As the workplace becomes increasingly diverse, the need for multicultural leadership rises since all workers want respect, patience, excellent communication and courtesy. Therefore, a multicultural leader should lead an organization into continuous success, while showing the staff respect and making accommodations for diverse cultures to interact and thus contribute comfortably. Jack Ma continues to be one of the most influential people in the world because he embraces the contributions, valuable insights and learning potential coming from people in diverse communities. His leadership qualities and styles are the reason why Alibaba is among the best performing mobile markets. Ma is a good example of a leader that recognizes and understands the effects of cultural background on people’s work performance and attitude in different situations.
Jack Ma’s Biography
Jack Ma, also known as Ma Yun, is a multicultural leader that leads and engages teams in entrepreneurship regardless of their cultural backgrounds. He was born on September 10, 1964, in Hangzhou, and studied English at a young age (Yan, 2017). To perfect the language, Ma worked as a foreign tourist guide. In 1988, he acquired a bachelor’s degree in English and taught the language at the Hangzhou Dianzi University till 1993. Ma applied for numerous jobs but was rejected, leading him to found Haibo Translation Agency in 1994 that offered English interpretation and translation services. After the invention of the internet, this Chinese business magnate identified an online business opportunity and thus created Alibaba, a one-stop-shop. Therefore, he played a significant role in founding the Alibaba Group and served as its executive chairman for many years before stepping down in September 2019. This Chinese entrepreneur is also a politician, investor and philanthropist that led his foundation in donating millions of medical supplies such as masks to Europe, Africa and the United States during the coronavirus pandemic.
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Leadership Traits
During his years as the executive chairman of Alibaba, Ma used his leadership traits to make the groups’ businesses successful. He identifies himself as an innovative and creative individual, which explains how he invented other firms such as Alipay. His confidence and powerful imagination enabled Ma to establish Alibaba when the future of the internet was still vague (Linzey, 2015). This investor is also open-minded and thus recognizes opportunities, and so he has stakes in various Chinese entertainment industry companies, such as Beijing Enlight Media and Huayi Brothers. Being innovative also enables this fifty-six-year-old Chinese financier to be visionary. His ample foresight assists him in staying ahead of competitors since he makes timely decisions regardless of the money aspect. Ma is also positive-minded and optimistic, which is evident in how he pursued English as a language and later applied for multiple jobs despite facing rejection. Having developed excellent communication skills when working as a tour guide, he is capable of leading groups of people into action to transform ideas into reality.
Leadership Style
At the beginning of Alibaba and before it grew into a popular online company, Ma used the autocratic leadership style because he had a specific goal, which was to conquer e-commerce. In this management style, only managers make decisions regardless of the subordinates adherence or coherence (Yasir & Kamal, 2019). So, decisions are a reflection of the leader's personality and opinions, which may project an image of business with proper management. However, competent and robust subordinates find limitation in the decision making process as irritating, which results in higher turnover rates among the most valuable workers. Ma was the only individual that could run Alibaba after being launched, and so he became an autocratic leader out of necessity. He was the only person with ample internet knowledge in his province and had to prove its existence and use in business, which made him the executive decision-maker. As the company grew, this Chinese businessman realized that autocratic management made employees more responsive due to the industries' work nature, but limited their freedom in providing ideas or making decisions. Since he wanted significant growth, Ma opted to change to a democratic style, which he has used since.
Ma values democratic leadership because it is effective as it allows employees to participate in the decision-making process, and thus helps in creating the best results as the majority agrees on a business aspect. In this type of management, communication is extensive, from leader to employees and vice versa, making it useful in making complex decisions requiring a range of specialists. It improves the quality of work and satisfaction as subordinates’ participatory contributions increase (Iqbal, 2011). Ma demonstrates the democratic management styles despite living in the People’s Republic of China since childhood. His exposure to the Western culture taught him the benefits of mixing power and democracy, which include good results. He hires personnel that have superior skills than him to delegate work where he cannot perform perfectly. Therefore, he takes these workers' knowledge and inputs seriously. Although the decision-making process may be slow due to multiple contributions from staff, a leader can streamline the procedure and reduce time issues.
Type of Power
Power provides a leader with the capacity to influence work decisions or actions. There are multiple control sources, namely coercive, legitimate, expert, referent and reward power. When using the autocratic leadership style, Ma also used legitimate power to propel his vision since he was the executive decision-maker. In this type of influence, leaders control due to their position and set companies’ directions as well as strategies (Giacalone & Rosenfeld, 2013). Ma maintained his control because he was the first person in China to prove that business can take place online and not necessarily in a physical retail shop. When this investor adopted the democratic leadership style, he switched to exercising expert power because he had gained experience in e-commerce. This kind of control is applicable when managers have years of experience and top-level skills. He continues to use expert power because he has immense knowledge on e-commerce, and continually learns and improves on online trading. As a result, Ma keeps his status and influence and hence makes an impact despite retiring.
Motivation
Ma has multiple characteristics and behaviors that motivate his audience, which includes his workers, partners and mentees. Despite being a self-made billionaire, he does not parade his fortune. Instead, he remains humble and focuses on pursuing more success. This attitude encourages people because it means that one should continue being industrious regardless of the achievements made. Ma also works in unity and uses understanding to prevent conflict, considering that employees, business partners and investors have different opinions. Unifying people helps in focusing on the common goal.
Additionally, he uses relationship management, an aspect of emotional intelligence, to inspire people and effect change. Ma creates time to understand the needs of the people around him by incorporating his communication skills. By meeting their needs, he motivates them to perform better academically and professionally.
Conclusion
Jack Ma made Alibaba a success by working with people from different backgrounds. Aside from being hardworking and dedicated, he is fair to his subjects. Additionally, this businessman is flexible in utilizing his skills and acknowledging those he does not possess through democratic leadership, which enables him to acquire skilled workers’ input. Although he retired from his position in Alibaba, Ma still exerts expert power to help business people seeking success.
References
Giacalone, R. A. & Rosenfeld, P. (2013). Impression Management in the Organization . Psychology Press
Iqbal, T. (2011). The impact of leadership styles on organizational effectiveness: Analytical study of selected organizations in IT sector in Karachi . Munich: Grin Verlag
Linzey, J. F. 2015. Moral leadership: the 9 leadership traits . Eugene, Oregon: Resource Publications.
Yan, Q. 2017. Jack Ma & Alibaba: a business and life biography . London: LID
Yasir, H. M., & Kamal, S. (2019). Servant leadership styles and strategic decision making . Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference.
