Earlier this month, Elon Musk weighed in after a clip surfaced on social media of Nvidia Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang in which he shares how his hands-on leadership style and humble beginnings built one of the world’s most valuable AI companies.
From dishwasher to AI Titan
Born in Taiwan, Huang moved to the US at the age of 9. As a teenager he took a job as a dishwasher Denny’s – a job he still refers to when explaining his leadership philosophy.
“I used to be a dishwasher… I cleaned toilets,” Huang said during a March 2024 interview with Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, adding, “I’ve cleaned more toilets than all of you combined.”
See also: The ‘Margin Moat’ Trade: Nvidia and Broadcom Boost BofA’s $1 Trillion AI Thesis in Semiconductor ETFs
Why there is no job under Nvidia’s CEO
Huang says he connects directly with employees by assessing their work, no matter how small the task, and showing them how he reasons through complex problems.
Huang said that when employees submit work to him for review, he wants to guide them through his thought process.
“If you send me something and you want my input on it and I can serve you, and share with you in my review of it how I reasoned about it, then I have contributed to you,” he explained.
He added that this approach helps empower employees by giving them insight into how complex decisions are made.
Nvidia’s CEO also admits that supervising and assessing employees’ work requires significant emotional and intellectual energy.
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Elon Musk Agrees: ‘This is the Way’
Huang’s practical, humble leadership resonated over the weekend when Musk shared a clip of the interview on X and said simply, “This is the way.”
Building a $4.5 trillion AI powerhouse
Huang’s values – humility, commitment and empowerment – have played a central role in Nvidia’s growth.
According to the Bloomberg billionaire IndexHuang is worth $156 billion.
Nvidia’s market capitalization reached $4.58 trillion and briefly topped the $5 trillion mark in October 2025, making it one of the most valuable technology companies in the world.
Nvidia posted third-quarter revenue of $57.0 billion, up 62% from the same period last year and surpassing the Wall Street consensus of $54.88 billion. Benzinga Pro Data.
Nvidia scores high in terms of quality Benzinga’s Edge Stock Rankingswith the shares showing strong upward trends in the short, medium and long term. For more information about the stock, its peers and competitors, click here.
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