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Nvidia\u2019s rise from an idea hatched over a booth at Denny\u2019s to the world\u2019s most valuable company is one of the defining business stories of the AI boom. But according to CEO Jensen Huang, whose net worth now sits at $196 billion, there\u2019s a less glamorous ingredient behind that success: suffering.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody suffers better than I can,\u201d Huang said in conversation with the Korea Society late last month. \u201cIn order to do something incredible, you have to suffer. It\u2019s not a walk in the park. If it\u2019s a walk in the park, anybody could do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Huang, that suffering has taken different forms over Nvidia\u2019s 33-year history. In the company\u2019s early days, he said, it was largely the result of simply not knowing what he was doing.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs the company endeavors, there are setbacks, or people didn\u2019t believe in your future, or they didn\u2019t believe in you,\u201d Huang said. \u201cMaybe the market didn\u2019t believe in you, maybe the customers didn\u2019t believe in you.\u201d<\/p>\n
But suffering alone isn\u2019t enough, according to Huang. It takes resilience, stubbornness and determination to push through it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes resilience to continue to believe in yourself,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Huang\u2019s fear of failure keeps him working 7 days a week<\/p>\n
This is not the first time Huang has spoken about the suffering that comes with building a successful company. In a conversation with Stanford business school students in 2024, he encouraged young people to embrace friction in their careers.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople with very high expectations have very low resilience\u2014and unfortunately, resilience matters in success,\u201d Huang said. \u201cOne of my great advantages is that I have very low expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know how to teach it to you except for I hope suffering happens to you,\u201d Huang added.<\/p>\n
Some of that suffering appears to have manifested in his approach to work. Huang has said he works seven days a week, including holidays, driven in part by a persistent fear that Nvidia could fail.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know the phrase \u201930 days from going out of business,\u2019 I\u2019ve used for 33 years,\u201d Huang said on an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience last year. \u201cBut the feeling doesn\u2019t change. The sense of vulnerability, the sense of uncertainty, the sense of insecurity\u2014it doesn\u2019t leave you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nvidia declined Fortune\u2019s request for comment.<\/p>\n
Leaders like Ray Dalio agree: pain and suffering is a motivator for success<\/p>\n
Huang\u2019s view on suffering echoes a broader philosophy among business leaders: discomfort, failure, and setbacks can be useful if you\u2019re willing to learn from them.<\/p>\n
Ray Dalio, the billionaire founder of Bridgewater Associates, has boiled that idea down to a simple equation: \u201cPain + Reflection = Progress.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no avoiding pain, especially if you\u2019re going after ambitious goals,\u201d the hedge fund manager wrote in a blog post. \u201cBelieve it or not, you are lucky to feel that kind of pain if you approach it correctly, because it is a signal that you need to find solutions so you can progress.\u201d<\/p>\n
The key, Dalio argues, is not to avoid the pain but to examine it: \u201cIf you can develop a reflexive reaction to psychic pain that causes you to reflect on it rather than avoid it, it will lead to your rapid learning\/evolving.\u201d<\/p>\n
Winston Weinberg, cofounder and CEO of $15.5 billion AI legal startup Harvey echoed that sentiment on an episode of Fortune\u2019s Term Sheet podcast earlier this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s really hard to figure this out without failing. You just have to fail a million times,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
For Weinberg, learning from those failures requires putting ego aside and taking an honest look at what went wrong\u2014and what worked.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of that is destroying your ego 24\/7,\u201d he said. But, he added: \u201cIt\u2019s a very good way to learn.\u201d<\/p>\n
#Nvidia #CEO #Jensen #Huang #successful #prepared #suffer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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