11 Dec December 11, 2025 – Leadership Guru William Davis and Ring Doorbell James Siminoff
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Transcript
Jim Opening: Holiday Hustle & Big Guests Ahead
| Intro 1 0:04 Broadcasting from AM and FM stations around the country, welcome to the Small Business Administration award-winning School for Startups Radio, where we talk all things small business and entrepreneurship. Now here is your host, the guy that believes anyone can be a successful entrepreneur, because entrepreneurship is not about creativity, risk, or passion: Jim Beach. Jim Beach 0:26 Hello everyone. Welcome to another exciting edition of School for Startups Radio. I hope you’re having a great day out there. We’re getting ready for the holiday fun and making some money along the way. We still have another week or so when you can do some business. I hope you are getting all of your goals met and hitting your numbers and all of that. I have a great show for you today. We have several things we’re going to do. First, we have William C. Davis of WilliamCDavis.net, who has a new leadership book out. I will introduce him in just a second, so I won’t waste the time now, but it’s a very good conversation on empathy, building relationships, and credibility. Great, great conversation. After that, we’re going to play a Quick 10 and then learn a little bit more about Claude AI. It’s one of the new competing AIs. And so, Stuart Draper is going to play the Quick 10 and then explain Claude to us as sort of a bonus discussion there. We still have not had a winner on the Quick 10, but Stuart said he was going to, so we’ll see what happens there. And then we have a greatest hits from 2015. This is a 10-year-old interview, so listen to how different I am. The interviewee is James Siminoff, the founder of Ring doorbell, and it’s interesting: in this conversation, he is just about to sell the business. He knows that. I think I know that, and I’m asking it. He can’t tell it because of, of course, the rules and regulations. And so, it’s an interesting conversation, listening out for that part. But he is now, I guess, a billionaire from Ring, and has done incredibly well with it. So great, great to have him back in a 15-year-old fashion, to kind of get a check-in then and see what he was doing right as he was selling the business and becoming a billionaire. All right, great show. We’ll get started in just a second. Please go buy the book Real Environmentalists. Please, please, please. We need to sell more. It’s a great book about environmental entrepreneurs that are saving the Earth. Time to talk, no action… Real Environmentalist Ad 2:42 Time to talk, no action… On climate change, introducing The Real Environmentalists, the bold new book by Jim Beach. It’s not about activists, politicians, or professors. It’s about the entrepreneurs, real risk-takers, building cleaner, smarter solutions, not for applause, but for profit. The entrepreneurs in the book aren’t giving speeches. They’re in labs, factories, and offices, cleaning the past and building clean products for the future. The Real Environmentalists is available now, because the people saving the planet aren’t the ones you think. Go to Amazon and search for Real Environmentalists. |
Meet William David – Leadership Expert
| Jim Beach 3:11 Thank you. We are back, and again, thank you so very much for being with us. Very excited to introduce my first guest today. His name is William Davis. He is a leadership expert with an incredible background and pedigree, 40 years in the corporate world, where he learned the difference between managers who hold authority and managers who earn loyalty. There’s a huge difference there. He was able to maintain 90% retention for decades as a manager himself. He is author of How to Lead Without Just Managing and Building Genuine Relationships, and he is the founder of The Leadership Blueprint. Very impressive. William, welcome to the show. How are you doing? William Davis 4:05 Good, Jim. How are you doing? Jim Beach 4:05 I’m very well, thank you. So what is the state of leadership today? William Davis 4:05 Well, many people believe we have a leadership crisis. In 2023, the World Economic Forum actually came out of their yearly session in Switzerland, you know, claiming we had a world leadership crisis. It wasn’t just corporate, it was all across the spectrum. And then the same year, the U.S. News & World Report / Harris Poll came out with a U.S.-based sampling: 86% were disappointed in leaders. Seventy-eight percent felt like we had a crisis in corporate America. So obviously, there’s something missing in our leaders. Jim Beach 4:43 Leaders like Trump and Pelosi and all of those people, or does that mean the personal leader that I have in my office? William Davis 4:50 That’s personal… yeah. Oh, absolutely, that’s the personal leader you have in your office. From a governmental perspective, there were actually 84% who thought we had a leadership crisis, which, honestly, I thought was a little low based upon the state of things. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. So yeah, you know, my focus has always been from a corporate perspective. But yes, we have, you know… and even in the family, you can talk about the fact that we have leadership crises there. Jim Beach 5:21 All right, but we have so many gurus and books now. There’s never been more gurus and books, William, so why are we at a crisis? William Davis 5:31 Well, I think the biggest thing is that we look at the wrong thing as far as building leaders and then them connecting to their folks. We are such a society where everything’s the bottom line: what is the profit margin, and how do you contribute to that? And if you don’t contribute to that, how do we improve it or move you out? Where really, we need to focus on leadership as — and it will always be — about building the human relationship. If I can build a relationship with my team or with whatever group I’m leading, then the success that I can have with them is, you know, astronomical, because I create an authentic relationship where they believe that I am invested in them, and then they are invested in helping me help them be successful. And I think that’s just, you know… you look at today, where, you know, we’ve gone to these stacked rankings, and it’s just like everything that we can do to make it about corporate, make it about money, and we forget about the fact that it’s the people that actually bring the success. |
William Davis: Empathy: The Leader’s Core Skill
| Jim Beach 6:46 All right, is leadership a trait that you’re born with, or can I learn it? William Davis 6:54 I think there are certain aspects of it, Jim, that are something you either have or you don’t. I think empathy is probably the first one that I would list. Again, people either have the ability to be empathetic to others and understand challenges that they have and how it relates to how they work day to day, or they don’t. There are some attributes I think that you can learn, but if you don’t have the basics of care — being able to care about other people, being able to understand that leadership is about you helping them be successful, not about you being yourself successful — then you’re going to… Jim Beach 7:39 You said that wrong, William. I’m pretty sure you said that wrong. Leadership is about making me more successful. I could care less about you. Why do I think you said that wrong? Go back and say… William Davis 7:53 Well, I go back to: me as a leader, I am concerned… Jim Beach 7:53 Yeah. William Davis 7:53 Yeah, okay, gotcha. All right, all right. Now, yeah, again, and that’s what a lot of people view, is that they view their team as the competition, and as my team has success, as my individual people have success, it threatens them. And, you know, in my career, I can’t even begin to tell you how many people that worked for me passed me by, and that was exciting for me, because it meant that I allowed them to spread their wings and grow and do what they wanted to do in their career, and they could do it here with me. They didn’t feel like they had to go off somewhere else and do it. Jim Beach 8:40 Well, but then you don’t get the raise. William Davis 8:42 Well, you know, sometimes that just happens. You know, leadership is, again, about the fact of, hey, let’s be successful together. And I was always… the first thing I told my folks is, we win together, we lose together. You know, if we stumble, we fix it, and we move on. And if somebody is going to end up having to take a hit, that’s going to be me, because I’m the leader of this group. But you guys, I’m not going to penalize you for taking risks. I’m not going to penalize you for being innovative. And if, you know, again, everything in the corporate world that you deal with is fixable. I don’t care what people say, it’s fixable, and you just have to be able to, you know, keep your emotions under control. Don’t fly off the handle when something goes wrong, and that allows your people to understand that, hey, I have flexibility here to try to do this the right way. Jim Beach 9:37 It seems to me that anything that you can have empathy over is illegal to talk about. William Davis 9:43 Oh, anymore it certainly, certainly is. And, you know, I understand that there are certain lines that you have to be careful that you don’t cross with individuals. But, you know, when somebody… and everybody has good days, bad days, and you as a leader have to be able to get them through those, right, especially the bad days, where they don’t hurt themselves on the other side — their career, the work you’re doing, etc. And while there is a line, I, as a leader, have to understand: (1) the challenge the person is dealing with is real to them. I may think it’s silly, but it’s real to them. And as being real to them, they need to have it resolved. So to the extent I can, I help direct them, whether it’s to HR within the company, whether it’s outside organizations that might be able to help them with whatever the issue is. Because generally, when somebody is having a challenge like that, you know, a crisis like that, they’re not thinking necessarily about what’s the solution outside of themselves fixing it, and that is one thing I can contribute as a leader, is to help them get through it. |
William Davis: Trust, Credibility & Small Wins
| Jim Beach 10:51 Yes, but how do you even get to the point of knowing that their kid is at home having trouble with school, if you’re not allowed to ask, “Do you have children?” William Davis 11:01 Well, I don’t… yeah, I don’t ask them that. And let me give you an example. I had a young lady who came to work for me. She was very young, but very, very smart, and did just excellent in the interview. And when she came to work for me, she began to constantly bring, you know, everything to my attention: say, “Is this okay? Is this okay? Is this okay?” And I’m like, okay, that’s not what I expect, right? I want her to be independent and do what she needs to do. So I established a relationship with her based on what made her comfortable. I didn’t bring her in my office. I didn’t bring her in a boardroom and say, “Let’s talk.” She liked to walk every day at lunch, so I just asked her one day, “Can I go with you?” And we did. And finally, about the third time around the lake, I said, “Okay, help me understand why you constantly ask for my approval,” and all of a sudden, I mean, the waterworks just poured out. The person that she’d had prior to me was such a horrendous micromanager and so controlling that everything she did, regardless of how little or how big it was, he had to approve. So when you’re able to establish a relationship with someone based on making them comfortable enough to feel like they can share with you without, you know, something bad coming from it, then you’re able to then get into those types of situations where you understand what’s going on in their life. Absolutely, you’ve got to be careful, because HR and some people are very litigious and will do everything they can to knock you down. But it doesn’t mean that you can’t try to establish the relationship to make the person comfortable enough to be able to share with you. Jim Beach12:49 All right. Well, you mentioned…Empathy, and we know that you have the blueprint. Is the blueprint a list of things that we can put down, like empathy, that we need to focus on? Yes, blueprint, or my fingers get bluish? William Davis 13:08 Well, your fingers are probably getting… yeah, probably getting bluish. You know, there’s a lot of things I talk about in regards to, like, building the relationship correctly, like we were just talking about. And, you know, as you build that relationship, you build trust, you build credibility with your people, because you’re treating them like they want to be treated — again, Golden Rule, “Do unto others” — and you treat them like they matter. And you do that by, you know, giving them public recognition, you know. And it may be just small things, but, “Hey, you know, this is important. You did it. You were successful. Be proud of it.” And I think one of the challenges that we have is we always wait till the end of a project or the end of a work, you know, sampling and say, “Okay, now we can celebrate. Now…” Celebrate the little wins along the way, because that means so much to people. It gives them the feeling that, hey, I’m contributing, I’m doing something worthwhile. And so, when you do that and you give them public recognition, you also inspire them to be creative. And that’s one thing I think people get so frustrated about: they’re told to do something, but they’re not told why, and that’s important — to understand the why of what I’m doing. Because when I understand the why, I’m able to then look outside the box and say, “Okay, how can I creatively maybe do this more efficiently?” Right? And then you, as a leader, give them that ability to do that and not… you know, if something goes sideways, don’t slam them because of it. Say, “Okay, let’s go back and let’s start over, or let’s do it again.” And, you know, it’s all those types of things that help build up the human feeling of themselves doing the right thing, being recognized, and feeling like they’re important doing something. Jim Beach 15:08 Yes, it is absolutely critical. And the why is so important. And even in, you know, lecturing in school and stuff, the kids need to know why it’s important. About Japanese business, you know? Yeah, that was beat into my head early on. So what do we do when we have problem employees that just don’t belong, shouldn’t be there in the first place, and they are challenging us in our leadership? What do we do? William Davis 15:49 Well, I would encourage people: first, when you’re challenged, make sure you don’t overreact, because someone challenging you is not necessarily a hit on your authority or questioning your authority. It may, again, be them trying to understand the why, right? So, you know, just dig deeper. Just say, “Okay, let’s sit down and talk about where your concerns are and what we can do to improve.” You go through a patient process to try to help them, you know, understand why you’re doing what you’re doing and how you’re doing it, and why you’re doing it that way. And then you get to the point where they just, you know, continue to push back and push back or cause disruptions. You end up just… you have to move them out, because at the end of the day, as much as you try to build the relationship properly and make it work, you cannot allow it to be detrimental to the overall team. Jim Beach 16:51 How do I pass leadership on? |
William Davis: How to Grow Future Leaders
| William Davis 16:55 Well, that’s a great question. I think, you know, the first thing I always say is: to pass leadership on to someone, they have to want to be a leader, because leadership’s a job, right? You know, managers… and when I talk about managers and bosses and leaders in my first book, I talk very specifically about, you know, leaders being different than managers and bosses as far as their mentality goes. Managers focus on tasks, getting the work done. Leaders focus on their people. So if I want to be a leader, I have to have that mentality that I want to see others succeed, and I want to help them get there. So make sure, first, the person you’re choosing or mentoring to be a leader has that mentality. They want it for the right reason — not for the pay, not for the title, not for the, you know, perceived authority, you know, or, to your point earlier, the extra pay — but that they’re really wanting to invest in people and give back. And one of the ways I look at people to determine whether that is a sincere motive or not is I look at: how do they deal with their family and their closest friends? Because if they can’t deal with their family and closest friends in a respectful, courteous, kind way, I can’t ever expect them to do that with people that they don’t really even have association or relationship with. So to me, that’s, you know, that’s big red X number one, and really kind of pushes them out of the way. So if you get somebody that is sincere, you just mentor them. Again, it’s helping them understand the thought process that you have and what you’re doing, why you’re doing it. Give them, you know, increased responsibilities, whether it’s, you know, incrementally at a time, or you give them something big and, you know, challenge them. But again, it’s giving them the ability to grow or fail on their own. When they fail, you pick them up. You don’t slam them, you don’t criticize them, you know. You help teach them: “Okay, here’s what went wrong, and here’s how we improve it or do that better next time.” Jim Beach 19:13 One of the biggest mistakes is when you are just incorrect and you think you’re something that you’re not. You think you’re a really good boxer, but you’re not. You’re going to get beat up. You think you’re really good at three-card monte, and you’re on the streets of New York, you’re going to come home poor, right? What happens when I think I’m a leader and I’m not? Do we have that category? Do you know that person? I’ve met that person. William Davis 19:38 Oh yeah. Oh yeah, I’ve met a bunch of them. And if they’re sincere, they will understand and acknowledge it and look to seek improvement. You do have those that are just so arrogant that they think that they are the greatest thing since sliced bread. And, you know, that’s one of those deals where you have to sometimes go around them, as, you know, someone who’s an underling to them, when they’re just completely detrimental to the team, and kind of be a leader yourself, become a leader yourself to those around you. But if you realize you’re not a leader, but you’re really sincere about wanting to be one, and you want to improve, again, you seek out somebody that you respect as a leader and, you know, look at them and see what they do and how they do it, and try to understand the whys. And, you know, seek counsel. You know, I’ve never been blamed about being the smartest person in the room — never will you ask anybody that ever worked for me. But you know what I did do was own my own mistakes, and if I found myself lacking, I sought out someone who wasn’t lacking in that area and tried to learn from them and tried to emulate how they did it. Jim Beach 21:00 How does the military do, in your opinion? William Davis 21:05 Well, certainly the understanding of taking care of your men first. You know, particularly in the chow hall, I always heard the comment, you know, officers make sure their men eat first, right? Their men are taken care of. And I think, you know, that’s certainly a commendable attitude and something that is important, but it’s got to be more than that. It’s got to be, again, you know, yes, there’s the mission, yes, there’s something we have to accomplish, but we don’t necessarily put our people in peril. And I think we have had a number of cases throughout our history where we probably made the wrong decision in that regard, because, you know, I myself aren’t going into that position. I’m sending somebody else. So what do I care? Or I don’t …consider the cost, right? Jim Beach 21:54 Ooh, that sucks. Yeah, you don’t… normally, I don’t normally think of the military doing that so much as… William Davis 22:06 Well, I think, you know, again, not in a, you know, maybe intentional sense or whatever. But, you know, when you don’t do your due diligence right on a battle plan, or, you know, the next step of what you’re doing, you know, it can really cause some harm. Jim Beach 22:27 What are the blind spots that we have about our leadership? William Davis 22:32 Well, I think the first blind spot is assuming that somebody who has a title, has a corner office, has all the money in the world, is good at what they do or is a good leader. Because I think — you and I talked about that earlier — there’s plenty of indication that that’s not the case. And so, you know, give deference to them, but don’t, you know, buy into the “everything they do is right, and they can never make mistakes,” because that just… that just doesn’t work. And in doing that, you make sure that you are continually looking for ways to improve, not just yourself, but maybe the work that you’re doing. I think the second thing is, understand that leaders make mistakes, and too many of them are not willing to own their own mistakes. They’ve always got an excuse. They’ve always got a reason. It’s always somebody else’s fault. And so, you know, leaders can make mistakes too, and just as easily and oftentimes in a lot more prominent way than, you know, the people that they lead. So again, if you’re a leader, own up to it. You know you’re allowed to make mistakes. You don’t have to be perfect. And so, when you do that, again, you’re buying credibility. You’re creating trust with your folks, those that you deal with, and they’re a lot more willing to go to bat for you and help move mountains than they would be if you weren’t that way. Jim Beach 24:12 And finally, what do I do in a crisis, William? What’s the best leadership? William Davis 24:21 The first thing that you do is you keep calm yourself. Every crisis is just something that’s gone wrong, and it can be fixed. And so your response to it sets the tone for your team or for those who are working on it. So if you’re calm, you’re deliberate, you are working as a group to get it resolved, as opposed to trying to pick and choose or find somebody to blame for where you’re at, the situation is going to get resolved a whole lot quicker and a whole lot smoother than if you fly off the handle, you try to do it all yourself, you overreact. Because in overreacting, people lose confidence in not just themselves, but they lose confidence in you, and then things continue to go wrong as opposed to getting resolved. Jim Beach 25:18 Very well said. William, how do we find out more, follow you online, get a copy of the books, get in touch, etc.? William Davis 25:25 Yeah, Jim, I really appreciate and thank you for having me on. I have a website. It’s called WilliamCDavis.net — WilliamCDavis.net. It has all my keynotes, my workshops, my appearances on podcasts, and there’s also a link there to my books out on Amazon. Jim Beach 25:42 Fantastic. William, thank you so very much. We’d love to have you back, and happy holidays. William Davis 25:49 Thank you. You too, Jim. Jim Beach 25:51 And we will be right back. |
Quick 10 with Stuart Draper
| Stuart Draper 26:03 Well, Jim, I’m so excited for my favorite part of your show, which is the Quick 10 game. Jim Beach 26:09 Oh, you want to play? Can we do it? Let’s go right now. Number one, your favorite creative… oh, I forgot, do you want to accept the wager? Stuart Draper 26:18 Oh, what’s the wager? Jim Beach 26:18 The standard bet that everyone else makes, which is, you know, the bet on the outcome that everyone always does. I’ve got the bet. I mean, there you go. Number one, your favorite creativity hack. Stuart Draper 26:32 Favorite creativity hack: get outside. Adventure is where I have found that I get the most creative. Jim Beach 26:39 Number two, favorite bootstrapping trick. Stuart Draper 26:43 Oh man, utilize your network. You have to go to friends and family first and connect that way. Jim Beach 26:52 Number three, name your top passions. Stuart Draper 26:55 Oh, my wife, my kids, my faith, my hobby of boating, and my hobby of baseball. Jim Beach 27:09 Number four, the first three steps in starting a business are… Stuart Draper 27:13 Sales first, then figuring out the type of entity to create. And then, geez, I guess it goes product, sales, and then legal — in that order. Jim Beach 27:27 Number five, the best way to get your first real customer is… Stuart Draper 27:33 Best way to get your first real customer is ask. Too many people are afraid to ask. Jim Beach 27:41 Number six, your dreamiest technology is… Stuart Draper 27:46 Claude AI. I am absolutely in love with what Claude can do for me. Jim Beach 27:52 Number eight, worst entrepreneurial mistake. Stuart Draper 27:55 Worst entrepreneurial mistake is partnership without contract. Jim Beach 28:03 Number nine, favorite entrepreneur, why? Stuart Draper 28:07 Elon Musk, because he does not need to be one, but he’s changing the world by continuing to have influence versus sitting back and relaxing on a beach. Jim Beach 28:18 Number 10, favorite superhero. Stuart Draper 28:20 My favorite superheroes are my parents. I get it, I’m giving a two-for-one there. My parents are my superheroes. Jim Beach 28:31 Fantastic. While we calculate the answer, or the score, how do we get in touch with you, find out more? Stuart Draper 28:07 28:37 Yes. So if you search up “Startups with Stu,” you will find me. My name is Stuart Draper. I’m on LinkedIn, if you want to search up that way. But “Startups with Stu,” go find that on Google — you’ll find the podcast, you’ll find my website, all that good stuff. Jim Beach 28:52 Fantastic. I’m just kind of pausing until… oh, Stuart, I am so bummed. Oh, this is devastating. You got a 94 — 94. It’s an excellent score, but you have to have a 95 to win the wager. Apparently, we had a judge from Wisconsin that doesn’t like people from Idaho or something. I don’t know what that’s about, but anyway, we always play for a Tesla. So thank you for that. I’ll look forward to receiving one in the mail. Stuart Draper 28:07 29:22 Ninety-four out of 100 is an A. I’ll take the A. I’m an A student. Jim Beach 29:27 So there we go. Why is Claude so much better than other AIs? Pitch Claude to me. Stuart Draper 28:07 29:34 The thing that I love about Claude is that it is such a good language learning model. The actual text that it writes back is written in such good English that makes perfect sense to me. And then I’ve been able to… my favorite thing to do with it is to run a business idea through it. So if I’m considering investing in a business, or if I’m considering starting a business, I just walk through every last question, and it does such a good job of not just giving me the answer, but then thinking ahead of time about the next questions it needs to be asking me and getting to the best possible final business plan. And I recommend it for every new founder. No founder should ever start a business after 2024 without using an AI to help you think it through. Jim Beach 30:27 Great suggestion. Stuart, thank you so much for being with us. Startups with Stu. Thanks a lot, Stu, we’d love to have you back. Stuart Draper 28:07 30:36 Jim Beach, thanks. You’re the man. Appreciate you. Jim Beach 30:36 And we will be right back. |
Meet James Siminoff – Chief Inventor and Founder of Ring
| Intro 2 30:56 Well, that’s a, that’s a, that’s a wonderful question, actually, Jim. Oh my gosh, I love the opportunity to do this. Thank you, Jim. Wow, that’s, that’s, that’s a great one. You know, that is a phenomenal question. That’s a great question. And I don’t have a great answer. That’s a great question. Oh, that is such a loaded question. And that’s actually a really good question. Jim Beach 31:19 And welcome back to School for Startups Radio. Thank you again so much for being with us today. I hope you’re using today to stay motivated, go out there and start a company and take over the world. I am very excited and honored to introduce you to my first guest today. His name is James Siminoff, and you saw him on Shark Tank about a year or so ago. He has a company called Ring, which is an incredible addition to the safety of your home. The company is called Bot Home Automation, and James has won tons of awards. He’s not only been on Shark Tank, but I think Jay Leno made fun of him, or we… well, there was a Jay Leno reference, and also Time magazine called it one of the top 10 gadgets of last year. James, welcome to the show. How are you doing today? James Siminoff 28:07 32:28 Thanks for having me. Jim Beach 32:28 I am excited to learn about you and the product. Let’s start right there. Tell us about the birth of Ring, how you got the idea for it, how you found a manufacturer. Just walk us through the whole thing. James Siminoff 32:28 Sure. So Ring is a… first of all, Ring is a smart doorbell, so it allows you to see and speak to visitors from anywhere using your smartphones or tablets. It just goes over your Wi-Fi in your house. And the idea that came… I was actually, I had sold a company and was working in my garage, and I was missing every visitor, package, everything that was coming. So I literally just went on and started looking for a video doorbell that would go to my phone, because I thought it would be a great solution. And I did one of those things where I just couldn’t believe it wasn’t out there already, and it ended up becoming something that I ended up building and then, you know, marketing, and so three years later, now, you know, here we are. Jim Beach 33:07 All right, and describe in a little more detail. So over the Wi-Fi in my home, from vacation in Mexico, on my iPad, I can answer my door. Is that the idea? James Siminoff 33:21 Jim or James, and you both… it’s both the video and also the audio, so you can fully answer it. It really allows you to sort of be “always home.” You know, if the guest is someone — or the visitor is someone — who wants to leave a package, you can ask them to leave the package and then call a neighbor and have them pick it up. Or if it’s someone who’s checking to see if the house is occupied, you can act as if the house is, yeah… Jim Beach 33:42 You can pretend that you are at home: “I’ll be downstairs in a minute. Just leave it there for me right now, and I’ll come get it in a minute,” or something like that. James Siminoff 33:42 Exactly. Jim Beach 33:42 I love it. I love it. All right, so how has the product been received? Obviously, it’s won all sorts of awards. How many have you sold? James Siminoff 34:00 So we’ve sold a lot. We’ve… I think our last announcement was that we’ve sold over, like, 40-something thousand units. Jim Beach 34:06 And how are you doing that? Is it online or retail? What’s your distribution at this point? James Siminoff 34:11 Yeah, so historically so far, we’ve been actually just direct online on our website, which is Ring.com, and we now are just starting to get into retail. We’ll probably start to get into major retailers just in, like, May, June, and July. And the way it works with retailers is, you know, you basically ship to their warehouses. So we’re starting to ship to warehouses now, and then three months after that… Jim Beach 34:38 Okay, and do we know what stores are going to be doing it yet? James Siminoff 34:43 Haven’t announced any of the stores yet, but, I mean, some of the bigger national electronics chains, big, big hardware store chains. Yeah, we’ll probably be in about 5,000-plus stores by the summer. Jim Beach 34:56 Awesome. Well, congratulations on that, James. It’s an amazing accomplishment. Let’s switch gears a little bit. Tell us about the Shark Tank experience. Did you get a deal? Who was it with? What were they like? Did they treat you fairly in the edit process, all that kind of stuff? |
James Siminoff: The Shark Tank Deal James Refused
| James Siminoff 35:15 Sure. So it was, first of all, an amazing experience. I was a big fan of the show before; I’ve watched for a long time, so I kind of already liked the show and actually really was a sort of fan of it. We were very lucky to get on it. I mean, the year that we went on, I think 40,000 inventors and entrepreneurs applied. You know, sometimes luck plays a big role in success, and that was one of those times. And, you know, once you get accepted — I think a little-known fact is that they basically accept you and ask you to come in and tape, and it’s a pretty big, grueling process to get ready for taping. After you tape, only a certain percentage of people actually air. So it’s not even all the people that tape who even go, you know, get onto the actual TV. So it’s kind of a crazy, stressful process. The actual being on the show — they tape you for about an hour. It is totally kind of live. They don’t stop it. They don’t ask, “Repeat yourself,” or, you know, “Can you make this moment better with… you know, can you and Mark Cuban stand this way when you talk?” or anything like that. So it’s a fully real and very stressful environment. It’s probably the most stressful thing that any entrepreneur can do, because you’re usually pitching your company to investors or venture capitalists or anyone like that. Even being on a radio show, you’re not trying to be kind of witty with every answer. And when you’re on Shark Tank, because they’re cutting it down from about an hour to, let’s say, about 12 minutes, you want every one of those sound bites really good, and you also want to make sure you air. And so you have to give them enough to make sure that it’s a good segment. So it was a really, really stressful thing to do for an hour, to sit there and answer questions in that way. Jim Beach 37:08 And did we get a deal? James Siminoff 37:11 So Mr. Wonderful gave us an offer for a deal, but it was one of those kind of royalty… whatever… Jim Beach 37:19 $87 for every unit you sell in perpetuity, and then I get your first-born child… James Siminoff 37:24 Exactly, so we ended up turning that down. But, you know, the exposure from being on Shark Tank… I mean, the awareness and credibility that you get from being on that show is like nothing… I don’t think there is a single thing that an entrepreneur can do that is as powerful as Shark Tank is today. You know, it just really is. There’s just nothing out there that gives you that sort of steroid injection to your company like they do. |
James Siminoff: The Shark Tank Effect on Ring
James Siminoff: Ring’s Scrappy Startup Journey
| James Siminoff 44:43 It’s been financed in every possible way you can imagine. So I financed it to start myself. We then raised a little money. We did do some pre-sales. The company has been out of cash, I think, three or four times, where we basically ran the well dry and were able to, you know, get the next amount in. At this point now, I think we’re hopefully out of those issues happening. But, you know, as a young, sort of, hardware company, it is very difficult. These companies do take a ton of cash to build properly. I mean, just the engineering resources that you need, R&D — it’s really kind of an incredible amount of cash that these companies take. Jim Beach 45:33 And you mentioned before that you sold a company and were working out of your garage. Did you put some of your own startup capital in it? Did you fund it a little bit at the beginning with prior asset sales? James Siminoff 45:46 I did. I funded it in the beginning, and then when we hit points where we kind of ran out of capital, I bridged the company a few times personally to make sure we got through these things. People always ask, like, “How do you do this? How do you do that?” as they’re trying to figure out startups. And the reality is, I mean, they’re really difficult, and, you know, I don’t know if it would have survived if I hadn’t had another exit and been able to personally write some checks in, because, you know, especially typically when you’re doing that is when the company is not looking very good — partly why you’re out of money and also because, you know, you’re in these in-between stages of, you know, before you launch a product, before you ship. And so, you know, sometimes you have to be able to do that. It is very hard to… especially hardware companies are very hard to make work because of the capital requirements. Jim Beach 46:37 And 53 employees — how has the HR issue been for you? Has that been easy? Has it been hard to find employees? How’s that been? James Siminoff 46:50 I’m also fortunate. I’ve been doing this for… I’ve been an entrepreneur since college, so I think that’s like 15 years I’ve had the different businesses. And so a lot of the people that work with me today have worked with me in other companies that I’ve run or co-founded or been part of over the last 15 years. So a lot of the core team are people that I’ve had some working knowledge with. And I think, again, another thing is, I think a lot of being an entrepreneur is that it’s not an overnight success, that it takes time to build up a lot of these things. Now, some people are lucky, and they’ll hit it right off the bat. You know, they’ll get a company, and in the first few years it’ll become worth, you know, a lot of money and be very successful and have a great team. But, you know, I think for a lot of us, including myself, I think it takes time to build those things up. And, you know, it is very hard to hire 53 people if they’re all people that you don’t know, especially at the senior level, because, you know, how do you work with these people? Do they culturally fit? Are they, you know, on track as you are to… on what you’re building as a company? And I think it’s, you know, it is very, very hard to just do that overnight. And that’s… I’ve had an advantage in that — of being able to have history with people and how they’re going to react to situations, and being able to, you know, build something with them. Jim Beach 48:09 And it’s interesting you referred earlier to the role of luck in your success. It’s kind of like the duck, James — calm above the water, paddling like hell underneath. And I just don’t believe you. Luck has nothing to do with your success. I’m going to call you a BS, sir. James Siminoff48:29 Luck has everything. I mean, I was actually just talking to someone this weekend who is an extremely wealthy person and has been beyond successful. And, you know, he said the same thing. You know, I think success comes from… I think it comes from hard work, for sure. I’ve never… I really haven’t seen very many people that didn’t work hard that were successful. It comes from passion — of being able to really sort of, you know, follow through. Focus is another big one. And then luck, though. You need to have luck. There are a lot of smart people who worked really hard and had great ideas and have failed miserably all their lives and have ended up not being, let’s say, quote-unquote successful in terms of having either the monetary or, you know, the impact that their startups or their companies should have had. And I think that has to do with luck. I think luck plays a big role in it. I think we have to appreciate the fact that you can’t be so smart as to not have some luck on your side. Jim Beach 49:27 Can you create your luck? Does luck come to those who are searching for it? James Siminoff 49:33 I think luck comes to people that work really hard and are, you know… passion — and the reason passion works so well is because without passion you’ll give up. And when you give up, you can no longer have any luck on your side because you’ve given up. I think between… you know, I think hard work and passion are two things that I see valid amongst many different sorts of entrepreneurs. And I think, as far as luck, I think the longer you stay at something, the more chances you have in luck. But I do think that there is a luck component to it that you just can’t dismiss, because — and again, I think the proof of that is there are a lot of very successful, extremely smart, way smarter-than-I-am entrepreneurs and founders who have started, you know, a company that goes to billions of dollars in revenue or exit or whatever, and then the next two or three companies they do are just complete failures. And I think a lot of that is luck. And then you’ll see, you know, the same idea that they had that failed, someone does, you know, two years later. The timing of something else out of everyone’s control is better, and then that company ends up becoming a huge success. So I think, you know, just doing it… and timing — timing is part of what… …out of our control. James Siminoff 50:57 Timing — you really can’t time things. And, you know, the timing of a startup, of an idea, of whatever, it really does play into the best of what it’s going to be. Jim Beach 51:06 You’re breaking up a little bit, James. You with us? James Siminoff 51:10 Sorry about that. Yeah. Jim Beach 51:13 Okay. Oh, I agree with you. I think luck is a huge part of it. It’s certainly very interesting the way you describe it, and I found some great Twitter moments in there. At what age did you realize you were not going to be going down the traditional path — not going to be a normal office worker, beyond plebeian pawn in the world there, James? James Siminoff 51:38 I think I kind of always was this. I mean, I had… I was always, even in high school, I was selling something or doing something or, you know… I was, like, on the way to school, I used to clean out horse stalls in the morning so I could make some money there. And then I had… I mean, I just always was, like, flipping, doing something to make money, to do something. I was always building stuff in the basement. So I think I was just the kind of person… I didn’t really fit into a corporation. I think that’s, you know… I think I would… I would be more of founding businesses because I just didn’t really… I don’t think I could have gotten a job. And I don’t… you know, it was almost the opposite. It wasn’t that I was such a maverick that I thought I could start companies. I think it was more that I just felt like I would just never succeed in an interview. Jim Beach 52:24 Well, I was fortunate. I got run out of Coca-Cola. They told me I should go be an entrepreneur, and I was like, “Entre-what? I’ve never heard that word before.” And so I learned early, at 24, 25, that the corporate life was not going to work for me. So I’m exactly right there with you, James. How can we find out more about you, follow you on Twitter, check you out on Facebook, look up the Ring, buy a Ring, all that kind of stuff? James Siminoff 52:52 So it’s Ring.com, which is hopefully as easy of a domain as you can have. Everything is there. I am lightly on Twitter — “JamieSiminoff,” one word, @JamieSiminoff. Not a huge social sort of public guy that way. But other than that, you can find everything at Ring.com, and my email address is there and everything else. So from that side, everyone can stay in contact with me if they want to. Jim Beach 53:22 Fantastic. Thank you so much for being on the show today. You’ve been a great guest. Thank you so much for the information and the stories, the Shark Tank experience, and I hope you’ll come back on the show when you sell your 100,000 units. James Siminoff 53:22 I will absolutely do that. Thank you so much. Jim Beach 53:22 Excellent. We are out of time for today, but back tomorrow. That’s what we do every day. Have a great day, everybody. Go make a million dollars, have some holiday fun, and take care of your family. Bye now. |
| Jim Beach 37:53 Right. Well, they call it the Shark Tank Effect. Even though you didn’t get a deal, it still helped you get into these five big-box retailers, I would assume. Was that critical? James Siminoff 38:06 Yeah, I mean, kind of. You know, it really was like… I mean, it was really like an injection of adrenaline. I mean, it increased our sales, which allowed us to hire more, you know, hire more engineers, things like that, which allowed us to build out our product. It gave us the credibility that when we did walk into a big retailer, they’d already seen us, and that there was this kind of effect from that of, you know, everyone… I mean, there are a lot of people out there that like the show, and a lot of big executives like the show and… go to a retailer and, you know, you get the biggest buyer, for example, and a retailer would never come to a meeting like this, and they come because, you know, they say, “Yeah, I saw you on Shark Tank. I was sitting with my family watching it. It’s so cool. What do you, you know, what did you really think when Mr. Wonderful said this?” And so obviously that doesn’t hurt you when you’re there, because, you know, as a nobody company, typically, you walk in and you have to, you know, claw your way up, and instead you’re kind of coming from the opposite side. So, yeah, I don’t think it can be understated how important it is for a company to be on, you know, a show like Shark Tank, where you have just all… I mean, all of that in one shot is kind of incredible. Jim Beach 39:15 And then what did Jay Leno say about you? James Siminoff 39:19 The Jay Leno thing actually was really funny. It was totally random, and we had no idea it was going to happen. It was when Justin Bieber was throwing the eggs at his neighbor’s house, right? And so they took our three-minute video and cut it up and basically made it like a funny video of Bieber getting caught on the Doorbot, you know, with throwing the eggs. So it was this… it was really, really… I mean, it was part of his monologue. It was right at the end, I think it was the last two weeks before he went off air. So it was kind of a really cool thing to, you know, be able to kind of sneak in and actually have been on, you know, in essence, on Jay Leno, because obviously that’s not going to happen anymore. He’s gone. Jim Beach 40:05 Well, he’ll come back with another product soon, I bet. I wouldn’t be surprised. But that is cool as hell to be that made fun of as a, you know, as one of the things…I was actually referenced in a David Letterman Top Ten list as one of the dorkiest things in the world. I was teaching a class at a university, and we were doing a study abroad, and all of the students got iPads — maybe it was iTouches or something, the latest whatever it was at the time — as part of the curriculum, and Letterman made fun of me in a Top Ten list. So we were all very proud of that. Anyway, you’re right. That is just an incredible thing for your company. That’s really cool. James Siminoff 40:51 So it also just shows, I mean, it again, it shows that Shark Tank Effect and obviously what else… all this other stuff that we’ve done that we’ve been able to break into, you know, really be kind of the leader of our space, which is sort of, you know, the front-entrance monitoring doorbell, you know, smart doorbell. So, you know, it’s kind of… you know, when you see Jay Leno, you know, using your stuff as a way to do a gag, I mean, obviously you’ve been able to break into another level of, sort of, you know, in your startup. So, yeah, definitely kind of a fun thing. Jim Beach 41:22 Yeah, the next thing you can hope for is to be a Saturday Night Live skit somehow. James Siminoff 41:29 That is definitely… yeah, that would be top on the list. Jim Beach 41:33 Yeah, you should send a free product to everyone on the cast James Siminoff 41:36 Yeah, not a bad idea. Jim Beach 41:39 Yeah, it’s Studio 8H, 30 Rockefeller Center, New York, New York, right? And just drop off 100 at the door. James Siminoff 41:49 I might be doing it. Jim Beach 41:52 Well, if you do, I want credit in your marketing campaign. Okay, what’s next for the company then, James? Do you have other cool products in mind in the home automation space, or do you run with this? What are your thoughts? James Siminoff 42:09 I think it’s funny. I think the easy thing is to have lots of other cool products in mind. I think the hard thing is to stay focused. So we’re going to go the harder route, which is to actually stay focused and really build a company and not just sort of scatter-shot a lot of products. I think, you know, as a small company — we’re 53 people now — you can’t be launching, you know, 10 different products in the home. I mean, even a company like Nest, which is an 800-person company, you know, they only have three products in the market, and they bought Dropcam as their third. So, you know, it’s really tough to get this stuff right. And so we’re going to really stay focused just on this doorbell, our doorbell market. We will, you know, come out with a different version, you know, every X years, and we’ll, you know, upgrade. Obviously, stuff inside of it is better, chips come out, and we take advantage of technology. But we’re really going to stay, you know, highly focused on the door-entry side of things. Jim Beach 43:09 Well, that makes a lot of sense. I love the focus. It’s certainly what the books at a school like Babson would teach us to do. Did you take entrepreneurship classes? I am referencing, of course, your undergraduate experience at Babson, which is the number one entrepreneurship place in the world. I don’t think that, really, anyone will dispute that when it comes to a university. You won’t dispute that, of course, James. And did you learn stuff like that there? James Siminoff 43:37 I did. I did. It was, you know… and I think people always ask, you know, like, “How can you go to school for entrepreneurship?” And I think that the reality is, you can’t go to school… you can’t go to school for entrepreneurship in terms of: you’re not going to get taught how to be able to deal with the mental side of actually starting a company or having that passion of starting a company. But you can learn things like not running out of cash, you know, legal things, stuff like that. And I think that’s where Babson definitely does help, is they are able to, you know, teach you these pieces. And so I definitely learned, you know, a lot of that sort of, I guess, discipline of being an entrepreneur at Babson, I think. Jim Beach 44:20 All right, well, that’s really interesting. They certainly produce great conferences and other products, so I think that they’re doing a great job. Let me ask you about the funding for Ring. How has this company been financed, and how have you gotten financed? Fifty-three employees — what can you tell us about that? |
William Davis – Leadership Expert, Keynote Speaker & Mentor
If you’re calm, you’re deliberate, you are working as a group to get it
resolved, as opposed to trying to pick and choose or find somebody to
blame for where you’re at, the situation is gonna get resolved a whole lot quicker.
William Davis
William Davis is a leadership expert, keynote speaker, mentor, and advocate who has spent nearly four decades in corporate America, leading teams and driving transformative projects. From his early days as a student in Future Business Leaders of America, he developed a deep curiosity about what makes effective leaders, a curiosity that guided him through a long and successful career leading teams, delivering impactful results, and inspiring trust and collaboration. Today, William combines hands-on experience with a heartfelt belief that leadership isn’t about power but about people. He coaches aspiring and established leaders, delivers motivational keynote talks, runs leadership workshops, and offers personalized mentoring to help others lead with empathy, integrity, and vision. He has also written several articles and authored two books, How to Lead Without Just Managing and Building Genuine Relationships: The Leader’s Guide to Connecting…, offering practical guidance for building strong, authentic leadership.
James Siminoff – Chief Inventor and Founder of Ring
A lot of being an entrepreneur is that it’s not an overnight success, that it
takes time to build up. I think for a lot of us, including myself, it takes time
to build those things up.
James Siminoff
James Siminoff is an American inventor and entrepreneur, best known as the founder and Chief Inventor of Ring. In 2011, while tinkering in his garage, he created the world’s first Wi-Fi video doorbell, originally called DoorBot, because he wanted a way to see and talk to visitors at his front door even when he was elsewhere. Before Ring, Siminoff founded and sold several ventures including a voicemail-to-text service and an email-cleanup tool. After rebranding DoorBot to Ring and raising external investments even after being rejected on the 2013 season of Shark Tank, he persisted and in 2018 Ring was acquired by Amazon for roughly one billion US dollars. Today, Siminoff continues to drive innovation at Ring, helping scale the company’s smart-home and home-security products with a mission to make neighborhoods safer and more connected.