Success and profitability are outcomes of focusing on customers and employees, not objectives.

I wanted to have a global company, so I chose a global name. Alibaba is easy to spell, and people everywhere associate that with "Open, Sesame," the command that Ali Baba used to open doors to hidden treasures in One Thousand and One Nights.

I flunked my exam for university two times before I was accepted by what was considered my city's worst university, Hangzhou Teachers University. I was studying to be a high school English teacher. In my university, I was elected student chairman and later became chairman of the city's Students Federation.

A leader should have higher endurance and ability to accept and embrace failure.

Even if your competitor is still small in size or weak, you should take him seriously and treat him as a giant. Likewise, even if your competitor is massive in size, you shouldn't regard yourself as a weakling.

If you don't give up, you still have a chance. And when you are small, you have to be very focused and rely on your brain, not your strength.

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.