Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has warned Stanford students that having very high expectations may make success harder. Speaking during an interview at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Huang said resilience matters more than ambition alone.
“People with very high expectations have very low resilience,” Huang said. “One of my great advantages is that I have very low expectations.” He explained that when people expect life to go smoothly, they struggle more when setbacks appear.
Huang said students at elite schools like Stanford often expect strong careers and easy success. Stanford is one of the most selective universities in the U.S., with tuition costs above $68,000 a year. But Huang said even top universities cannot teach resilience.
“I hope suffering happens to you,” Huang told students. He said hardship builds character, and character plays a major role in long-term success.
Huang’s views come from personal experience. He was born in Taiwan in 1963, spent part of his childhood in Thailand, and moved to the U.S. at age nine. He said his early life included many challenges despite supportive parents.
One example was his time in high school in Kentucky, where he crossed a dangerous footbridge daily and faced racist bullying. He has previously said classmates even tried to push him off the bridge.
Huang also spoke about his first job at Denny’s, where he worked as a dishwasher and busboy. He said he always tried to do his best, which shaped his work ethic. It was at Denny’s where he and two friends later discussed the idea that became Nvidia.
Today, Nvidia is valued at around $2 trillion, but Huang said he still welcomes pressure and difficulty at work. “Pain and suffering” remain part of the company’s culture, he said, because they help build strong teams and lasting success.
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