Alvaro Villasante

Jensen Huang on how he keeps 55 executives motivated when they're already incredibly wealthy: His answer reveals an unconventional management philosophy that starts with the structure of his leadership team: "I'm surrounded by 55 people. My management team, my direct reports is 55 people. I write no reviews for any of them. I give them constant reviews and they provide the same to me." Even more surprising is how he handles compensation: "My compensation for them is the bottom right corner of Excel. I just drag it down. Literally, many of our executives are paid the same exactly to the dollar. I know it's weird. It works." Jensen also avoids the typical executive rituals that most CEOs rely on: "I don't do one-on-ones with any of them unless they need me. I never have meetings with them just alone. There's not one piece of information that I somehow secretly tell E-staff that I don't tell the rest of the company." He explains the thinking behind this radical transparency: "In that way our company was designed for agility, for information to flow as quickly as possible. For people to be empowered by what they are able to do, not what they know. That's the architecture of our company." But the real answer to keeping wealthy employees motivated comes down to one thing — his own behavior: "How do I celebrate success? How do I celebrate failure? How do I talk about setbacks? Every single thing, I'm looking for opportunities to instill every single day. What is important, what's not important, what's the definition of good? How do you think about a journey? How do you think about results? All of that all day long." The lesson is clear: when money no longer motivates, culture does. When your top people no longer need the paycheck, what they need is a leader worth following.