From resignation posts on the intranet to complaints about business, from executives’ decisions to complaints from ordinary employees, Alibaba’s reflection seems to be everywhere. However, is this reflection a real self-analysis, or is it just a superficial complaint? What kind of changes can it bring to Alibaba’s future? This article will delve into Alibaba’s reflective phenomenon, analyzing the cultural, business, and human factors behind it.
On the one hand, it has quietly become the most powerful open source large model (in order to avoid violating the advertising law, add a “one”). On the other hand, some recent BUs such as DingTalk, with the drastic adjustment of personnel, have also generated some public opinion, in Alibaba’s black words, “another set of combination punches”.
In fact, Ali is very good at boxing, not only fighting, but also playing left and right. Recently, the intranet post of a departing employee is very popular, and it has been discussed on Xiaohongshu, Maimai, and Zhihu, and can often be swiped. I didn’t look at the content of the post in particular detail, but quickly flipped through it and generally knew what it was about. I also know the poster and have had direct work docking with him, and I have some impressions, so I will not comment here.
I would like to touch on a few topics:
1. Why does Ali have so much reflection?
2. What is Ali reflecting on?
3. Is reflection useful?
Let’s talk about the first question first, why does Ali have so much reflection.
Alibaba has an intranet called Alibaba Inside and Outside, where every employee can post, and in principle, they will not delete posts. There are several types of posts that are more popular, one is blind date posts, there are many boys and girls. The other is the resignation post, according to the custom, the resignation is to send a resignation post, similar to a check-in. Another type is reflection posts, where you find your own problems and complain about other people’s problems.
Of course, complaining about other people’s problems will be very specific, such as where a product design is unreasonable and where the service is not good. Generally speaking, we are not as good as Pinduoduo, we have no wolf nature, low organizational efficiency, middle level lying flat, executives do bad business and so on. I may have become accustomed to these posts, and the more I see them, the more I see them, so I didn’t look closely.
Reflections from other companies can also be seen occasionally, but generally executives come out to reflect, such as Huawei’s Ren Zhengfei reflecting on whether the front-line call should be fired, Xiaomi’s Lei Jun reflecting on the lack of investment in R&D, etc., occasionally seeing an employee reflecting on a long speech, most of which is a big news and being fired. But Ali is different, Ali everyone can reflect and should reflect.
Of course, it is hard to say whether this reflection is right or not.
This leads to a very strange phenomenon, with extremely unified thinking and great internal friction.
To achieve these three challenges, product managers will only continue to appreciate
Good product managers are very scarce, and product managers who understand users, business, and data are still in demand when they go out of the Internet. On the contrary, if you only do simple communication, inefficient execution, and shallow thinking, I am afraid that you will not be able to go through the torrent of the next 3-5 years.
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At the beginning of the establishment of Alibaba, there was a campus culture, sometimes you feel that it is not like an international company, but like a school and a river. Other companies have relatively clear boundaries of responsibilities, but Alibaba is different, Alibaba emphasizes “one step forward”, R&D can take a step forward, operations can take a step forward, and design can take a step forward… Whoever moves forward more, who has a loud voice, and who has more voice. Therefore, if you don’t know how to do things and come to work, I am afraid that you will not be able to advance your work.
There was a saying before that many small companies were afraid of Alibaba’s parachute arrival, there were many falsehoods, less real, I think there is a certain basis, but it is definitely not all, Alibaba also has many down-to-earth people who do things.
Alibaba’s culture is actually to encourage reflection, free speech, and fierce disputes, which is also a characteristic of this company.
In recent years, especially after 21 years, Alibaba’s stock price has plummeted, to the point where its market value has been surpassed by Pinduoduo. Alibaba is also doing a lot of actions, changing the chairman and CEO, adjusting the structure, divesting offline low-human efficiency assets, and betting heavily on AI, with the evolution of the Qianwen model, it has also re-pulled up Alibaba’s stock price and stabilized the TOP3 position in the domestic Internet industry.
The second question, what is Ali reflecting on?
On the surface, it is reflecting on the loss of competitive advantage in the big industry, e-commerce has been caught up by Pinduoduo, Doukai e-commerce, etc., and the interactive entertainment content has been pressed and beaten by Tencent Video, iQiyi, etc., and the game has invested a lot and only made a popular game, as if everyone is worried about the company’s business, hoarse, mourning its misfortune, and angry about it.
But I think this is just an appearance, and I don’t deny that many people have feelings for this part. But I also found that there are many people who are more positive when it comes to reflection than anyone else, and there are problems here and there, but in fact they are practicing the content of their reflection. For example, if you look at the phenomenon of lying flat in the middle level, you will find that those who lie flattest may happen to be the most complaining people on the Internet, why? We must add points to ourselves in terms of values and brush up on our sense of existence. What do you mean by “coming”? This is called a meeting.
Many old employees have experienced a sharp rise in stock prices before, and now they feel that this treatment cannot match their own value, it is not worth working hard, and they hope that the treatment can go back to the past, rise every year, and do anything to get good performance.
But obviously, this is unrealistic, this is just a beautiful expectation of human nature. In some businesses, Alibaba did it early, it had a first-mover advantage, and it was once very advantageous, simply unbreakable, in Jack Ma’s words, it was even with a lantern that could not find an opponent, but this is not the truth, nor is it an objective fact. Nothing is eternal, you are also a human being, I am also a human being, who is worse than whom? It’s just a phased advantage, but many people can’t accept this.
In fact, it can be understood that many people are not reflecting on the company, but just complaining about themselves. I, XXX, talented, you see how good the achievements I have made before, now it’s all you guys messing around, life is not so good now, executives pat their heads to make decisions, old employees lie flat on Blabla, but I am everyone drunk and I am sober, out of the mud without staining, washed clean and not demonic, a rich flower in the world.
In the final analysis, my personal opinion, I don’t think this is really reflection, and when the remarks are very open, they must not be amazing, so that they can get more attention, and they cannot be overcorrected.
I think that real reflection should be in the conference room, when you are thinking deeply and summarizing your decisions, rather than making a big news on the Internet.
However, Ali does have a lot of people, and it is this style.
The third question, what is the use of reflection?
I don’t think it’s useful, to be precise, only a very small number of brain reflections are useful, useless and even harmful to the company’s reflection.
Thinking of the joke about donating a cow to the country, when I didn’t have a cow, I was really willing to donate to the country, so when the reporter interviewed or something, I must show my greatness. But when I really have a cow, will I still be willing to donate it to the country? No, most people don’t have this awareness.
This joke is also very appropriate to use here, when I am talking about other people’s problems, I reflect casually, the bigger the better, the deeper the better, and the operation is as fierce as a tiger, and the punch is hard. When I was talking about my problems, I was always cautious, afraid of being caught by others, which would lower my performance, and this year’s year-end bonus was XX yuan less.
When I say that the team is inefficient, I feedback that it is difficult for department A to coordinate, and the leader B lies flat and does not promote things, when I want to make decisions to do things and be responsible for this, let me think, it seems that it is still not very thorough, we need to think more clearly, we need to research and co-create, and finally the time has passed and things are gone, but we have held a lot of meetings, and we are really working hard to advance!
Is there any point in such reflection?
The main question is that it is unthinkable or impossible? It is not right to assume that others are stupid. The questions you can think of, others can think of. The important thing is not to think, but to do.
How? That’s your business, it’s none of my business.
Do you see where the problem is?
Therefore, I think this kind of reflection is useless and cannot change anything.
The company is big, the business has been for a long time, there will inevitably be various problems, this is the philosophy of life. There is no eternal constant, change is the norm.
A generation of new people replaced the old, each leading the way for hundreds of years. No one can violate this objective law, so it is better to worry more about three meals a day.
It’s a bit of the way of Laozhuang.
Everything has a fixed number, just move forward.
