Why is Dr. Wang Jian a doctor of psychology, but he can be the president of Alibaba Cloud and the CTO of Alibaba?
Before answering this question, I want to tell you a truth: There is a kind of person called a "prophet", who can see the future in five years, ten years or even longer, just like a doctor.
Many students will say that Dr. Wang Jian and his party have never written the production code. How can a person who has not written the code be the CTO of Alibaba and the president of Alibaba Cloud?
However, under everyone's doubts and doubts, the doctor still started Alibaba Cloud. Moreover, Alibaba Cloud did not take the safe road of open source scheme, but chose to develop its own Feitian Alibaba Cloud operating system and maximize the realization of "self-controllable Feitian Cloud".
3-year-old professor, 31-year-old doctoral supervisor and 32-year-old dean.
Perhaps most students will say that even if talents are promoted in an unconventional way, the rocket-like promotion speed in the system has been given "special care". Special care is true, but doctors conquer academia and industry by strength.
Dr. was a world-class expert in the field of man-machine interface, mainly to improve machine intelligence and efficiency, including the most core computer frontier technology, and was responsible for the national 863 project. When I was a graduate student at Hangzhou University, I often attended the courses of Computer Department of Zhejiang University.
For large companies, the CTO may need to write code in the early stage, but when the enterprise reaches a certain size, the CTO does not need to write code directly.
There are software engineers who write code, architects who do architecture, and algorithm engineer who optimize algorithms. The CTO's duty is to draw a "cake" for everyone. As for how to make such a cake and what materials are needed, just leave it to the people who implement it.
Anyone who often listens to the doctor's lectures knows that what he says is "incomprehensible", not because people's thinking is confused, but because what he says is likely to be the future.
Take Alibaba Cloud as an example. Ten years ago, the doctor told a group of people about cloud computing and smart cities. Who could understand?
Mr. Ma bluntly said: It feels like separation, and I don't understand it, but it feels like the future. However, at the most difficult time in Alibaba Cloud, at the time when Alibaba Cloud and the doctor personally questioned the outside world the most, Mr. Ma resolutely stood up and supported the doctor, and publicly expressed his attitude on the intranet:
In the early stage of Alibaba Cloud's development, Mr. Ma gave the best resources and the best engineers, otherwise Alibaba Cloud would not have today.
The road to development in Alibaba Cloud is too hard. The doctor, who was already famous all over the world, put down his posture and started to be a Alibaba Cloud from scratch, which was questioned by everyone, even countless people in Alibaba Cloud. Many people left because they could not persist. At the annual meeting in Alibaba Cloud in 212, the doctor hid his face and cried. Only those who really do technology know how difficult it is.
many things have their own providence. Strictly speaking, neither Wang Jian nor Ma Yun was born in a computer science class. Wang Jian is engaged in psychology and Ma Yun is engaged in English. But it was Ma Yun, an English teacher who didn't know computer technology, who used computer technology to create Alibaba Group, and it was Wang Jian, a doctoral tutor in psychology, who pushed Ali to create the world's top three cloud computing service-Alibaba Cloud.
Ma Yun once said: "It is precisely because I don't know computer technology that Ali is very awed by technology, so Ali can become the strongest computer network company in the world, and to be modest, it is also one of them." This is Ma Yun's logic. Perhaps he thinks that Ali's technological change can be led by a big computer-savvy person outside the computer field, and this person is Wang Jian. Then, why can Wang Jian win the favor of Ma Yun to hold such an important position? Of course, this is inseparable from Wang Jian's personal ability. Let's take a look at it together.
Wang Jian was born in Hangzhou in 1962, and he and Ma Yun are fellow villagers. Although they are fellow villagers, the fates of Ma Yun and Wang Jian are quite different. Judging from Wang Jian's personal resume, it is not too much to describe his life as smooth sailing.
In 1984, Wang Jian obtained a bachelor's degree in psychology department of Hangzhou University. Although he was in psychology, his main research direction was digital human-computer interaction, which can be simply understood as a branch of computer psychology, which laid a solid foundation for Wang Jian to enter the computer field in his later years. Six years later, in 199, Wang Jian had obtained a Ph.D. degree in psychology from Hangzhou University. Judging from this point in time, it is enough to prove that Wang Jian is not in the pool. In 1992, Wang Jian was promoted to a professor and became a doctoral supervisor a year later. In 1998, Wang Jian became the head of the psychology department of Hangzhou University, and was selected into the "151" talent project in the same year. Even now, many people who are committed to taking the academic road have regarded this experience as a genius level.
Although Wang Jian has been groping in the field of psychology, he prefers to show his skills in the computer field, but he suffers from no opportunities. In 1999, Wang Jian finally got this opportunity. He was invited by Microsoft to join Microsoft Research Asia as the vice president, and became colleagues with Kai-fu Lee and Lin Bin, who is now the co-founder of Xiaomi Company. In the same year, Ma Yun led 18 friends of his teachers and students to set up Alibaba Group in Hangzhou.
Wang Jian is in charge of user interface, machine learning, large-scale data processing and other research at Microsoft, as well as the adCenter laboratory in Beijing. From this time on, Wang Jian's talent really matched his ambition, and he was finally able to completely immerse himself in the super-large-scale data ocean with Microsoft, a technology giant. It is worth mentioning that Wang Jian's research achievements in Microsoft SQM big data technology have successfully helped the development of Office 27 and dozens of Microsoft products; Not only that, the ink technology invented by Wang Jian has also been applied in many products such as ablet PC, OneNote 23, Windows XP Tablet PC edition 25, Windows Vista and so on.
So, Wang Jian's ability has been fully proved by Microsoft, and he doesn't need to prove himself to anyone.
In 28, just as Wang Jian was doing well in Microsoft, Liu Zhen, Wang Jian's friend and then technical director of Alibaba, found Wang Jian due to technical problems. This was the first time that Wang Jian and Ma Yun met. As soon as Wang Jian saw Ali's situation at that time, he immediately knew the changes he might bring to Ali. Coincidentally, Ma Yun recognized Wang Jian at a glance.
a month later, Wang Jian joined Ali group and served as the chief technical architect. Wang Jian's strength is big data processing. At that time, the problem faced by Ali was that he didn't know how to deal with such a large-scale data volume. Even from the job matching, Wang Jian was the best candidate for Ali in China.
When Wang Jian saw such large-scale data, he discussed with Ma Yun that Ali would build his own cloud computing platform. This is the first time that Wang Jian put forward the concept of "Alibaba Cloud" in Ali. Ma Yun was quite supportive after learning about it, and promised to invest 1 billion yuan in Wang Jian's Alibaba Cloud project one year, even if it was ten years, he would complete the "Alibaba Cloud Calculation" project; It is not easy to build a cloud computing platform. In the process, Wang Jian was considered a "liar", but he did not give up. Finally, with Ali's acquisition of China Wanwang in 213, Wang Jian successfully built a complete cloud computing platform for Ali-Alibaba Cloud with the help of China Wanwang's technology platform.
Since then, Alibaba Cloud has made great strides and started to provide its own cloud services to the whole country and even the whole world. Large state-owned enterprises, large and small government units and private enterprises, including 1236, have become customers of Alibaba Cloud, and Alibaba Cloud has become the top three cloud computing platforms in the world.
Don't take it for granted. Wang Jian is a technical background, but not the background of liberal arts students as you think.
He is one of the best experts in the field of man-machine engineering, which is an interdisciplinary subject of psychology and computer. When Kai-Fu Lee set up Microsoft Research Institute Beijing office (which later became the Whampoa Military Academy of China AI and CTO), he asked the domestic authorities in this field, and Wang Jian was the first one recommended by others. Moreover, his performance in Microsoft Research Institute is very outstanding, and he is unique in the choice of research direction and achievements, which makes many other scientists who are engaged in a harder direction have to admire.
in my opinion, Wang Jian may be the most successful CTO in China in the past decade. Just look at how much Alibaba Cloud's valuation accounts for in Ali's current market value of hundreds of billions of dollars. Alibaba Cloud should have been one of the largest technology companies in China when it was separated. It is extremely rare for CTO to do this step by spending money to support the business in the company, but making the technology itself a business and earning such great value for the company.
it's not so important for CTO to write his own code. The key is to be able to look far in technical strategy, find the right direction, think clearly, and form an understanding with the CEO of the company, get support, and really implement it in this general direction. At this point, Wang Jian is very successful.
thank you for your question. Wang Jian, a doctor of psychology, is indeed the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) of Alibaba, which shows that there must be talents as well as Bole.
Wang Jian, Chairman of Alibaba Technical Committee, was a doctoral supervisor and head of the psychology department of Hangzhou University and Zhejiang University. In 28, he chose to join Ali as the chief architect from Microsoft Research Asia. In 29, he founded Alibaba Cloud and became the first president. In the case of starting from scratch, he "arrogantly" abandoned the relatively safe open source route and insisted on making a large-scale distributed computing system-"Feitian".
Wang Jian's view of technology has nothing to do with psychology. Professor Wang is a professor of psychology at Zhejiang University and director of the National Laboratory of Industrial Psychology at Zhejiang University. Wang Jian served as executive vice president of Microsoft Research Asia in 1999. Therefore, Wang Jian has the background of industrial internet, not pure psychology. Just like our view today, many people questioned Wang Jian as a psychologist many years ago. Is it a big deal to go to Ali for scientific research? In fact, before entering Alibaba, Wang Jian was an engineer at Microsoft Research Institute. At that time, we can refer to Bill Gates' mantra, "Don't ask me, go to Wang Jian", which shows trust and Wang Jian's technical expertise is obvious.
why did Dr. Wang Jian of Alibaba Cloud get his doctorate? In psychology, can he become the chief technology officer of Ali?
Wang Jian is a tough talent. Ma Yun handed Alibaba Cloud to Wang Jian. However, Wang Jian and Alibaba Cloud were regarded as a joke at that time. This technology is difficult to realize and the prospect is uncertain. In particular, Li Yanhong and Ma Huateng also publicly stated that they are not familiar with cloud technology. Wang Jian suffers in Ali, and he also has a job in his heart. There were many accidents in the early development of Alibaba Cloud, and engineers couldn't sleep. In the most difficult period, 8% of the engineers left Alibaba Cloud. Wang Jian said that Alibaba Cloud was filled in by engineers. This is indeed a big fact. For many years, Alibaba Cloud has been the world's leading cloud computing technology, with a valuation of nearly $7 billion. It is expected to become another unicorn company worth $1 billion under Alibaba. Wang Jian's persistence finally paid off.
1. Wang Jian studied in Hangzhou University in his early years. Hangzhou University has been merged by Zhejiang University for a long time, but most people don't understand it. In fact, this university should be stronger than Xiamen University now, and its graduates are academicians of the two academies, rich people, senior political officials and well-known overseas professors. At present, it is at least better than more than half of the 985 universities. Among them, Wang Jian's industrial psychology was ranked first in the country at that time, and the founder was Professor Chen Li, the founder of industrial psychology in China. In this industry psychology major ranked first in the country, Wang Jian was a professor at the age of 3, a doctoral supervisor at the age of 31, and a department head at the age of 32, which was excellent in itself. In addition, industrial psychology is an interdisciplinary science. Besides the research contents of management psychology, labor psychology, engineering psychology, personnel psychology and consumer psychology, the interaction between man and machine and the relationship between man and environment are also one of the research points. Dr. Wang Jian realized the importance of computers in industrial psychology when computers were still in the primary stage in China, so he often went to Zhejiang University to attend computer courses. With Dr. Wang Jian's learning ability, it was credible that computers learned to the top level at that time. This laid a solid foundation for his rich cross knowledge. After arriving at Microsoft, Wang Jian mainly engaged in user interface, machine learning, large-scale data processing and other research, which is in the same strain as his previous industrial psychology. It can be said that Wang Jian is a pioneer in big data, machine learning and human-computer interaction in China, which laid an important foundation for his work in Ali.
2. Wang Jian is a CTO, not a code farmer. The important role of CTO is, firstly, technical strategy, and secondly, technical management. Wang Jian was already an expert in big data when he was at Microsoft. After seeing Amazon Cloud, it was natural for Wang Jian to be a Alibaba Cloud. Although there was great resistance, Wang Jian had "seen the world" and he believed that cloud and data represented the future. In fact, some of Ali's forward-looking products and plans in recent years are more or less related to Wang Jian: online and offline integrated new retail, leading car operating system AliOS and subsequent Internet of Things operating system AliOS Things, leading office social products nailing, Dharma Institute, China Taiwan, etc. Under the leadership of Wang Jian, Ali's research and development expenses have been rising and his technical level has been continuously improved. Wang Jian is very competent as a technical executive.
4. I have to say that Ma Yun is really strong in employing people, such as Wang Jian, a master of technical strategy and management, Zhang Yong, a master of overall operation, Ceng Ming, etc., while Jiang Fan of Taobao, who was 85 years old, and Ali's talent echelon, should be the best among Internet enterprises.
Many people think that psychology is a liberal art, but it is actually a science.
Wang Jian is a doctor of psychology at Hangzhou University, and was the director of the psychology department. Before 1998, Beijing Normal University, Peking University, East China Normal University and Hangzhou University were also called the four major psychology departments in China, among which the industrial psychology of Hangzhou University was the first in China.
In 1998, Hangzhou University was merged by Zhejiang University. Zhejiang University also attaches great importance to the Department of Psychology, and has expanded it into a school of psychology. Unfortunately, the psychology department of Zhejiang University lags behind in the ranking of many disciplines.