Gracy Chens first community AMM: Running a company is a marathon, and it is important to keep the pace

On the afternoon of July 17, Bitget CEO Gracy Chen held a quick question-and-answer AMA with community users. Gracy shared her work experience, team management, and personal life at Bitget, and answered questions about development plans, listing review, BGB destruction, etc. that users were concerned about. The following is a summary of the AMA text:

Q1: From joining Bitget in 2022 to being appointed CEO, have you encountered any challenging and impressive problems in the past two years or so?

Gracy: I joined the company in April 2022, and the company made an official announcement in June. Soon after, I encountered a series of events such as the collapse of Luna/Terra, the collapse of Celsius and Three Arrows Capital. It can be said that my timing of entering the market was very unsatisfactory. Therefore, the most profound impression was that during the bear market, the market generally fell, and many well-known cryptocurrency institutions, such as some of the ones mentioned above, experienced financial crises, large-scale layoffs, and even bankruptcy, which challenged my beliefs to some extent.

But experiencing these challenges together with the Bitget team in the bear market also tested and trained us. Looking back over the past two years, this experience has greatly enhanced the cohesion of our team.

In the past two years, we have achieved good results, which are obvious to the market. We have attracted a large number of talents, and the team size has expanded from less than 500 when I first joined to 1,500 now. At the same time, we acquired some high-quality assets at relatively low prices during the bear market, and expanded the companys business from CEX, decentralized wallets, and investment media to incubators and other upstream and downstream related industries in the industry chain, achieving a great expansion.

As for the most difficult problem, it is the companys global development. We have expanded from a small team that started in East Asia to a global company that now serves more than 100 countries and regions and 25 million users. The needs of these users in various regions vary significantly, not only involving the problem of multilingual communication, but also the different needs for product functions and token selection under the different cultural backgrounds of each region. One obvious feeling is that a few days ago I held a meeting with the heads of various regions. During the two-hour meeting, more than a dozen regional managers reported, and everyone had a different English accent, including accents from the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Europe, which made me feel very interesting. Looking back two years ago when I first joined, the participants were almost all Chinese who spoke Chinese, but now we have a meeting, and English accents from various countries gather together, which also reflects the companys globalization process and achievements from the side.

Q2: Recently, there have been media reports that Bitget has impressive data in terms of capital inflow/website visits. Can you share how to manage and motivate the team? And some of your own management experience?

Gracy: Yes, I have also shared this on Twitter, and multiple data sources have confirmed that we are developing well.

When it comes to team management and motivation, we have an efficient and result-oriented style.

We have drawn on the experience of some large companies, such as the OKR system of Huawei and ByteDance, to strengthen management and promote it globally. The system we use also supports communication across time zones. In addition, we do not advocate upward management or formalism. For example, there is no need to make complicated PPTs when reporting, as long as it can be explained clearly on one page.

In terms of performance, we are result-oriented and will give high-level incentives to team members based on their achievements. Another is full trust. Our current achievements are largely due to our high trust in the regional teams. Although these colleagues have different language and cultural backgrounds, they have penetrated the market, understood market needs, and established good relationships with local opinion leaders and project parties. Therefore, we delegate power to local teams in many regional decisions, including various marketing plans. At the same time, these decisions require them to bear corresponding responsibilities. For example, they can decide whether a project is worth sponsoring, but they also need to consider the return on investment.

It can be said that on the one hand, we use data and the OKR system to capture actual results, and on the other hand, we delegate power and trust our team. This culture helps us attract and retain talents that match them, thereby achieving more efficient decision-making and management.

There are also some correct decisions made during the bear market: when other companies were reducing their staff, we were recruiting and acquiring assets. This is because we believe that this is a marathon, not a sprint. In this marathon, it is very important to maintain a good rhythm, rather than just focusing on the short-term benefits.

Those who choose to stay in this industry during a bear market are believers and true industry builders, which is consistent with our culture. Moreover, during a bear market, we can obtain top talents, high-quality assets and advanced technologies at a lower cost, thereby widening the gap with competitors.

Now that the bull market has arrived, we are very pleased to see the corresponding results. This also proves that our concept is correct, and the bear market is the golden period for growth and construction.

Q3: What kind of person are you in life? What do you like to do?

Gracy: I also want to show you the real me. This is my look at this moment. I think this bunny is very cute. This is also part of our summer peripherals, so 5 lucky viewers will get it. I will also share some small photos, which are more lifelike.

Maybe my brain is too much on work, but I am actually a bit rough in life. I spend most of my free time with my son, but because of my carelessness, my son often suffers with me. For example, I recently took my son out for a picnic, and I bought a not-so-hygienic cake at a gas station. After eating it, we both had diarrhea for several days.

I also like to hang out with friends. I am quite friendly and like to interact with people. I also have many friends who work in other fields. Communicating with them can also help me expand my horizons and worldview. But when I am with friends, they often say that I am a funny girl. A few days ago, when I was with friends, they urged me to have a relationship and asked me what requirements I had. I said that my requirements are not high: handsome, rich, and good to me. Then they asked me if I had met anyone who meets the requirements recently? The intersection of these three is probably only gay friends.

Everyone knows that the work intensity in the crypto industry is high, but I think the more so, the more we need to live our lives seriously, draw more energy from life, and feed it back into our work.

I also love traveling. I travel to more than 10 countries on average every year. When I am on a business trip, I may find a little time to go for a city walk. I also look forward to a pure travel state without a business trip, but such opportunities are very rare recently.

I also like to party and drink with friends. Please dont spread this. This is a farewell party for my friends in the previous city when I left this city and moved to another city. So we had a lot of fun drinking. I have never sent this photo to him, and I have never shared it on Twitter. Only people in your village know about it, so please dont spread it. Just take a look in the group.

Q4: How do you view the phenomenon that there is a low proportion of female leaders in the industry?

Gracy: Whether it is the founding team of Web3 or ordinary Web3 companies, the proportion of women in the executive team is very low. This is especially true in the venture capital industry. I recently saw a comment saying that I am the only female CEO of the top ten trading platforms in the world. This made me realize that female leaders are very rare in almost all industries.

In fact, I am very concerned about womens career development, especially the disadvantaged position of women in male-dominated industries. I think we need more female leaders. Often, society has prejudices against women. For example, female leaders are often asked how to balance career and family, which in itself implies that they should devote more to their families. This prejudice not only comes from society, but may also be internalized as a constraint on women. Especially in the field of financial technology, there are not only few women, but also often lack confidence. Therefore, we first need to break these barriers from the inside and enhance our confidence. As the saying goes: an egg broken from the outside is food, but an egg broken from the inside is life. I hope I can help and advocate for women to break some shackles themselves and be more confident. The premise is that we must believe that we can do it.

Therefore, I have been committed to promoting these changes, such as improving these phenomena through the establishment of non-profit organizations and other projects. The public welfare project Blockchain for Her launched by our Bitget is to support the development of women in the cryptocurrency industry. We have set up a small fund to support female founders and teams, and select top female leaders from around the world as mentors to provide collaborative support. In addition, in 2020, I also created an organization called SheShapes under the World Economic Forum. This is a non-profit organization that is still in operation. It mainly provides career consulting services, community support and mentor planning for women.

This is the speech I gave when I launched the non-profit organization sheshapes in 2020. I have been concerned about the issue of inequality for women in the workplace for a long time.

Of course, these thoughts are also related to my personal experience. In the early days of my business, I met a male investor who clearly stated that he was unwilling to invest in female entrepreneurs, especially married women without children. I was married without children at the time, and this experience made me deeply realize the prejudice of society against female executives and founders.

Therefore, I am now able to take some real actions and bring some positive impact to the society. I feel very happy. At the same time, I also look forward to more outstanding female talents joining our industry and making their own contributions to the sustainable development of this industry.

Q 5: There are many popular traffic coins recently. Will Bitget consider listing these coins?

Gracy: Yes, we are keeping an eye on it. I also mentioned in the meeting with the team last week: add a time limit for assessment and the criteria for delisting in the contract, and formulate transfer rules to make delisting regular, institutionalized and transparent.

Q 6: When reviewing new projects on the platform, will you pay more attention to project popularity or project quality?

Gracy: I pay attention to both. It鈥檚 hard to choose just one because they are both related.

I have a video of the Killer Whales show recorded in Hollywood at the end of June. It is the most influential reality show in the industry. The first season was broadcast on Apple TV, Amazon Prime, etc. In the second season, we made a vlog. In addition to recording the behind-the-scenes story, the last two and a half minutes also detailed some of the indicators we looked at when listing the currency (the essence is mainly here).

Ill find this video and send it to everyone in the group, but its in English. There is a Chinese version on our official video account.

English: https://youtu.be/dIZlleTOkB8?si=VCKKeo2wWlochgom

Chinese: WeChat video account search Bitget Chinese site

Q 7: This year is Bitget鈥檚 sixth anniversary. Will there be a large-scale event to celebrate?

Gracy: Last year we held a big conference to celebrate our fifth anniversary , Bitget EmpowerX Summit 2023 .

But to be honest, it is a bit difficult to hold such a conference this year, so we tend to do some small-scale activities, such as offline meetups in the Chinese-speaking area. The classmate who just did the event briefed me: There should be at least five or six side events this time, and I will probably go to some of them. Then during Singapore Token 2049, I will have a speech at the main venue. Last year, I also shared the stage with some other exchanges, which was quite interesting.

Q8: What is Bitget鈥檚 focus in the second half of the year? What is its strategic goal?

Gracy: At the beginning of 2024, I mentioned in an open letter Bitget鈥檚 three major focuses for the whole year: 1) compliance, 2) emerging markets 3) Web3.

Six months have passed, and we have made good progress in all three areas. Taking Web3 as an example, our non-custodial Web3 wallet Bitget Wallet has just completed the BWB launchpad and coin listing, and the number of users is also growing rapidly.

In addition to these three strategic priorities, we also have bigger dreams and expectations for the role Bitget will play in the mainstreaming of the crypto industry in the future, so in the longer term, we will focus on:

1. Strengthening the Bitget ecosystem: In addition to centralized exchanges, Bitget is enriching its ecosystem through investment. After we launched the Bitget Web3 Fund and EmpowerX Fund last year, enriching the ecosystem through investment will be our long-term strategy.

2. Connecting traditional finance and the crypto industry: With the approval of spot crypto ETFs in major markets such as the United States and Hong Kong, more institutions and retail users are expected to include cryptocurrencies in their portfolios. We are committed to working with industry partners to promote this trend and lower the barrier to entry into the crypto world.

3. Bring crypto assets into everyday life: We launched the Bitget Card at the end of 2023, a crypto asset credit card that can be used anywhere Visa is accepted. This innovation helps make crypto assets part of everyday life, not just an investment. We will develop more services to support this integration. (But this is currently a small-scale invitation system)

Another point is the listing strategy. Listing is something that an exchange should do well, so it is not written in the strategy. But I reflected on myself and felt that our previous spot investment was not enough, so after increasing investment since last year, we should have a big breakthrough in listing strategy, spot growth, and MM/liquidity this year.

Q 9: Does BGB have a destruction mechanism and when will it be activated?

Gracy: This is still under discussion. Currently, BGB is following the market and will be an important medium in the participation of launchpad, launchpool, etc. (Secretly, we will also have a launchpool online soon) and I believe that as Bitgets business flourishes, BGB will be the same.

User Interaction:

How do you plan to further diversify Bitget鈥檚 services and products to meet the evolving needs of the crypto community?

Gracy: In terms of products, we now have a very rich range, from earn products to learn products, and the entire ecological layout is relatively complete.

On the contrary, I think the important issue lies in how to make each individual product more refined and better. For example, in the spot market, we can discover the best assets that everyone is interested in, and in the financial products, we can find partners with competitive returns and security guarantees.

What is your security strategy and how do you ensure the safety and security of user assets on the Bitget platform?

Gracy: Regarding security strategy, I happen to have a page of PPT here that explains it quite completely. You can take a closer look. Also, some of our competitors had problems not long ago. From a security perspective, we have actually done a lot of inspections and added new procedures to ensure the safety of funds.

What does Bitget think about the Ton ecosystem?

Gracy: The Ton ecosystem is indeed a very important partner of ours, and I have had exchanges with the CEO and COO of the Ton Foundation.

In the TON ecosystem, we continue to pay attention to: TON ecosystem TVL has grown rapidly, from $100 million in April to $600 million now, a five-fold increase in two months. Mainly due to the development of the Liquid Staking project tonstaker, new assets such as NOTs launch of stonfi and dedust, especially the launch of TON-USDT in cooperation with Tether, have brought positive impacts to TVL. Tethers official transparency page shows that the authorized issuance of USDT on the TON chain has increased to approximately $580 million, and it is currently the sixth blockchain in terms of USDT issuance, second only to Tron, Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche and Omni.

The total number of TON addresses has also increased very quickly, from 21,464,799 to 34,466,137 in one month, and the activity has continued to rise. Delphi Digital said in a statement that driven by Telegrams 900 million user base, the TON ecosystem has grown quietly, and its daily active addresses have surpassed Ethereum. Among them are popular projects with a large number of users such as NOT and CATIZEN. In particular, CATIZEN has gained 17 million players in the two months since the launch of the game. Now the TON ecosystem has formed a positive cycle due to the growth of users, TVL and TON coin prices. The increase in users has led to an increase in TVL, which has driven the coin price, all of which have had a positive impact.

Which one is the center of gravity, BGB or BWB?

Gracy: Both are important. My work focus is still on Bitget, which definitely empowers BGB. Bitget Wallet has its own independent CEO/COO. Although we often have some business exchanges, you can understand that these are still two teams. In the end, the practices of centralized exchanges and decentralized wallets are still very different.

Bitget has been facing FUD for the past one or two years, but it has remained standing and responded with practical actions. Is this kind of pattern and style inherent in the company? Or is it cultivated?

Gracy: Every exchange will encounter a lot of FUD. I think if we do our own thing well, the FUD will dissipate on its own.

Will Bitget and Bitget Wallet jointly develop projects in the future? Do you have any ideas about developing a public chain?

Gracy: We have a public chain for cooperative investment.

This article is sourced from the internet: Gracy Chens first community AMM: Running a company is a marathon, and it is important to keep the pace

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