Every time a salesperson at online trading site Alibaba signs up an important new account, the entire sales department cheers in triumph. But today they have been asked to keep the noise down as Jack Ma, founder and chairman of the world’s largest online trading platform for businesses, is being interviewed in the open-plan office.
If Mr Ma feels most comfortable next to his sales force, it is because their work comes closest to what the 44-year-old has been doing over the past 15 years: preaching the importance of the internet and convincing companies to pay for offering their products on Alibaba’s website.
