Alibaba exec trashes his own staff and customers, quickly apologizes
- Reference: 1733807705
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/12/10/alibaba_ceo_gaming_apology/
- Source link:
The December 6 speech by Alibaba Digital Media and Entertainment Group CEO Fan Luyuan was delivered at a ceremony honoring employees who have spent five years at a subsidiary called Lingxi Interactive. Fan [1]allegedly went off topic, though – way off topic. He chastised the Lingxi team for lacking alignment with Alibaba's corporate culture, demanded the team's performance surpass rivals Tencent and NetEase, and then tossed in his penchant for fining staff who use their phones during meetings.
He didn't stop there. He also allegedly devoted a significant chunk of his speech to criticizing the head of Lingxi, Zhou Bingshu, calling him inexperienced and lacking vision, and aired other personal grievances. He also allegedly suggested the gaming division should be more grateful that Alibaba acquired and "saved" it.
[2]
Fan's remarks leaked to social media, went viral, and were not received well.
[3]
[4]
He apologized the next day, with a post to the corp's internal network. A copy was acquired by media outlet [5]Technode and reported on by [6]Alibaba-owned South China Morning Post.
According to the reports and document, Fan claimed he had intended to "be casual" and "liven up the atmosphere" but went too far.
[7]
"I have a straightforward personality, I am carefree, I like to joke, and sometimes I don't know how to control the scale, so I have been criticized for this for many years," Fan reportedly wrote.
[8]Baidu's PR head has a PR problem after workaholic social media posts
[9]Sweet 16 and making mistakes: More of the computing industry's biggest fails
[10]Alibaba Cloud brings chatty SaaS products out of China and into more markets
[11]China warns citizens to stop posting info about spy satellites on social media
According to the document, Fan conceded that many of his words had been inappropriate and that he was sorry. He then offered up three months of his own salary to go toward team building for the Lingxi staff.
He is not the first Chinese tech leader to present as demanding and authoritarian. Earlier this year, Baidu's PR head found herself in a PR nightmare for [12]creating a toxic work environment and demanding workaholicism.
Some orgs in China's competitive tech industry advocate a "996" lifestyle that sees employees work from 9AM to 9PM, six days a week.
For Fan, his comments represent a cultural clash – between harsh authoritarian leadership and the creative autonomy often valued in the gaming industry.
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Lingxi is best known for the mobile game Three Kingdoms released in 2019. Zhou is credited with contributing to the game's overall direction and development. ®
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[1] https://weibo.com/1560906700/P3EQYog6h?refer_flag=1001030103_
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Z1gfVVPLBgOPLAjC-o5GfgAAAEQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Z1gfVVPLBgOPLAjC-o5GfgAAAEQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Z1gfVVPLBgOPLAjC-o5GfgAAAEQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://technode.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/apology.png
[6] https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3290026/alibaba-entertainment-group-head-apologises-belittling-video-gaming-unit-cantonese
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Z1gfVVPLBgOPLAjC-o5GfgAAAEQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/09/baidu_pr_chief/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/29/where_computing_went_wrong_feature_part_2/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/25/alibaba_cloud_phone_dingtalk_extension/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2024/07/01/asia_tech_news_roundup/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/09/baidu_pr_chief/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Z1gfVVPLBgOPLAjC-o5GfgAAAEQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: The cream always rises to the top
according to the villagers in "Holy Grail" I recall other things swimming on top....
Re: The cream always rises to the top
"The cream always rises to the top"
...but then, so does the scum.
Re: The cream always rises to the top
There is a problem that nice CEOs are often less effective at driving a successful company than pyschopathic bastards. My skill set* has meant the majority of my career I've been in very close proximity to corporate boards. I've worked for some fun CEOs, some dull CEOs, some driven CEOs, some successful CEOs, and some complete R soles.
Perhaps the nicest CEO I can recall was a very, very competent senior manager, reputation as a real people guy, liked by all he worked with, and recognised as smart and experienced, and caring. Everybody who knew him was delighted when he was promoted to CEO of £6bn a year business with a huge national profile. Then it all went wrong. He lost his confidence, his skills didn't step up to the harsh realities of decisions like shutting down or restructuring under-performing business units, and he didn't seem able to project the essential two-facedness that a CEO needs, pretending competence, control, calmness to the outside world, whilst simultaneously fighting political battles internally and externally, and having to monitor and sort out performance across a large and complex business. He got shown the door after about three and a half years (albeit replaced by a different flavour of not-good-enough).
The CEO most fun to work for, with the most potential for their own career was a mad, driven, psychopathic Scotsman. Demanded loyalty but offered none, workaholic, demanding, unreasonable, unafraid of technical challenge or difficult decisions, not actually a nice person at all but exciting to be around.
* For a certain definition of "skill"
"tossed in his penchant"
I guess he did. The tosser couldn't keep his hands of his penchant, could he?
Wow that's totally not going to cause a problem between the subsidiary and head office. And I'm sure there will be ZERO consequences if the subsidiary takes up the offer of the CEO giving up 3 months salary to the Subsidiary's team building. No consequences whatsoever! Because we all know that those at the top are NEVER petty, spiteful, and vindictive. No, no, no...
Culture clash? I don't think so.
"For Fan, his comments represent a cultural clash – between harsh authoritarian leadership and the creative autonomy often valued in the gaming industry."
I know people who work in the videogame industry. I also know people who worked in the videogame industry. Those who worked almost universally left it because they were made to work long hours without autonomy. Those who still work there concur that they have both of those things, but are somehow into the videogame industry enough that they're willing to accept it. I don't think this guy is in the wrong industry. As programmers go, I think ones working on videogames both get and accept worse conditions than many others. This is probably one reason why he has managed to not understand how wrong his approach is, although some people have demonstrated that they can be that stupid without any reinforcement at all.
So...
... the shit hit the Fan, after all. Or is it the other way around?
"I am carefree"
Yeah sure, right up until you see some underling being carefree as well.
Then you step on him like you squash a bug.
Your attitude really is "I'm at the top, so I do what I want and you do as I say".
Not a very novel attitude. A despicable one, but not novel.
The cream always rises to the top
The psychopath cream that is.