as in ambitious
having a strong desire for personal advancement
she's the most hard-driving malpractice lawyer I've ever seen
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of hard-driving
In its hard-driving push to toughen immigration policy, the Trump administration has found an unusual ally: old and at times rarely enforced laws that can be used to further its goals.
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Henry Gass, Christian Science Monitor, 11 Apr. 2025
Brothers Osborne returns with a hard-driving, barroom-ready new track, while another brother duo, Band Reeves, melds country and pop with a faith-leaning message.
—Jessica Nicholson, Billboard, 7 Apr. 2025
The pleasantness of his company sits unsteadily beside his reputation for being, at times, hard-driving, harsh, and unempathetic.
—Anna Wiener, The New Yorker, 24 Mar. 2025
That same year, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had spent just over a decade as Turkey’s hard-driving prime minister, became its president.
—Michael Kimmage, Foreign Affairs, 25 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for hard-driving
Henry Gass, Christian Science Monitor, 11 Apr. 2025
Brothers Osborne returns with a hard-driving, barroom-ready new track, while another brother duo, Band Reeves, melds country and pop with a faith-leaning message.
—Jessica Nicholson, Billboard, 7 Apr. 2025
The pleasantness of his company sits unsteadily beside his reputation for being, at times, hard-driving, harsh, and unempathetic.
—Anna Wiener, The New Yorker, 24 Mar. 2025
That same year, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had spent just over a decade as Turkey’s hard-driving prime minister, became its president.
—Michael Kimmage, Foreign Affairs, 25 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for hard-driving
Recent Examples of Synonyms for hard-driving
Adjective
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Encoded in the machine's engineering was an ambitious globalism.—
Emily Feng,
NPR,
5 July 2025
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Lopez also has an ambitious and uninhibited way of speaking that is far removed from the prudence of players from older generations.—
Laia Cervelló Herrero,
New York Times,
4 July 2025
Adjective
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Following this ethos, Cano also trained and mentored aspiring musicians for decades, ultimately leading to his involvement in the 2000 founding of the Mariachi Master Apprentice Program (MMAP) in California’s San Fernando Valley.—
Michelle Mehrtens,
Smithsonian Magazine,
2 July 2025
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But most aspiring teen entrepreneurs get stuck in research mode, bouncing between TikTok tips and YouTube tutorials.—
Sarah Hernholm,
Forbes.com,
1 July 2025
Cite this Entry
“Hard-driving.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/hard-driving. Accessed 13 Jul. 2025.
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