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Alibaba founder Jack Ma. Photo credit: Alibaba.

Chinese billionaire Jack Ma received an honorary degree at the De La Salle University in Manila today.

Immediately after the awarding ceremony, the Alibaba chairman sat down and answered a range of questions from moderators and the audience – not all of them easy.

The eminently quotable Ma talked about his early Alibaba days, how the internet has changed the world, and what entrepreneurs must do to succeed.

Here are some of his memorable quotes:

When he started Alibaba, Ma, a former school teacher, said he had no training in technology nor knowledge of computers and the internet. What he had was the dream of being able to help small businesses.

I believe it is not the technology that changes the world, but the dream behind the technology.

Don’t worry whether your dream is silly, he said. Believe in something you’re passionate about.

There are about 7 billion people in the world and there’s just one you so [your dream’s] worth it.

And get a team who will believe in it too.

If it is just your dream, you can never go that far. But if it’s a group’s dream, you can go much further.

More than dreaming, what matters is how far you’re willing to go to achieve what you want. Be prepared to spend years to make it happen.

Ask yourself what you have, what you want, and what you can give up. What are you willing to sacrifice?

When he started his business in the 1990s, Ma said no one believed in the power of the internet. People didn’t want to invest in ecommerce.

If people help you, you’re lucky. If they don’t, that’s very common. Don’t be discouraged when people don’t help you. You should earn the right to be helped.

He believes good leaders possess different kinds of intelligence. There’s the old-fashioned IQ or intelligence quotient. Then there are other Qs.

If you want to be successful you should have great EQ – because EQ means knowing how to work with people. No matter how smart you are, if you don’t know how to work with people, you will never succeed, your dreams will just be dreams.

If you want to be respected, you should have LQ – the quotient of love, which is very important.

He shared why he likes the movie Forrest Gump. On the day he watched it, he was devastated after failing a string of projects and being betrayed by his friends. He drew inspiration from the character – Forrest Gump wasn’t a smart guy, he said, but he never gave up.

Be simple, stay foolish with your dream, and no matter what, just continue running.

He shared how Alibaba quietly dealt with challenges.

Don’t complain about others, only complain about yourself. If you complain, you have to have a solution. If there’s no solution, don’t complain.

Finally, on leadership and mentoring, he urged people:

Find a good boss. A good boss is better than a good company. A good boss will discipline you, train you, develop you.

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