Question

Transferring a strategic plan into a reality can take more than planning. Provide an example of a leader who has transformed a strategic plan into a reality? How did they innovate and lead the company? What can you learn from this person? DONT USE WALMART

Answer 1

Alibaba & Jack Ma is one example of a company and a leader that has transformed a strategic plan into a reality.

Firm - Alibaba

Leadership, former CEO - Jack Ma

Here is how he innovated and showed his leadership skills -

• Jack ma started with a unique business idea and knowing that it's not the only company in the industry it managed to take on many business domains based on notions which were unique to the market and have shown great success.
• Jack Ma through his leadership has shown great foresight and in order to remain ahead in the competition, much significant decisions which are bold are taken by the leader.
• It is important to maintain a positive & optimistic attitude to sustain the form especially when the market conditions are competitive.
• Jack Ma has adopted the value of positive workplace culture and embracing diversity.
• Jack ma understands that uniting people is an important aspect of any business and even though a small fraction of employees and stakeholders will have shaky trust in the words he has accepted the same with open hearts and also changed his mindset & approach to his advantage.

Learnings -

• More than focusing on uniting the entire organisation he has given more effort towards hunting the subordinates and departmental leadership because he has always valued vision as more important than the leader.
• It is an important belief that Jack ma holds where he says that team members should have more technical skills than the leader and hence the killing aspect of employees are an important agenda as it helps to take the vision forward.
• Jack ma has shown immense value in people who try to make things happen to achieve the goals. He believes and communicates that people learn best from their mistakes, obstacles and other challenges.

Working with people from various background and genders helps to influence each other working style and creates a culture of ideation. It helps team members respect each other thoughts and come up with a collective solution. Various skills combine team members and help to contribute to each other strengths and weak areas.

Alibaba has shown it by making sure that 50% of its team constitutes of female leaders and suggestion would be to continue having that diversity and faith in leadership.

He has emphasised in his leadership style that people shouldn't complain but look for opportunities to add positively to the conversation. Alibaba has not seen instant success and slowly made history.

Overall I believe Jack Ma is the perfect example of successful leadership and establishing a business from scratch. The humble beginning which involved lots of rejections has defined his leadership style and it is those ideas, values and thoughts with people align and value that leads to the success of Alibaba.

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