James Dyson: Invention: A Life
EPISODE 164
Dyson has become a byword for high-performing products, technology, design, and invention. Now, James Dyson, the inventor, and entrepreneur who made it all happen, tells his remarkable and inspirational story in Invention: A Life.
Famously, over a four-year period, James Dyson made 5,127 prototypes of the cyclonic vacuum cleaner that would transform the way houses are cleaned around the world. In devoting all his resources to iteratively developing the technology, he risked it all, but out of many failures and setbacks came hard-fought success.
SHOW OUTLINE
INTRO
James Dyson and his family reflect on how the journey to innovation takes time
See things through (1m56)
INSPIRATION AND PERSEVERANCE
James Dyson and the creation of the BallBarrow leading him to the vacuum
Progress comes from small improvements (1m06)
COURAGE IN THE DYSON BUSINESS
James Dyson speaks about the Dyson business’ approach to engineering
Problem-solving (53s)
James Dyson and the importance of prototypes
Embrace and track failures (3m39)
OUTRO
James Dyson and his family discuss the bravery that comes with building the business
Trust your instincts (1m51)
CLIP CREDITS
READING
James Dyson: Invention: A Life
TRANSCRIPT
Hello and welcome to the moonshots podcast. It's episode 164. I'm your co-host Mike Parsons. And as always, I'm joined by the man himself, Mr. Mark Pearson Freeland. Good morning. Hey, good morning, Mike. What an exciting way of bookending and sadly completing our series and entrepreneurs with today's episode.
I mean, we've been on quite a roller coaster as Darren Hardy would have said. To Shay a rollercoaster indeed. And I can tell you what today's guru superstar inventor went on quite the rollercoaster himself. Yeah, I think you're totally right. He went on quite an experience as we're going to hear in today's show in today.
Show number 164, Mike, you and I are going to dig into sir James Dyson's brand new book that came out just before the end of last year, Invention: A life (buy on Amazon). What a great title for him, sir. James Dyson. It's it's pretty [00:01:00] epic just in title, but I think deservedly. So don't you think. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, where we've been so far over the past couple of weeks in our entrepreneurship series, Mike, you and I have dug into Darren Hardy, the entrepreneurial rollercoaster (buy on Amazon), where we learn a lot about some of those mistakes, as well as the fact that it's a little bit hard to be an entrepreneur, hearing some hard truths from Darren Hardy, but actually last week we heard maybe even more of a direct assault or approach.
From Mr. Michael Gerber on the E-Myth, who again, had some pretty hard truth to tell us about this, maybe dream of being an entrepreneur, but today, you know, finalizing and finishing off our entrepreneurship series with James Dyson. I mean, what a perfect way of closing out, what I think has been a really informative and pretty practical approach to thinking about being an entrepreneurial ourselves.
Yes, both Darren and Mike. Fully loaded with a lot of clear advice, a [00:02:00] lot of clear models and habits that we can use. What's so fantastic about James Dyson is he has done it and he's done it in a big way. Mark. I propose to you, I had no sense that we would ever care about vacuum cleaners, quite this much in a life before.
Dyson. In fact, I think we can buy, regardless of which country you're in a good thousand bucks or more, whether it's pounds, Sterling, or U S D or Australian dollars, who would have thought you'd pay so much for a vacuum cleaner. It's very funny. When you do look back. You know, our upbringings and the economy of, of purchasing these products.
It was probably within the last, I guess, maybe 15 years or so when there was that shift around consumer products. You know, James Dyson and his vacuum Canadians, they really did become almost [00:03:00] lifestyle products as opposed to practical ones that were tucked away on the your stairs or, you know, in the, in the coat room tucked away.
And instead they became almost icon. I can a graphic and. You could have them maybe on display or you could just use it as a talking point, even perhaps. And it did become. Almost a reference between iPhones in your pocket and the Dysons in your house. You know, similar price ranges, which in itself is pretty mad.
Isn't it? A vacuum cleaner it's that innovation that I think James Dyson and the brand of Dustin limited was able to build around them because people just started associating innovation and good design. With Dyson over Holies. Totally agree. And I think for those of you, who've got the entrepreneurial Twitch and you're not going to build a new vacuum cleaner, please don't turn [00:04:00] off the show because in fact, so James Dyson, what he has done is reinvented several categories.
What he has done is he has applied. One of the best test cases for moonshots thinking that there is, he has both been on one side, incredibly resilient. He's created the habits for success, and he's been compelled to solve a problem that his customers face. And that's why ladies and gentlemen, we pay more than a thousand dollars for our vacuum cleaner because he did these things.
So no matter what you're trying to do. So James Dyson is the man. In his story, we have so much to learn. We can take from him some of the best practices for reinventing a category, in fact, for being the best version of yourself. So why don't we just launch in and listen to. To this incredible story told through not only his voice, but [00:05:00] some of his family and it all came down, his success came down to the ability to see things.
That all we'd hear was this sort of banging and crashing and soaring. And, and there were honestly, every day there was a development and then a failure and the development that a failure I'd be able to do about one test like that a day. And I get in the next day and make a different site clone and do another session day after day, month after month.
As it turned out year after year. Apart from that, we had a normal family life
quite a long time before he started getting the old person in to help him for life in the coach house. At that time, it was probably quite similar to a lot of small businesses. First, September 89. And it was sort of quite a magical place, but then, you know, everybody was very busy. Everybody knew exactly what they were doing.
Those grades, esprit de Corps [00:06:00] for up designs, get a prototype made downstairs in the workshop. So if you find out, don't say, as I say, maybe at the end of the day, we'd go down and sort of help out. We haven't got a salesman. We haven't got a production manager. We had none of the structure and organization that you have when you set up.
Manufacturing something where were merely a group of engineers developing a product at this stage. And then I can remember the day when we actually made a hundred machines and that was all like a big sort of threshold to, to get to in a small team of two or three people that achieved a full on one production line is incredible.
The speed with which all changed in the third year of college from everyone talking about. Phillips dark roasted off go from, which has been a lesson to everyone talking about that in lectures in the third year, this is the designer of the future. This is the businessman Andrews. And this is someone who actually manufactures what they've invented.
I'm extremely [00:07:00] proud. I sort of realized, in fact how unique he was and what he'd achieved, unique individual. As described by his son was what's wonderful, Mike, and you can hear it just in the clip at the beginning of that, that clip that we had, you've actually got James Dyson looking through his notebook.
From when he was creating the first, well, one of his first vacuum cleaners and these pages and pages of refinements of tweaks to his prototypes, to his vacuum cleaner, I, you can just imagine a kind of almost mad inventor going away, creating all these little changes. And it's, it's this resilience. I think that allowed him to see through these projects and these products, even though he was, you know, himself in a, in a family situation, really inspiring.
Well, and I think there's another part of this that we can pull out as well, mark. And that that's the fact that, you know, he started by himself and was alone for quite a long time. That's something else that we just got from that clip. [00:08:00] I think that's really important to remember that it won't be, you know, you hanging with five or six, you know, true believers for the vision that you have of the business that you want to create.
It's going to be kind of a lot of work. And do you remember, you said day after. After month. And then he was like year after year slaving away on it. I mean, to me, this goes a little bit to. What Michael Gerber and Darren Hardy we're talking about is this is no easy ride. You've got to be prepared to invest, and it is critical to be prepared for that.
Otherwise you'll just quit because it just gets hard and lonely and boring and tough. And there's lack of progress. And you feel alone in the world. I think that's why you have to be. Prepared for that. It's just part of the journey. Isn't it, man. Yeah. I totally agree. What we heard from Darren Hardy in the entrepreneur's rollercoaster (Buy on Amazon).
[00:09:00] He was calling out to all of us budding entrepreneurs that you got to get the right people in your team. You know, he was kind of echoing Jim Collins. Wasn't he and saying that you're not going to be good enough on your own. You've got to bring in the experts. I think where Darren's coming from is perhaps further down the line.
And what you're hearing from James Dyson in that clip, we've just heard is the real day zero. They, number one is the first day when you're starting out, maybe you've quit your job, or maybe you've woken up. And you're now going to go and build that product that you've always wanted. This is what the. First day of an entrepreneur's career looks like you're probably all alone.
You're probably in the garage by yourself working away and yeah, like Darren Hardy says the team. Of course, but they're probably going to come later and I think that's a great little clip from James Dyson, just showing us or revealing to us the true elements, the, the, the, the true truth behind it. You're going to be [00:10:00] alone for a bit.
Yeah. And I think that's why it's so good to talk about these things, because rather than avoid them, because they're tricky, just talk about it, be ready for it so that you can. Booty and your best effort. And then you've got a chance of being the best version of yourself. And I'll tell you, who's putting in the effort to be a best version of themselves.
Our members mark. It is so wonderful to see so many people are signing up and sticking around to be part of the conversation to support us and. Mike, I think it's only appropriate that we do a shout out to all our Patreon members. Oh, I totally agree. Mike, these individuals, these members of ours are supporting our podcast and they're also receiving Mike that lunar power dose of good karma, as well as our thanks every time we give them a shout out.
So please drum roll and welcome our Patreon members, including Bob Niles, John Terry and Brady Nyland Sandy modulating care. [00:11:00] Ditmar Tom Byron, mark Halena, Yaniv Marjon and Connor, Rodrigo Yasmeen, spaceman, Daniella, Lisa said. And once again, Mr. Bungee. Thank you to all of you. We really do appreciate your support because for like what it works out to be mark, I think it's like for one coffee a month, know one customer.
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We love, we need your support. And with that, we can go on and tell the story of great inventors. Just like James Dyson. Can't we mark that's right. And just like, sir, James Dyson, we are looking for the way we're giving away our perseverance and drive around our beloved moonshots show. And we love all of them.
Listening in every week and joining us on our members' side. And Mike, like you say, with perseverance, James Dyson is definitely an individual entrepreneur innovator and creator. Who's put that practice, not only something that he just talks about. But puts it into his work. And it's clear throughout all of the clips that we've got today, as well as everything you can read up about@james dyson online and on the moonshots.io website.
He's all about perseverance. So this next clip we've got from James Dyson is [00:13:00] how he describes the creation of quite an unusual product. I think it's fair to say, Mike called the ballbarrow and how progress comes from small improvements. When people first saw the ballpark they thought it was outrageous, but the thing it did teach me, if you have a better idea and engineer it, well, people will want it.
Even though it's three times the cars off to the ballbarrow, there were a number of things that, that is looking at in terms of products, range from a potato peeler to an amphibious vehicle, we'll say a wheelchair very much proving out the principle and the viability of. And then the thing it was the last one, I don't remember,
but could I imagine myself being a vacuum cleaner manufacturer? Could I possibly take on all these huge. Like Electrolux and Hoover and Mila and so on just in the back of my head, [00:14:00] but in my heart, I suppose I thought I'd done something important. You don't know that you've got absolutely no idea, but it's been a commercial success or whether it's going to work, even whether you're going to be able to make it, how you're going to make it is fragile.
I, I, you know, when I listened to that clip, mark, the first thing I think is, wow, there were some really big incumbents Hoover, electro Lux, et cetera, who kind of own the space. They were just doing a thing, but through small improvements, what he ended up coming through with was something radical, something game-changing.
So isn't it funny that contrast between small efforts, small improvements every day. They accumulate. They, they, they compound into this dramatic end result, which feels like, wow, this let's just come out of left field, right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, from a product perspective, I think what is, what really stands out when you think about Dyson versus some of the other [00:15:00] competitors like Electrolux or Hoover, and we've done it before, when you look in a, in a store department store, vacuum cleaners tend to look pretty darn.
That you can't really distinguish one from the other. Whereas when you move to Dyson, it's suddenly unusual. Sometimes it's see-through or perspex. Sometimes it's one of those long the handheld ones and they're totally revolutionary and pretty unusual and how they look. And I think that's really stands out those little improvements that he started to test with his ballbarrow then made it into.
His standup Hoover, the multi-room vacuum, which then in turn, went into the small handheld devices and so on. So what I really like about the story of Dyson is these small continuous improvements. And that each time get maybe a little bit smaller, maybe they get a little bit more improved, but they make it into the next product.
And gradually over time, like you say that combat. [00:16:00] Interest amount of facts is huge because then the product that is out there that we all go and purchase is the product of multiple layers of rejuvenation and refinements. Yeah. And what's, what's really important here. Is the lesson of whatever we're trying to do is to break things down, into really small tasks and small steps.
Otherwise I think the problem is it becomes very overwhelming. We say, I am going to totally reinvent this particular category. That's, that's huge. Right. But if you say, Hey today, I'm going to make my widget, do something a little bit. That's all I'm going to focus on. And then the following day, you say, well, I'm going to make it, do this other thing just a little bit better.
And it's the power of compound interest. And you need a ton of resilience to see it through. But I think the big lesson here, mark is always try and break a big vision. Down into small steps and, and [00:17:00] it's very much a behavior that we've seen, not only in our entrepreneurship series, Mike, but in the moonshot show, this idea of compound interest really stood out within our James Clear and Atomic Habits series (buy on Amazon).
Didn't it? It did. James was very big on that, but I think it's not mutually. It's not exclusive to him alone. In fact, I think what you will see here is a pattern. Take, for example, what Elon Musk is doing with the battery every year, they announce and improvement with lithium ion batteries. And then he's like, oh, by the way, in the end, I don't want to use lithium.
I want to use another store of energy. And to me that is just, step-by-step chipping away at the problem and staying the course. So whether you're forming a habit as James Clear we'd have us do, or whether you're trying to. Invent something from scratch, like James Dyson, it all [00:18:00] comes from this iterative, small steps every day, build it up.
And if you stay the course at certain point, you'll go. Maybe after six months, a year, maybe two years, you'll get. Oh, my gosh, look at what we've got. And when people from the outside look in, it'll be like magic Ronin. Yeah. I think big concerns or challenges that face entrepreneurs, as we've found out from Darren Hardy, Mike Lee Gerber are the ability for entrepreneurs to see things through, but also.
Cope with the fact that you can't just boil the ocean. I think a lot of entrepreneurs expect things to happen very, very quickly. I've got this great idea. I'm going to bring it out and I'll be a millionaire by Christmas, but actually as we've found out throughout this series, It takes time. And like you say, those small improvements, whether they're by Elon Musk and [00:19:00] his batteries or James Dyson and the, the widgets that he was putting into his product, just as an example, they do take a lot of time.
So staying the course, waiting for it and seeing those small improvements over time. Yeah, this is, this is a big aha moment. Isn't it. For any of our as spiral. Entrepreneurs out there. Yeah. And I think it's important too, to remind everyone something that we are pushing against is this idea of easy, quick money from a side hustle.
Right. I just typed into Google trends, side hustle to look at the improve, look at the increase in. And it is off the charts. This search term has just roughly looking here. It's four X in the last five years in the amount, the volume of people typing in side hustle into Google. And look, if it's all in service [00:20:00] of entrepreneurship.
Great. But too often, There are these the classic thing that comes to my mind are those YouTube videos. Like I made a gazillion dollars and it's like no time at all. And what we want to do is debunk it. It is our lie in the end. If you want to make meaningful impact, you have to invest meaningful time.
And there ain't no. And this is so true, isn't it, Mike, no matter what sector you're in, whether you're building products or whether you're investing like Warren Buffett, these things, there is no getting rich quick scheme. You can't just jump to the finish line. It takes sometimes a lifetime as such James Dysons's book, invention of life (buy on Amazon).
It's something you are fully committed to. You have the patience to see it through as well as the resilience. Roll with the punches. Yeah, totally go on that entrepreneurial rollercoaster as Darren Hardy was [00:21:00] breaking down for us. Yeah. So what we've seen here is this big story of little habits, a little, a little improvements every day, the resilience to see things through this is just the start of what we can learn from James Dyson.
And he's got this brand new book in. Alive by sir James Dyson, which we all thoroughly recommend to you. If you actually want to see a moonshot or inaction who's alive and well and kicking today, you can actually get his brand new book and you will see these themes. You will see how he did it. And I think it's a real gift.
In the moment, you can see someone being the best version of themselves. And you can just ask yourself the question, how can I do it too? And the story and the lesson is both there and here on this show, mark, and I'll tell you where you can find this show. It's in the apple podcast app, and you can do a lot of things in there.
One is you can write and [00:22:00] review this show now. Jumping on Patreon and becoming a member. That's a bit too, too much for you right now. Okay. We hear you. We feel you, but what you couldn't. Let's go into your apple podcast app, give us a rating or review and share the love. Because if you do that, if you're enjoying the show, this helps the act of you rating or reviewing the show.
It helps other people find the show. And that's great for us because we can help more people by learning out loud together. And while you're there, you could also subscribe. To the master series. I mean, all of that, just in the apple bowl app that's I mean, we're, we're kind of spoiled for choice nowadays.
Aren't we, when it comes to learning out loud and having access to comprehensive deep dives, and that's exactly what we're trying to provide and create for you, our dear listeners and patron members through the apple podcasts. I in fact, I think Mike has a two week, three week trial. [00:23:00] Yeah, totally, totally.
So if you don't want to do patron, you can subscribe to it, an apple podcast. And if that's too much for you, just give us some love, some ratings and reviews, help share the show with others. When we get those ratings and reviews, apple says, I'll make sure lots of people. To see, to hear the moonshots podcast.
So jump into your app while you're listening. If you're working out while you hydrate, give us a huge thumbs up in apple podcast. We'd really appreciate it. I came I think we're now ready to turn to the second half of the show to learn. How did James Dyson think about the problem and how, what were the models that you use?
What were the habits he had to actually solve such a big problem? So where do you want to start? Well, I'm going to start with something that I think has been consistent with. Some of our other entrepreneurial authors, but [00:24:00] one that again, we sometimes overlook and we think it's part of all of our daily lives.
And sometimes we maybe really don't realize that it's actually connected to everything you do, including styling and business. And this is the idea of problem solving. So let's hear from James Dyson, talk about the business and how he applied and approach of problem. So. And the way it problem solving is a disease you want to do is, and although each one's a headache, it's there to be sold as the mountain to climb, not in the us, have that disease.
And we have that. We were a group of engineers starting to want to make it a different type of product with better technology. And we've carried on like that things that do heavy things are too polluting. Things don't perform as well as they should. Things don't last, as long as they should. There were just hundreds of problems and every product.
We're doing is trying to do something different than best. If you always do what you know is going to work, then, okay, I'll have less [00:25:00] failure, but you'll never make a substantive change or a breakthrough. What we're trying to do every day is to make better technology and design develop better performing products.
And I think we've gathered around us group with people who want to do that. Problem solving continual problem solving. I cannot give, I don't think I could give better advice to anyone who wants to be an entrepreneur, then make sure you're solving a problem. To me, this is like a fundamental law that everything else kind of works out.
If you're solving a problem and the bigger, the problem you're solving, the more it means to people to solve that problem, chances are the more successful you're going to be. What do you think? Yeah. And I think, I think in turn, the more problems you're trying to solve, perhaps the more failures you're going to run into, the more roadblocks maybe they're going to be from your consumers, because they didn't realize it was a problem.
Th th that they're [00:26:00] all products we're doing, perhaps using vacuums as an example, when he brought out into the market, his brand new designs, maybe consumers, then the end users didn't realize that it's the design that they really wanted until they can see. So I think through problem solving and having a, maybe a target or a vision or a goal of creating and changing the industry, or perhaps a set of products in the market, you're going to run into those challenges.
And I think what Dyson did a great job of is being able to see the longterm goals. I'm doing something in the sector and the market space rather than be put off, perhaps by those electoral Alex's and those Hoovers there's big conglomerates. There's big competitors in the space. Where he might not be able to fit in very easily being a family, essentially.
Yep. It reminds me so much of the show that we did on sir, Richard Branson, because he he's very similar [00:27:00] in that. He takes a little note pad around with him and he's looking for things. To solve. So in fact, Virgin airways came from the fact that he couldn't get a flight when he was on some sort of exotic Caribbean island.
If I remember the story correctly and he's like, why is it so hard to get a flight? And then he'd just, he hired a charter plane and basically kind of started an airline by solving a problem. And I think this is sort of. Something. I think that we can all take away without, from, from what James Dyson is, is talking about.
Edit the heart of his success is. He wants to solve a problem. And importantly, that problem must be experienced by others as well as himself. So make sure, I think the takeout here make [00:28:00] sure that whatever you're doing is truly solving a problem and make sure you go out into the world. Build prototypes and test them.
Don't be a victim of wishful thinking. Get out there, make it happen, make sure you're solving a problem. Don't live in this dystopian illusion or this distorted reality field where actually all your effort is not really solving a problem. I mean, how many times do we hear stories, mark of entrepreneurs?
Like toiling for years and years only to realize they're not really solving a problem. What comes to my mind is a show we did on Eric Reese. He spent five years. And I think it was a 30 or $40 million in funding working on a startup team. And at the end of the five years, when they launched, nobody wanted the product, it wasn't solving a problem.[00:29:00]
Out to save least. I mean, I was, I was gonna call out Eric Reese as well, actually, because you're totally right. If you're not solving a need for the end users for the consumers, it's going to be much, much harder. To convince them to go out and research or purchase or take part in your business. And you know, that whole story of the lean startup with Eric Reese is a fascinating demonstration of that in practice.
Isn't it, you know, without going out and building an MVP, a minimum viable product testing. Learning out loud or it's rating with customers. You're going to spend all that time and perhaps wasted and similar to what James Dawson was saying in that previous clip. We just heard without having a methodology or framework with problem solving at the forefront and that you're working around trying to figure out, you know, maybe a slight product tweak, [00:30:00] maybe an approach to marketing or whatever it might be.
Yeah. Were you, in fact, even just creating a brand new business as an entrepreneur, it's going to have a much harder time of see of being authentic in the space. Isn't it? Because nobody's going to take it for 'em to take it for that for a seriousness. Yeah, I think, and it won't be legit. Exactly. So I think, you know, this problem solving thing, if you're really interested in that, go and check out our Eric Reese show on the lean startup, you can certainly go a lot deeper here.
And if you want to talk about resilience, oh my gosh. Head over to I think there's a lot of shows we've done on. David Goggins is the one that stands out to me, mark on resilience. How about you? Yeah, Dave Goggins show and his book, Can’t hurt me, was and remains one of our most popular shows particularly his approach to just grinding away.
Mike calls to mind again. [00:31:00] David Goggins is in a totally different industry to Dyson, to Branson, to Eric Reese, to any of our authors within the entrepreneurship series that we've been over for the past couple of weeks, but it's the same behavior that exists with this. Marathon running or training for special forces, this mental and physical resilience.
It is an entrepreneurial trait. Isn't it. To be able to put up with it. And if you want to make small improvements every day, I mean, it has to be James clear, doesn't it? James clear is one of the. Easiest to remember. I think in my experience, when it comes to atomic habits, that 1% better each day, once again, transcends all these different sectors and industries, doesn't it.
You can be whether it's an author or an inventor or just somebody who's starting a new business. You're going to need to have the right habits in place in order to [00:32:00] stay maybe as confident or focused or resilient, or just hard working disciplined, you're going to need those little habits to help you.
Stay on track. They would a good business hire the right people and be diligent and disciplined with yourself when it comes to delegation to managing your accounts and so on and atomic habits for me, Mike you're totally right. James. Claire is the man to go to, if you're trying to get into the habits. I mean, we did a whole series on habit formation actually highly recommend to all of our.
To go and go and check out that series if you haven't already. Totally. And if you become a member, you can listen to our master series on, on habits. So we actually did. We went super deep and did the master class on habits. So while James Dyson is really proving out A lot of truths around the moonshots model, the way we should approach being the best version of ourselves and going out there and building [00:33:00] something and it doesn't stop there.
In fact, the next thought that we have from James Dyson is all about. Prototyping. And really at the essence of this is embracing and tracking your failures and what, so as you build each of these prototypes, you make one change at a time. You've got, gotta be very clear what you're trying to achieve and you mustn't stop until you've achieved it.
It's gotta be, it's gotta be perfect. And so you're watching each of these variables, you're recording it. You then tend to produce. Or some form of visual display to try and understand that. Because it's not always immediately obvious which fits working on which, but it isn't. And often there's several variables you're looking at.
So drawing that graph the way you subsequently display the results. And then your analysis of that often gives you the clue as to why you should be going. Yes, no, there are state. Proof of [00:34:00] concept and technology displayed and things like that. They've all established a very good system. I don't quite understand it, but really what you're doing is, is proving that your technology idea works and that's probably the most difficult stage.
And it's the stage of it's usually has the most patents attached to it. So that's the first thing. And you, as I say, you don't do that with a complete product. You do it probably with the bit of it, but. Inventing and those that prototype doesn't look like the real thing. It doesn't have to be made of the right materials.
It just merely has to prove a technical. You then go on. So that's stage one. So I've now got my scientific principle, whatever it is working, you then try and incorporate that into a product, realizing that other things will happen when you do that. Stop, the variables will start. So then you try and produce an entire product in prototype form, probably again, not worrying about how it [00:35:00] looks or worrying, what materials are making it from.
And we nowadays we use all these object printers and SLS prototyping various things rather than hand building prototypes or even machining. So we've got lots of fast ways of doing it so we can get quite quickly to seeing a product incorporating all the technology and working as a product. We're not too worried about what it looks like at this stage.
So we get that to work. And then we say, well, now how would this be as a complete product, if it were injection molded or machine or whatever, whatever the manufacturing processes. And that's quite exciting as well. That's, that's another great phase. So you end up with a fully functioning and visually correct prototype.
And actually this one I've got here is a good example of that. That's not produced on production tooling. This is all rapid prototyping, this entire product, but I can put. Tests course I can get people to try [00:36:00] it at home. So it will perform, behave exactly like the manufactured product. And you want to get rid of your problems before you tooled up, because once you've tooled up and you produce the tooled up model.
You can't make any changes. So you've got to get it right on the prototype. So this is a really, really critical phase and you've got to listen to and go and see how it's used in the home. You've got to beat it to death on the user course, and then you discover what's wrong with it. And a little bit, lots and lots of things wrong with it.
And you then make those modification. Still in rapid prototyping, and then you've got to test them again and then maybe 3, 4, 5 stages to that. And any, when you're absolutely certain, you've got rid of all the problems, the technology works, the product works, it doesn't break people like it. They only then do you order the very, very expensive tooling to make this kind of thing in mass production?
I mean my, what a great breakdown from [00:37:00] entrepreneur inventor, James Dyson, laying out the journey it takes in order to build and develop and then release brand new products. It was a rapid prototyping masterclass right then and there. Yeah, a good three minute breakdown for all of our listeners, as well as you and I into how Dyson take an idea, boil it down to its essential foundations of DNA, and then build it slowly from the ground.
Prior to then going to spend lots and lots of money on, on building it. I mean, this re-approach to product development makes so much sense. Doesn't it? Well, it does. And I think it's important to remind everybody that this doesn't only apply to someone who's building a physical product, regardless of whether it's an experience, maybe you're creating a cafe, prototype it, whether you're creating it.
Prototype it with creating a [00:38:00] wheelbarrow. You can prototype it. I think the point here is it helps you. Learn make those improvements, but importantly, before you launch it, you can, de-risk the major problems with the product. And trust me, you'll never get it. Perfect. And nor should you, because you'll spend forever trying to make it perfect, but you can definitely make it good enough and remove some of those big risks of launching with a crappy product or service.
I mean, this, to me, his success alone. Tells me, we should pay deep attention to this idea of prototyping, to this idea of doing all these low fidelity tests and iterating iterating in the early stages in order to de-risk the launch of your product. I mean, that truly was a masterclass in prototyping.
Wasn't it? Well, what it reveals is how much attention. How much love how much blood, sweat, and [00:39:00] tears go into each of Dyson's products. You know, I obviously we're hearing from Dyson, just in a couple of minutes, they're boiling down the entire journey that they'll go on from idea through a proof of concept in its raw form, whether it's 3d printed or SLS all the way through to it, maybe a refined design and then a full on test of a finished prototype.
It he's boiling it down, obviously. Succinctly for us, but the truth is, again, I think a lot of these take time, but the value exchange is if you do it early on prior to going out to spend the money on the product, or maybe it's marketing, maybe it's a coffee shop or an app before spending all that time to actually just go out and refine it, test it a number of times it's going to, like you say, That product when it, when it does eventually come out.
And I, it reminds me Mike of I think it was probably going to be Darren Hardy again, [00:40:00] who just calls out to the entrepreneurial. Stop waiting around. Just, just get going because you're right. You can't create the perfect product. McDonald's burgers are not the perfect products. Are they, they own the best burgers you can necessarily buy, but they are the most popular.
So just going out and getting it, moving, learning from customers to improve those products. And so it's, it's a great little journey that I think all entrepreneurs have to just start with. And, and gradually over time improved. Yeah. And I think the, the way, the way to take this is I'm going to be a little bit pushy against Darren Hardy on that, that, you know, when you're an entrepreneur, it's not what it was.
Here's your formula, 90% marketing, 10% product, 90% marketing product. Yet. I'm going to disagree a little bit with that. I've been on both sides of the equation, both marketing and product. So. I love both [00:41:00] equally. I would say that if you take some of that approach of, you know, Darren Hardy of getting out there and selling your product and meeting your customers and jumping into action is really crucial.
And imagine if what you took to your customers was something that was prototype. To the degree in which James Dyson did to get it right. I believe you would have enormous success. I have seen this happen when your product is as good as your marketing and your marketing is as good as your product, if they are both well thought out, if they are both really well And rigorously created, then you will have tremendous success.
I think that you can change the world when you put equal effort into both. I think you can do [00:42:00] things that transform the lives of your customers and you can become, I think at the very highest form of this is apple and Nike, where both the product and the marketing are so damn good. You don't know.
Great products or great marketing. The answer is that both, if you have a great product, it's easier to market. And if you have great marketing, it's easier to build a great product. And I think that's the relationship that prototyping has with the marketing side of things. In fact, you can even prototype your marketing to mark.
This prototyping thing is pretty big. Isn't it? I mean, it's. Way to really de-risk to validate all these different approaches. Like you say, whether it's marketing a product, I mean, we've certainly used it Mike together, and I'm sure a number of our users have, and listeners have as well, but it's amazing the results you do find sometimes they're pretty surprising.
Aren't they, they journey that you might go on and every time you and I have prototyped together, we've always [00:43:00] discovered we've always had an aha moment where we're like, oh, I didn't realize that's what customers needed. Oh, I didn't realize that was going to be so hard and much better to do that, to have that aha moment when you're testing and prototyping before you launch, rather than having.
After you launch and go, oh my gosh, we've got to change everything, but we've already got customers. Oh, well I think, again, it, the truth is a lot of entrepreneurs or business owners or product creators think that their product is spot on. And the truth is you might just be in your own bubble. So. By spending all the time and not seeking out refinements, whether those refinements are with your family, your friends, your colleagues, or the end users themselves without giving yourself the opportunity to do that.
I mean, yeah, you're, you're, you're painting in a, in a very dark room. And you're [00:44:00] not quite sure I think where it's going to be successful or not. So I think what Dyson is a great example of here, bearing in mind, it's such a successful business. The time it takes to, to prototype, to test, to learn, to validate, to make refinements it's worth it in the long run.
You can't, you don't want to just sprint towards the finish line. Do you? You want to do it? That's right. Don't cut corners, at least those fundamental corners, because there are any going to catch you out once you get alive. And you're like, oh my gosh, we've got a huge problem. Like you can get rid of that with rapid prototyping.
Well, might before we go to our last clip, I think we want to remind our listeners. Th they certainly today they've heard about all the goodies they can get from our website where they can become a member. They've heard about all the goodies. They can get out of apple podcasts, but man, they can also go to Spotify too.
Can't they? That's right. Listeners. You can go and listen to us. Pretty much any, any podcast app [00:45:00] of your choice, you can follow our us in Spotify. You can also rate and review us now in the Spotify app. And you can also go and check out the master series directly within Spotify. Can't you Mike, you can't.
And so give us some love. We we'd really love to see you guys getting active in Spotify. We just appreciate your contribution back to us for everything that we do, all we ask is give us a rating or review a ha a thumbs up be part of this community. I mean, there is a lot of you and we really happy to see that you continue to share.
The lessons that you've learned with moonshots to share the show with others as we continue to grow. And boy, we've been doing some growing on this show. We've heard about resilience. We've heard about this thinking model of how to actually build a product from scratch. There's just one more big idea to come from James Dyson.
You want to set it [00:46:00] up? Yeah. One more time in today's show from sir James Dyson all around his book, invention our life, which actually might closes out our current series on entrepreneurship. We're going to hear wonderful. From James Dyson. And this time he's going to be discussing bravery that comes with building a business and product.
So let's hear from James Dyson who actually teaches us to really go out and trust our instance. I really believe that if you, if you have a new technology, that's well designed and you make it well, and then you sell it, they'll succeed. Whatever the economics from then on, I was just distinct story.
Honorary demonstration of putting back in what you've made to grow. It always felt like this is absolutely innovative. This is, this is the future. You know, this is somebody who creative Dyson is a company of experimentation that is just got to solve. Because we're a company that makes things, [00:47:00] but we're a little bit different because of the way we choose the things that we're going to make.
Well, the potential to shape the future of how humans live. And Dyson's a private company where in it for the long term, we do the research and development. We put huge amounts of money into it, and it has a long-term payback. We want to be very, very permanent and grow and get better and better on what we do.
We've assembled a really. Plus team of researchers and engineers and scientists, and located them in all these different places around the world. Emotional thing that you actually feel when you go to that, it's not a predictable path and that's what makes it swirling say interesting. The future has. To incorporate a lot of stuff, thinking of young generation coming through, it takes a long time to develop technologies.
We've got to continue to be creative, but we have to bring it into how the world is changing [00:48:00] all the time. It's not really about making money and that's not what it's about. It's about the difficulties and struggles and battles that you will have the warrior spirit that you need. And then it stopped grandstanding and talking about things and actually get together.
And. We can do it. The warrior spirit. Fuck. I didn't realize there was such a fire inside of James Dyson. Well, I, I think, yeah, you, what you. Perhaps we, we don't get in these he's so kind, he's considered he's thoughtful. Isn't he in all of the clips here, he's got a real methodology and a practice and a behavior around all of the work he puts into it.
But he sounds quite chilled, quite relaxed and quite thoughtful. I think what's great in that last clip that we hear bookending entrepreneurship series is that you've got to have the drive now warrior spirit, which I think is present in all of the entrepreneurs that are out there. And I think that [00:49:00] that is what helps.
Smaller percentage of small businesses succeed because they're resilient because they'll dig in because they'll stay focused. And I think that that powerful war warrior spirit of James Dyson helps him stand out up against those Electrolux is, and Hoover's right. It certainly does. And it has, it's also the courage to take on big problems to come out with radically new approaches.
I think it all comes down to. This idea of whatever you choose to do, it has to matter to you. You have to care about it. You know, you must be compelled by, you must feel like you can make a difference there. It can't just be some quick opportune, moneymaking opportunity. It's gotta be more than that because you will give up if it's just like, oh, I think there's a lot of money in this category.
Like if that's how you're thinking about it. You just want it [00:50:00] last, will you? Yeah, I totally totally agree. I think if you are there just to make that quick bar. You're not going to have the patience or the focus to stay in it for the long time. And I think whether they're entrepreneurs in an investor space like the Warren buffets or whether they are entrepreneurs much, like we've heard today with James Dyson or Elon Musk, even the ones who stay the course and get really well known like Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates or the ones.
Almost stay in the lane, so to speak. And what I mean by that is not from a behavior perspective, perhaps, but they'll believe in their business, they'll go out and work hard and be focused on it rather than perhaps jumping into lots of different things. I'd even go so far Mike, to say, maybe this brings us into the circle of competence.
Yeah, it is definitely related knowing what you can do makes it easier to go out in the world and have impact because you don't get distracted by stuff. That's not really your strength. That's right. And I think that's [00:51:00] the strength of J James Dawson. As we've heard today, the ability to see things through problem solve and track failures has allowed him to better each of his.
From each generation, hasn't he? Yeah. And what a great way for us to wrap up an entrepreneur series, you know, we had Darren Heidi really bringing like an all-in philosophy of doing the hard work for for being an entrepreneur. We had Michael Lee Gerber who was telling us to work a lot smarter understanding.
Are you the manager, entrepreneur technician work on your business, not in your business. And then we see these lessons of prototyping of problem solving of really making progress through this iterative and very resilient journey of SUD James Dyson. This has been a big series, mark. Yeah, it certainly has the idea of getting better each time.
The idea [00:52:00] of tracking failures, that's been very, very consistent. Hasn't it? But the thing that stands out to me, Mike is just the fact that it's going to be hard. Work. It's going to be a roller coaster to be an entrepreneur. Isn't it? It is. I think the argument for why that's so good to know is you can steal yourself, prepare yourself, ready yourself.
But I also think it does this other thing is that if you know, it's going to be really hard, then you kind of need to be pretty compelled by the idea. Otherwise, otherwise you'll be like, oh, well that all sounds a bit too hard, but it's when you care about it enough. Yeah. That doesn't matter. I know it's going to be hard, but I still want to do it.
Then that's calling you, isn't it go out for the journey rather than the destination? Isn't it? I think so. I think that you are prepared for that journey [00:53:00] ready for that journey. Because you care about the outcome. So you're like, yep. It's hard. Good. Must be doing something right, exactly. Go willing, willing, check out that moonshot stuff.
He's got a whole show on problem. Good. A moonshot favorite for sure. Ah, so. So true, Matt, we've done a really great job of digging into the world of James Dyson. We have gone and done our first epic series on entrepreneurship as we wrap up. And by the way, we've got a mindset series coming. So that's pretty where thinking about.
We've got a few listeners favorites, but I want you in the here and now having done this dive into James Dyson, what is the thing that has struck you the most about listening to his story? It has to be the rapid prototyping. It has to be the [00:54:00] staying on the course, creating small versions, essential versions of the product, whether it's marketing or whether it's digital, whether it's an application or whether it's a vacuum cleaner, making it really, really small and gradually building out the different phases in order to get to your final destination.
That for me is the biggest. For an entrepreneur starting out today. I think you're absolutely right. Absolutely. Right. Well, mark, thank you to you for joining me on what has been a rip roaring ride in the story of James Dyson and it's still being written, which is super exciting. And thank you to you. Our listeners, the moonshot is we really do appreciate you staying here for the complete journey of every show and today's show 164.
On sir, James Dyson and his new book invention alive. And he reminded us that on day [00:55:00] zero, you start alone and you have to be resilient. In his words, you have to see things through. And one of the key ways to seeing things through is this idea of compound interest in atomic habits. He's all about progress coming from those small improvements that you make every single day.
And then as he applied his mind to the problem, it was all about how to solve it. In fact, he's obsessed about it. And one of the key things he does to solve problems is rapid prototyping. So he can embrace and track his failures. Do these things, do these things, find that warrior spirit and trust your instincts.
Just like just so James Dyson and you too will have impact in the world. You too will be the best version of yourself and you can do it all here. Learning out loud together on the shocks podcast. That's a wrap.