How Jack Ma managed to overcome 7 of his biggest failures
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Today, entrepreneur Jack Ma is 51 years old, his wealth is estimated at 23.3 billion dollars, not counting 150 billion IPOs - the largest in history. However, he began by working as an English teacher for $ 12 a month (although he was pleased with his life at that time).
Given the modesty and meagerness of the first steps of Jack Ma, his achievements are almost impossible to believe. During his life, he experienced more setbacks (and they were more impressive) than most of us could handle.
Here are 7 moments when Jack Ma, faced with humiliating failures, managed to maintain his optimism . Exactly like his favorite character, Forrest Gump.
So Jack ...
1. Do not give up, failing many times at school exams
Jack Ma is not a diligent student. Moreover, he even barely moved to high school.
“I failed the primary test twice in elementary school, failed to pass the exam in secondary three times, and failed to pass entrance tests in college twice ...”
Oh, the majority was fortunate enough never to report such things to their parents.
But, amazingly, Jack is not alone. Great people (Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein, Abraham Lincoln - and, of course, Forrest Gump) have a tradition: to face difficulties in learning at the dawn of life, but then achieve amazing heights.
2. I scored 1 point out of 120 possible for the mathematical part of the college entrance exam
Failure is one thing. But to get a mark that does not even reach 1%, trying to go to college is something completely different. And this could not be explained by the lack of the opportunity to prepare. To this day, Jack Ma has difficulties with mathematics, but this does not prevent Alibaba from being an information technology company.
As Ma himself says:
“I have a bad situation with mathematics, I have never studied management and still do not understand accounting reports at all”
But, as it turned out, he did not need mathematics to turn into a billionaire. And even more surprising is the fact: in childhood, the word "computer" was unfamiliar to him.
3. Didn’t stop, having been refused 10 times from Harvard
First of all, it’s not surprising that he wasn’t admitted to Harvard ten times, but that he submitted the documents so many times. This suggests that Jack Ma is an example of tenacity:
“It is very important that you have patience”
He also attended Hangzhou Public Institute, where he majored in English.
4. He remained optimistic after he was not hired in 30 places
After graduating from college, he applied for 30 different vacancies, and everywhere he was consistently rejected.
He even tried to become a police officer. But there they did not even pay attention to him , formulating a refusal in three words: "You do not fit."
Fortunately, while copying his favorite movie character Forrest Gump, Jack continued to run:
“Today is hard. Tomorrow is even worse. And the day after tomorrow will be beautiful. ”
5. He turned out to be the only (out of 24) applicant rejected by KFC
In a group of 24 candidates, 23 people were hired by KFC. Jack Ma was the only one denied. He attributes this to his undersized appearance and short stature.
His wife Zhang Ying (who had connected her life with him long before he became rich) has no complaints about his appearance:
“Ma Yun is not handsome, but I fell in love with him because he knows how to do a lot of things that handsome men are not capable of”
6. Failed to persuade Silicon Valley to subsidize Alibaba
Even after launching Alibaba, he ran into many troubles. The first 3 years the project did not give a profit. In the beginning, it expanded too fast and nearly burnt out when the dotcom bubble burst. At some stage, Alibaba was only a year and a half from bankruptcy.
Looking down, Jack Ma says:
“I call Alibaba my“ 1000 and 1 mistake ””
7. Told his 18 Alibaba business partners that none would be CEO
Having made the worst decision (both financially and motivationally), which is only available to the CEO, Jack Ma told 18 partners (who made a total contribution of $ 60 thousand) that none of them could rise above the post the manager. He was going to hire outside managers.
This, he notes, was his greatest mistake.
“The tough times at Alibaba made me learn a lesson: you have to make your team have values, innovative ideas and perspectives”
If success did not come to you right away ...
Jack Ma is a classic example of a man who got "from rags to riches." But his extraordinary stubbornness is far more impressive than his fabulous wealth. It serves as evidence that no string of failures (no matter how humiliating they may be) can prevent a person from realizing his dreams.
As Jack likes to repeat:
“Until you give up, you have a chance. The most serious failure is admission of defeat. ”
PS We recommend another useful article on the topic of self- development - How successful people cope with procrastination .
The author of the translation is Vyacheslav Davidenko, founder of TESTutor .
