My advice to the young people
25 years old,
make enough mistakes,
don't worry
You fall
you stand up. You fall, you stand up
Enjoy it, I mean, 25 years old enjoy the show, enjoy the show.
From 30 to 40 years old,
you have to think very clearly
Were you working for yourself
if you really want to be entrepreneur.
So 40 to 50 think about,
how can you focus on things that you are good at
But when you are 50 to 60 years old
work for the young people
because young people can do better than you.
So rely on them, invest on them making sure they're good.
So 25 years old
Don't worry
Any mistake is an income, is a wonderful revenue for you.
In the future, it's not about the competition of knowledge.
It's the competition of creativity,
it's a competition of imagination,
it's a competition of learning,
it's a competition of independent thinking.
If you think like a machine the problem will come.
In the past 20 years, we make people like a machine
in the next 20 years, machines will look like people.
So in the future it's not knowledge driven,
it's the wisdom driven,
it's the experience driven.
In the past it's the knowledge driven and it's the manufacturing driven
and in the future it's the creativity driven.
I think next 30 years the world is going to change a lot.
The new technology is going to change every aspect of the world
So this is what we think the world should be focusing on
not only the IQ, EQ but also focus on LQ
the Q of Love.
Because only when you care for the others, only when you care for
the others that succeed and are more successful than you are
you have the chance.
10 years ago internet was so good
when nobody believed internet was so good.
Now internet is so tough because all the smart people go to internet.
So you should go to the off ground.
I fail for...
Funny things like I failed in a key primary school test for two times
and I failed like three times for the middle school, middle schools.
No I tried, there is an examination that young people if you want to go university
you have to take, take the examinations.
So I failed three times.
When I graduated from university,
and before I, you know,
for three years I tried and failed in the universities.
So I apply for jobs for 30 times,
got rejected.
I went for police, they say “No, you’re not good”
I went to even the KFC,
when KFC came to China, come to our city
- You applied? - 24 people went for the job
23 people were accepted, I was the only guy.
And we went for the police, 5 people, 4 of them accepted.
I was the only guy they're not receiving.
So to me, being turned down, rejected
Oh, by the way, I told you that I applied for Harvard for 10 times, rejected.
I learned so much about the Hollywood movies
especially the- Forrest Gump
- You love Forrest Gump? - I love Forrest Gump.
Why do you like him?
Simple.
Never give up.
People- people thinking he's dumb
but he knows what he's doing.
And I was very depressed
the day... the year 2002 or 2003
in the States
I was very depressed when I could not find out a way for the internet
and then I watch the movie in my friend's home Forrest Gump
when I see him I think, "This the guy
we should learn from."
Believe in what you're doing.
Love it whether people like it or don't like it, be simple.
And like the words, "Life is like a box of chocolates"
you never know what you can get, right?
I never knew I would be here talking to you,
I never know.
But today I made it.
I told my people in my apartment
18, 15 years ago
"Guys we have to work hard
not for ourselves, if we can be successful
80% of the young people in China can be successful.
We don't have a rich father,
a powerful uncle, we don't get one dollar from bank,
one cent from government.
Just work as a team.
I worry about it today, young people, a lot of young people lose hope,
lose vision and start to complain.
We also have the same problem, when I got...
It's not a good feeling being rejected by so many people
We also depressed
but at least later we find...
that the world has a lot of opportunities.
How you see the world?
How you catch the opportunity?
So... and Hollywood gives me a lot of inspiration.
I, at the beginning I never thought...
I thought when I was young I said,
"Everything is possible".
Now I know not everything is possible.
When you have something you have to think about
you have to consider about the others, you have to consider about the customer,
society,
your employees, the shareholders.
There are so many things that
I think if you continue to work hard there's...
there's possibility.
It's not... if you don't do it
nothing is possible.
If you try to do it at least you have the hope.
Calm down, there's always a way out.
And keep yourself balanced.
And meanwhile, don't try to...
because business is a compt... Competition is fun.
Business is not a battlefield, you die or I win
Business... even if you die I may not win
right? So it's about, it's about fun.
- Yeah, - Tell them the story,
and tell them that if Jack...
I don't think in this world a lot of people be rejected more than 30 times
If we, you know, the only thing we never give up,
the only thing like, we’re like Forrest Gump.
We keep on fighting, we keep on changing ourself.
We don’t complain. Whether you are successful or not successful.
I find that when people, when they finish the job,
if they make a mistake and they fail,
if they always complained to others,
this guy will never come back.
If the guy only check himself,
Yeah. Something wrong with me here, something wrong with me there.
This guy has hope.
So many people I talked to at that time for AliPay, they say
"this is the stupidest idea you have ever got."
But I say, "I don't care if it's stupid or clever as long as people use it"
Now we have 800 million people
using this AliPay.
1999, year 2000 and even at the Yahoo time
a lot of people say, "This Jack is crazy.
He's- he's doing something that we don't understand."
And a lot of venture capitals give you money
because there is such a American model already there.
But they say, Alibaba we don't see this kind of model, right?
- They say Jack's crazy - yeah this is crazy guy
I mean I remember my first time in Time magazine
they call me crazy Jack
and I, I think crazy is good
we are crazy but we're not stupid.
We know what we are doing
but if everybody agree with me, if everybody believed my- our idea is good
we have no chance.
So that's... the money we raised, we're very thankful.
So, when our investors make a lot of money,
I feel proud and honored.
Everybody is made unique and different
so you must have a unique and different way.
A lot of people today have a lot of complaints
say, "I don't have opportunity."
I complained a lot when I was young
And suddenly I realized complaining does not solve any problem
where the opportunity always in the place where people complain
there are so many, if there are so many opportunities in the world in this world
because there are so many complaints.
If you can solve the complaint, one of the complaints
that’s the opportunity
so this is what we- we made
I think young people if my advice is to be an entrepreneur
don't be scared of failure, of setbacks
and don't give up.
When we start the business,
we had 18 founders including me
17 of them, most of them my students
and most of them...
Well, today people think, these 18 people, the smartest people in China
We don't think we were smart.
Honestly,
we all graduate from the very poor schools.
The only thing we did
we were very united, we all believed in the future,
we are all optimistic,
and we learn through mistakes,
we never give up.
If you graduate from famous university
please,
respect the people who graduate from the poor schools.
Those people like us graduate from poor universities
please respect yourself.
We have chance
we came today to...now
We made so many mistakes
people say, "You are lucky" Yes, we are very lucky.
We took only 19 years to today's size
But we have gone through so many tough situations.
We made so many mistakes
that people cannot even imagine.
In probably 19 years, you have gone through so many tough experiences
and that will make you different.