字节跳动六周年演讲

ByteDance 6th Anniversary Speech

> By Zhang Yiming · internal speech at ByteDance's 6th anniversary celebration (theme: Hello World) · full text as published by GeekPark · March 2018 · [Original link](https://www.geekpark.net/news/227173)

Thank you all, thank you to our investors, thank you to our partners and all employees, for joining ByteDance's sixth anniversary celebration together. First, to be honest, I'm a bit nervous, especially after watching the video and realizing that this annual meeting we're facing so many colleagues around the world.

Our theme this year is Hello World. We started globalizing in 2015: for the first time we launched a globalization team, and for the first time we had foreign employees. Globalization includes the domestic business. In 2017 we already made quite a lot of progress; in 2018 we want to take the domestic business up another level and lay a better foundation, while the overseas business makes more headway. That's the theme of what I want to talk about today.

If I had to give 2018 a keyword, I think it would be: globalization. This year is a very critical year. For our organization, when driving at high speed you need to grip the steering wheel even tighter. Globalization in particular is like switching tracks: we have to overhaul the car, and we can't stop to make adjustments either; we can't slow down, we have to keep moving forward at the same time.

The company's previous vision was "to be the information platform that knows you best, connecting people and information, promoting creation and exchange"; now it's simplified to one phrase: "a global platform for creation and exchange".

An advantage we already have is that we can span China, the US and regions around the world at the same time. This goal isn't very far away; although we're still well short of it, at least we can see it. A vision has to be out of reach yet visible to count as a vision. That's why we set this vision.

To reach this vision, we should have a requirement for the company. From the early days of the company I've kept saying that we're building two products at once: one is the business product, the other is the company product; the company itself is a product. So we hope that while building a global platform for creation and exchange, we can become the world's best technology company. The company product is the foundation of the business product. Many companies seize a business opportunity and rise fast; such a company is called "a pig in the wind" (风口上的猪). I hope we can find the wind and seize business opportunities, but even more I hope we have our own power: we don't rely on luck, the company itself is creative and is an excellent product.

To run the business product and the company product better, fulfilling our corporate social responsibility well is very important. This is also an issue the company takes extremely seriously.

Business organizations come in five forms, or five stages. The first stage is the sole trader. If you're a sole trader, nobody cares whether you open today; opening at 9, or at noon or in the afternoon, doesn't matter; a sole trader can be a bit casual. The second stage is the studio. If you're a studio, you take on one link of a company's work; say you're a design studio, maybe once you finish this PPT you're done. The third stage is the ordinary company. If you're a company, you have upstream, downstream and consumers; say you're a bicycle tire company, above you is the rubber factory, below you the bicycle company, beside you your competitors; you have your up, down, left and right. The fourth stage is the platform company. If you're a platform company, you affect hundreds of millions of users. For example, if the product has a small problem, a pile of people send me messages, I see it in my WeChat Moments, and complaints show up on other products too. The fifth stage is the global platform company. If you're a global platform-level company, the responsibility is even bigger. Every country faces all kinds of environments; policies, regulations and cultures around the world differ enormously. As a global platform, we also have to abide by every country's laws and regulations and respect every country's public order and good customs.

We are moving from the fourth stage toward the fifth.

As a global public platform, we face a great many corporate responsibilities. Not only the responsibility of legal compliance, but also responsibility for content. Because you're a bigger company, you must hold yourself to higher standards and take on more responsibility. Whether it's our Toutiao Missing Persons Search or Mountain Goods on Toutiao (山货上头条), we hope to take on more social responsibility.

You might say, what does corporate social responsibility have to do with me? Isn't it enough for me to do my own work well? No. We need every employee to have this awareness. Whether something should be done, and how it should be done, should be measured against the social responsibility we've promised the public. This year we will strengthen fulfilling our corporate social responsibility. We need to catch up on the fourth stage, and in the course of moving from the fourth stage to the fifth, tighten this string even more.

We've distilled some key points about corporate social responsibility. Beyond creating commercial profit, providing jobs and generating taxes, a company's existence should have some leanings. First is being upright and good (正直向善). Only if we're an upright and good company can society feel at ease entrusting more important things to us.

At the same time, we need to keep up technological innovation, because we're a technology innovation company; we should drive economic development and bring good methods to society.

We also need to create value, and the value created isn't only commercial value but also social value; for example, Toutiao Missing Persons Search creates new social value. Very often, if our product extends one step further, it can create more value. Not only our products; if the company extends one step further, it can also create more value.

Then there's taking on responsibility. We need a stronger sense of responsibility toward users and toward society. Our standard for doing things can't be that complying with the law is OK; we need self-imposed standards higher than the law. The law is the bottom line, and we can't do things measured against the bottom line. We should proactively take on our social responsibility and industry responsibility; for some responsibilities bearing on users' interests, even if the law doesn't require them and we don't need to bear them, we should proactively bear them. We should actively take on more responsibility beyond what the law requires.

Finally, win-win cooperation. Why raise this? A company doesn't exist in isolation in society; companies also have to cooperate with other companies. Cooperation requires a win-win mindset. We hope that not only do we develop well, but the companies that cooperate with us also develop well, and we should also respect other companies.

That's corporate social responsibility.

Finally, I'll use last year's closing again: "Do challenging things with excellent people"! Actually the company as a whole is made up of individuals. For the company to become an excellent product, it can't do without individuals; if the company develops well, everyone will have many chances to get good returns in all respects. Every individual hopes to become a better individual; besides good returns, I believe everyone hopes even more to grow at the same time.

Doing challenging things with excellent people is the best way to grow.

Although each year's annual meeting content is somewhat different, looking back over the past three years, I feel the most important things haven't changed. So I hope that in the new year we keep doing the most important things well.

Thank you all!

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