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COO who Googled 'What is PR?'
From diplomacy to risk
She had studied diplomacy, including international security and counterinsurgency, and wanted to work for the government on security issues. As a non-citizen she couldn't, so she ended up in Washington, D.C., doing political risk: what a company like Google does if it enters Egypt and there's a coup, or what Alibaba has to overcome for its biggest IPO in the U.S.
The partnership
There she partnered with Jim Wilkinson, a born and bred Texan who had worked in government and helped Jack Ma run the IPO as Alibaba's head of corporate affairs. After the IPO he decided to start a firm and asked her to do it with him. He told her he thought she could figure it out. She wasn't sure she agreed, and went anyway.
Learning by blundering
She learned by embarrassing herself. In meetings with leaders at Citadel and S&P Global, some of her comments landed, and after others someone would pull her aside to suggest fewer Power Rangers references next time. In a meeting with Gap Inc., it became clear that she thought corporate communications meant putting on a summer sale.
How do companies measure political risk?
Analysts study how elections, coups, regulation, and conflict could damage an investment, then rank countries by how likely those events are. Specialist firms began selling such ratings in the 1960s and 1970s, after a wave of expropriations and revolutions. Insurers cover part of the exposure: the World Bank's Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, founded in 1988, insures investors against expropriation and political violence.
How big was Alibaba's IPO?
Alibaba listed on the New York Stock Exchange in September 2014, with shares priced at 68 dollars. The offering raised about 21.8 billion dollars, and the total reached about 25 billion dollars once underwriters sold additional shares. It was the largest IPO in history at the time. The stock opened its first day of trading at 92.70 dollars.
How did public relations become a profession?
In 1906, the former journalist Ivy Lee issued a Declaration of Principles promising to give the press accurate information on behalf of his clients. Edward Bernays, a nephew of Sigmund Freud, then helped build the field's methods in the 1920s, publishing Crystallizing Public Opinion in 1923 and Propaganda in 1928. Corporations and governments were the main clients for the first PR firms.
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