all look like (a) friends. And we can talk about the different idea about one questions.

Ma is under no illusions about the scale of the task ahead, but he says it is not just about opportunities or corporate culture. The crucial thing about the internet in China now he says is that it's starting to make Chinese people think outside the box. And that's not something they're used to.

I think it really helps to stimulate 13 the individualism of the Chinese people. When we were young, we hear only one voice. Today you got opportunity to hear 100 and 1000 different voices and you will judge, and you have to judge yourself. When you judge yourself, it is a way to train your innovation.

And perhaps, that will be one of the defining factors of whether China goes on to greatness, if the choices which come with the Internet can make business fairer, and opportunities greater for more people, but perhaps most of all, if they can bring back the spirit of innovation that centuries ago gave the world paper and printing, the compass and gunpowder 14, but somehow, that got lost along the way. Rob Gifford, NPR news.