Nvidia CEO Offers Parting Advice to Departing Employees
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is known for his direct and honest approach to departing employees. A recent example of this was when David Hoeller and Nikita Rudin, two former Nvidia engineers, left the company in 2024 to start their own robotics startup, Flexion Robotics.
Before leaving, they had a late-night call with Huang, who didn't try to persuade them to stay but did offer some parting advice. Huang told them that the name of their startup, Checkpoint, was bad and suggested changing it. He also warned them about the difficulties they would face in starting a new business.
Huang's approach is not unique to Hoeller and Rudin. Bing Xu, who left Nvidia earlier this year after being acquired by the company in 2024, said that Huang had given him honest feedback when he shared his plans to start another startup called INT21.
Xu credited Huang with pointing out a major weakness of his - poor communication skills. Huang suggested that staying at Nvidia would be a better path for Xu, but ultimately encouraged him to take the risk and pursue his new venture.