SCALE UP is a bi-weekly video series of insightful conversations with senior HR leaders, founders and venture capitalists at Alibaba, TikTok, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Open AI, Sequoia Capital, A16Z… across the globe on topics around talent strategies, future of work, and how they get to where they are. I hope these conversations can democratize the access to information and inspire those going through similar challenges when scaling their growth companies.
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From Crazy Rich Asians to Midnight Coders: Why One-Size-Fits-All is Talent Suicide in Southeast Asia's $1 Trillion Tech Gold Rush
How did COVID trigger a $25B remote work revolution that rewrote six nations’ talent playbooks?🔹 Why do 85% of regional teams fail, while only 15% find the formula for long-term retention?🔹 And what separates companies burning $2M+ on failed hires from those achieving 85%+ retention in Southeast Asia’s hypercompetitive market?When Crazy Rich Asians gave the world its champagne-soaked view of Marina Bay Sands, it glamorized Southeast Asia. But the real story is far more contrasting. In Ho Chi Minh City, midnight coders debug AI systems over bubble tea. In Jakarta, motorbike drivers weave through traffic to power billion-dollar e-commerce networks. In Manila, young professionals juggle U.S. client calls while building TikTok side hustles that often outpace their day jobs.The numbers behind this transformation are staggering:💰 $87B in venture capital over the past decade🚀 32 unicorns since 2014📈 A digital economy on track to hit $1 trillion by 2030Yet most global companies continue to make the same mistake—treating Southeast Asia as a single market. A one-size-fits-all playbook here is talent suicide:- 🇸🇬 Singapore’s fast-switching career racers won’t behave like 🇹🇭 Thailand’s hierarchy-respecting teams- 🇻🇳 Vietnam’s credential-driven engineers think differently from 🇮🇩 Indonesia’s consensus builders- 🇵🇭 The Philippines’ American-influenced workplaces are nothing like 🇲🇾 Malaysia’s multicultural balancing actThe companies that succeed do things differently. They build cultural intelligence into their strategy from day one, design for retention over recruitment, invest in AI and tech development hubs, partner early with governments and universities, and see Southeast Asia not as cheap labor but as a launchpad for leadership and innovation.
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16 Aug 2025
Deep Dive into The Dragon Awakens: China's AI Ascent and Talent Revolution
Many have asked me to write sth on the AIGC frenzy happening in China since my last post. So here it is, this time I am telling it like a story. When ChatGPT dropped in late 2022, Silicon Valley 🇺🇸 looked like Goliath—$5B+ poured into training GPT-4, a handful of fortress-like labs guarded by prestige PhDs. China 🇨🇳, meanwhile, seemed like David, locked out behind the Great Firewall. But then the dragon awakened: instead of waiting, China built hundreds of its own models—and the story flipped.Here’s what’s fascinating: two completely different playbooks for the same revolution.🔹 The Fortress (U.S.)- 3–5 dominant labs.- Training costs: $100M–$5B per model.- Release cycle: 12–18 months.- Talent: PhD pipelines from Stanford/MIT, 5–7 years to leadership roles, avg. comp skewed to salary + big tech stock. 🐉 The Swarm (China)- 200+ serious LLM contenders launched in 24 months.- Training costs: DeepSeek R1 at <$6M (≈16:1 cost advantage).- Release cycle: monthly iterations.- Talent: 11.8M annual university grads feeding the ecosystem, recruiters camping outside Tsinghua/PKU, equity offers of 0.5–2% even for senior engineers, promotions in 12–18 months.And it’s not just about AI models—it’s about talent philosophy (Knights in armor VS. Agile warriors) 1️⃣ Velocity vs. Prestige – do you prize speed of impact or brand credibility? 2️⃣ Scale vs. Resilience – one fortress or many agile units? 3️⃣ Career Promise vs. Career Acceleration – longevity or fast-track growth?As the AIGC race unfolds, the question isn’t just who builds the best models. It’s this: will the future of talent look more like fortresses… or swarms?
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14 Aug 2025
Deep Dive into The Little Red Book of China's Talent Maze
When foreign companies ask me for suggestions for entering China's talent market, my usual answer is - try to partner or acquire something domestic, or go completely local. This one is for China 🇨🇳. With 11.8M university graduates annually—the largest talent pool on Earth—China’s job market is massive but uniquely volatile. Salaries in AI can spike 35% in just one quarter, and entire hiring landscapes shift within days when a unicorn moves. Behind the Great Firewall, billion-dollar empires can spring from viral phenomena like Labubu collectibles, while domestic tech giants evolve at breakneck speed—from the BAT era (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) to the TMD wave (Toutiao, Meituan, Didi) and now the TTMAP generation dominating AI and consumer tech. Layer on the “35-year career ceiling,” the exodus from Tier-1 cities, and a legal grey zone where crypto firms still employ thousands of mainland professionals… and you’ve got one of the most paradoxical and high-stakes talent markets in the world.💡 So how do you win here?1️⃣ Build multi-hub hiring models that tap emerging cities without losing Tier-1 prestige2️⃣ Offer career longevity paths to keep mid-career talent in play3️⃣ Hedge against market shocks by diversifying hiring pipelines across regions & sectors
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