Jack Ma's business partner reveals billionaire is spending his free days painting

In April 2018, Mark Zuckerberg told reporters that he made a ‘huge mistake’ in failing to take a broad enough view about Facebook’s responsibility to the world. This statement was also in the context of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which the data mining firm misused data to try and influence elections. In March 2018, Zuckerberg said that “one of the biggest mistakes” of Facebook was not digging deeper into the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

The year 2015 marked the 50th anniversary of Warren Buffett and his partners’ decision to take control of Berkshire Hathaway. In his letter to the shareholders, Buffett shared his biggest investment mistakes. He said that buying Berkshire was a “monumentally stupid decision” and that he had only bought the company because it was cheap. Buffett kept investing money in Berkshire’s textile mills, eventually shutting operations in 1985.

In July 2015, Ratan Tata, chairman of Tata Trusts and former head of Tata Sons, said his greatest mistake was branding of the Nano car as the cheapest instead of the ‘most affordable’, which was the intention of the company. Branding the car as the cheapest created a negative impact on the market, he said. “Success comes i f one took decisions that one thinks are the right ones,” Tata said.

In March 2018, Elon Musk participated in a Q&A at South by Southwest. While answering a variety of questions, the Tesla CEO said that the biggest career mistake he made was not being more involved with Tesla in its initial days. From 2004 to 2008, Musk was a lead investor in Tesla, but he was the CEO of SpaceX, a space exploration company. At the event, Musk said, “I think that was probably the biggest mistake of my career. Whenever you think you can have your cake and eat it too, you’re probably wrong.”

In April 2016, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba’s founder and CEO Jack Ma spoke at the 20th St Petersburg International Economic Forum. At the event, Ma reportedly said, “My biggest mistake was I made Alibaba. I never thought that this thing would change my life. I was just trying to do a small business and grow that big [sic], take that much responsibility and got so much trouble. Every day is like as busy as a president, and I don’t have any power. And then I don’t have my life.” In January 2018, Alibaba became the second Asian company to break the $500-billion valuation mark.

Jack Ma recently faced flak for his blog post endorsing the tech industry's overtime culture.

The 54-year-old encouraged employees to embrace the overtime culture if they wished to flourish in the tech world. He was also known to dismiss people expecting a typical, eight-hours-a-day work routine.

Earlier, China's richest man said that people who can stick to a hectic schedule are the ones that have found their passion beyond monetary gains.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is known for his temper outbursts, and his 'rage firings' have often made headlines. The 47-year-old, whose employees have reported incidents of extreme yelling, allegedly fires any employee who comes his way on a bad-temper day.

Earlier this month, Musk reportedly pushed a former employee who was saying goodbye to colleagues after having resigned from the company.

In another example, it was reported last December that the auto giant's employees were asked not to walk past Musk's desk in case it ruined their career.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is known for his cut-throat management style as much as he is known for being the world's richest man. The top boss doesn't mince his words, and the e-commerce giant has gained a reputation for having a ruthless work culture.

As a leader, the 55-year-old is reported to be a difficult-to-please boss - who is easy to agitate. Stories of his comments including, "I'm sorry, did I take my stupid pills today?" and "Why are you ruining my life?" have often made it out of Amazon's office.

Bezos has reportedly been this way from the start. In 1997, three years after launching the company, in a letter to the shareholders, he had revealed that while interviewing prospective employees he always tells them, “You can work long, hard, or smart, but at Amazon.com you can't choose two out of three.”

In 2017, Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick was forced to exit from the company. The decision was made after he was accused of sexual harassment by an ex-employee, Susan Fowler. But Fowler's account of her time at the company was just a trigger that led to a chain of reactions including complaints of a ‘toxic bro culture’ at Uber.

Soon stories highlighting the unhealthy, sexist work culture that had flourished for years under Kalanick made headlines.

Uber's former Chief People Office Liane Hornsey was forced to leave the company in July last year on grounds of poor management of discrimination complaints filed within the company.

Ironically, Hornsey was Uber's spokesperson on diversity and discrimination. She was also accused of making derogatory comments against the global head of diversity and inclusion.