Dave Weiss, Hatch COO on Shark Tank and 2M IoT Devices

Michael Koenig: ** Hello and welcome to Between two COOs. We're phenomenal Chief Operating Officers come to share their knowledge, advice, and crazy stories. I'm your host Michael Koenig, and I'm excited to welcome our guest, Dave Weiss, founder, president and chief operating officer at Hatch, a company on a mission to help. ** Everyone sleep better. Hatch products like Hatch Restore, combine a sound machine, sunrise Alarms smart light meditation app, and of course, the alarm clock all into one Smart Sleep Assistant Hatch was featured on Shark Tank in 2016 and has since gone on to help over half a million people get restorative sleep. ** Prior to founding Hatch with his wife Anne, Dave spent six years as the Chief Technology officer and SVP of Product Management at Baby Center. Welcome, Dave. Thanks for being here. I'm excited to have you on.

Dave Weiss: ** Thanks for having me.

Michael Koenig: ** Did I do [00:01:00] hatch, uh, justice there?

Dave Weiss: ** Absolutely. Very, uh, very well done though. ** We're, uh, we're over 2 million, uh, homes now. Um, so, uh, the, the info's a little bit dated, but, uh, still going strong. Okay. Lots of, lots of people sleeping.

Michael Koenig: ** Fantastic. 2 million now. That's quite a remarkable achievement. Congratulations.

Dave Weiss: ** Thank you.

Michael Koenig: ** So you're currently Chief operating Officer, but you have a technical background as a CTO, which is a bit of a rare breed. ** How'd you end up as, as COO? What was your path?

Dave Weiss: ** So I started as an engineer and um, I think I was a medium engineer, but a good explainer. Of what engineers do. And so I kept getting called into the meetings to actually translate, wait, what are you guys doing? How long is it gonna take? And so, um, that was a little bit of my path to engineering leadership [00:02:00] and um, and then through some twists and turns, I, um, I really. ** I really always wanted to be in the room. Um, you know, back early in my career, it was very much a product came up with the requirements and hand, you know, just sort of threw them over the fence to engineering and I really wanted to be in that room where they were coming up with the solutions for the consumer. ** Um, I had an opportunity at BabyCenter to take over product and marketing and design, and I, um, I, I loved it. And so, um, uh, expanded beyond the sort of traditional CTO role and, and, uh, you know, took over, uh, a bunch of different functions and, and got to spend time, uh, with one foot in many different rooms.

Michael Koenig: ** That's so interesting. It, especially the part about being able to translate and summarize. What engineers are talking about into a language that non-engineers [00:03:00] can actually comprehend. Is there a secret? I think we could all know, um, love to know.

Dave Weiss: ** You know, I spent a, a little bit of time as a high school teacher early in, in my career. ** I actually sort of switched to teaching high school and then came back and, um, it was really, um. It was really hard to explain math. I was teaching math and computer science, and you've got, you know, 16-year-old there who's fidgety and, and struggling to understand the material, and I just made it my mission to say it again and say it again and say it again in a way where I, this is sort of rehearsing that someone who really had no context could understand it. ** And that seems to translate pretty well into trying to take technical concepts like I. Uh, the rest of the organization understand it,

Michael Koenig: ** so this is very funny. Essentially treat everyone like a high school student, which is quite similar to what [00:04:00] my head of people operations says. Her secret is to treat everyone like a kindergartner and explain it. ** So you're actually giving us more credit though though. Kate is phenomenal and I think she only gives me. That advice, advice versus everyone else. So I have some more to do clearly. So the COO role, it isn't one size fits all. The responsibilities can range from GNA to finance to go to market sometimes all three. ** How have you divided up your areas of responsibility now at Hatch, and is there a technical component to what you're doing given your background?

Dave Weiss: ** Absolutely. So, um, when we were a smaller company, it was, uh, a little bit of everything including manufacturing and, um, and, and Hatch is the first company that, uh, that I've worked at that makes physical products. ** So this was all new. It was a ton of learning. Um, you know, my, my co-founder, uh, Ann and I spent time, a lot of time in Pete's [00:05:00] coffee fi trying to figure things out before we actually launched the company. And, um. So in different iterations, it was, um, customer support, it was all sorts of things that I'm, I'm not at all trained to do, but that's what you do when you're five or 10 person company. ** As we've evolved and we've hired, you know, I ran marketing and it was easy to spend a few thousand dollars a month and, and sell product. But once you get to the point where you're, you're spending real large sums of money, you need a CMO. And so, um, we've hired experts in those functions. And, um, primarily I spend my time with, um, the product development team, which is product engineering, design, and qa. ** And we're the team that builds stuff. And, uh, and, and that's, that's sort of our current iteration because we've hired experts in, uh, in other places. Selfishly, it's the part that I enjoy the most. So that, that's been, uh, [00:06:00] that's been my path and that's how, how we're defining it now. But I've probably spent time running every department in our company at some time or another.

Michael Koenig: ** Got it. And starting a company, founding a company, having any sort of success is a remarkable achievement. And I would say, at least from my perspective as a software guy. Doing that with a hardware product is also quite noteworthy. Can you tell me a little bit about those beginnings of building a hardware product as a first time entrant into hardware and having the capital to do that? ** Like these are very sort of capital intensive and r and d intensive.

Dave Weiss: ** Venture. Um, I'm, I am very fortunate in, um, in that regard because, uh, my co-founder, my wife, um, uh, had started a [00:07:00] company. Earlier before we met and, uh, had a successful exit and, um, had a very supportive venture firm who said, Hey, you just tell us what your, what you wanna do next. ** And so, um, from, from a capital perspective, we were in a great place. And, and True Ventures, which was our, our sort of main backer. Also the money behind, uh, the first investor in Ring and Peloton. And so they at least knew what they were getting into. They said, Hey, make sure you, uh, account for the fact that one of these tools you build, you're gonna have to throw it away. ** We said, wait, does that happen? And um, and so they were a great investor, super knowledgeable. I think when I was in software, I looked at hardware as just, just a new problem to solve, which, uh, you know, I often wonder, had I known then what I know now about how difficult hardware is and specifically iot, [00:08:00] I'm on the fence as, as, as to whether or not we would be talking today when I interview some folks, uh, specifically some engineers. ** You talk about the expectations of software versus hardware and if, if you open your, it's a Saturday, you open your your Chase online banking app and it says, Hey, the app is down, come back for maintenance, come back tomorrow. You don't switch banks, you don't go to Wells Fargo. You just close the app and move on with your day. ** But what if your microwave said that, sorry, I can't heat your food today. Come back tomorrow microwave. So expectations. Frankly, a market that's that from an iot perspective that's fairly immature. All of that combined together makes for a really, really challenging job,

Michael Koenig: ** especially in the iot, right? ** Because you're not just building a new invention here. You also have to build in compatibility with mobile devices, for instance. So there's a whole other complex layer of innovation that [00:09:00] you have to account for in addition to the innovative new product that you've produced for improving sleep.

Dave Weiss: ** Absolutely. I mean, environmental factors, things that you don't have to worry about when you build websites or apps. Environmental factors like interference in someone's home. Um, you know, constant updating of other software, router software, 450 versions of Android. So, uh, you know, you have, you have quite a test lab when you're doing this. ** Um, and, and there are always things that you're, you never find in, uh, in QA that actually make it out into the world. I've spent my share, my, my share of time actually driving over to customer's homes and saying, Hey, would you mind if we, uh, we wired this up and tried to figure out what, what was going on?

Michael Koenig: ** That's a great story of being on the ground, especially when, when founding companies and, uh, I'm sure you have plenty others where things have been a little bit non unpredictable [00:10:00] as far as that goes. Uh, I mean, you're talking about driving around to people's houses, getting them plugged in and, and getting them set up. ** That's pretty remarkable. Other instances where you're thinking back and you're like, gosh, I can't believe I did that.

Dave Weiss: ** I mean, we've had, uh, uh, moments where we've had, you know, a thousand units to unbox and, um, take off the bottom ring, unscrew, uh, swap out a part, put 'em back in. And, um, we, we just did it. We got a bunch of tables and, um, bunch of pizza and, you know, leaned on my, my, um, my kids and their, some of their friends. ** And those are the moments where you wonder. Do other companies do this? Um, but having talked to some other founders, I think everyone has their, their moments like that.

Michael Koenig: ** Oh, absolutely. I delivered phones in a truck, ** but that's a story for another time. So tell me, you were on Shark Tank in [00:11:00] 2016. Uh, you mentioned that you've since gone on to raise money from True Ventures. And they're a phenomenal firm, especially in light of all of the hardware expertise that they have. Generally raising institutional capital for hardware products can be challenging and daunting. ** You all. Skipped that part by having that prior success. Can you tell us a little bit about what the experience is like raising those subsequent rounds now that you have a product in market that you have to deliver, that you have sales figures to show things of that nature?

Dave Weiss: ** Absolutely. Um, it is, uh, it is always challenging to raise capital. ** I find that there's very much a what happens to be in vogue at the moment. Which, you know, cap, you know, valuations 10, 50 times just fly at people who've, who've got significantly less revenue. The consumer space [00:12:00] is challenging, the hardware space is challenging and we started with, you know, helping babies and new parents. ** And again, that market is traditionally challenging. We are now. Sleep for your whole family. Um, so we started as Hatch baby and now we're, we're Hatch. So all along the way I feel like it's been a little bit of an uphill climb and, and I've got some friends who, who make, you know, some B2B software where, you know, it's like they open their mailbox and there's, you know, checks just showing up at their doorstep. ** But we have consistently proven over and over again that the business has legs and, and we find people who are believers. I mean, there are some amazing, you look at Apple, apple is. They make hardware, right? We shouldn't be afraid of hardware. Um, and fortunately, successes like Peloton, uh, show people that actually purpose-built hardware and a full surround sound experience is really what the consumer wants from a, when we do the fundraising. ** Fortunately, [00:13:00] um, uh, my co-founder, um, is uh, uh, she takes. You know, she takes the lead. She's amazing. That's sort of her, her, her gig. And I come in for the, uh, you know, the, the second or third round of conversations. And usually when I come in, my job is to sit there and be quiet for most of the time. And she talks, and then I have to say one or two really intelligent sounding things at the right moment. ** So. That's our, that's our, our, our yin and yang. And, and you know, sometimes people look over and they, does, he, does he ever say anything?

Michael Koenig: ** We'd love to hear from this guy? No, no, no. He, he is just here for show. That's fantastic. Now, you mentioned your co-founder and founding and building a company is a rollercoaster ride in and of itself. ** Plenty of highs, plenty of lows. In other words, it can be insanely stressful. Now your business partner is also your wife. How has that ride [00:14:00] been? And careful with your response because she's gonna be listening.

Dave Weiss: ** We, um, we, we, we talk about this all the time. In fact, we have other married couples who reach out to us and say, Hey, we're thinking starting a company. ** And, you know, we give them the honest picture. It is not, um, I, I sort of liken it a little bit to the journey of having kids together. It stretches you in a ton of different ways. It adds, um, you know, it takes away space and air out of the room. It, um, it tests you. And, um, in the end, you, you, you reflect on these moments of shared experience that a lot of people don't get with their, with their spouse. ** I mean, this moment where we were on Shark Tank together at the moment where we launched our first booth at CES or we're sitting next to each other unscrewing products, um, you know, the. Those lasting memories I think are, [00:15:00] are just, are really, really important. And I tend to think that the stress and the sniping and the bad behavior that we all do, uh, that sort of stuff melts away. ** Um, in retrospect, in the moment it's terrible and painful and difficult. We, uh. We have, uh, more than one CEO coach. And, um, we both have our own therapists and we, we try to remain emotionally healthy. 'cause this journey is a tough one regardless of whether or not your spouse is your co-founder. Um, but, um, it's certainly not for everyone. ** But I, I, um, I couldn't imagine being here and not having shared it with, uh, with my wife.

Michael Koenig: ** Great answer. You're not gonna be in the doghouse.

Dave Weiss: ** Well practice

Michael Koenig: ** for sure, for sure. Now, what I'm really interested in is understanding, uh, I mean that dynamic is so unique, and [00:16:00] particularly from a leadership perspective. ** You have a successful company here, 80 plus employees. CEO is your wife, COO, uh, is, is the husband. Does that ever come up and do you ever have to kind of set that aside or do you try and, and sweep it under the rug? Or is it just this is who we are and like all founders, we're gonna have, uh, some, some challenges here and there? ** What's that like?

Dave Weiss: ** Um, you know, I, I think that in the beginning there's always some trepidation from the, from, from external parties like investors. But as you achieve more success, and you've been doing this for a while, and this isn't our, our first startup and this, you know, they, you know, they sort of look at it now and it's a non-factor internally. ** You probably have to ask our, our, uh, the rest of our executive team. But, um, we try to be really mindful, um, though it doesn't always work [00:17:00] of, um, when we're. A discussion when we're, we're treating each other the way we would treat any other co-founder one of our, one of our CEO coaches, um, says, smart people with the same facts often, you know, most often come to the same conclusions. ** And so when there's friction. We really try to step back and try to put some boundaries on the discussion and challenge ourselves to write some prose and to try to understand what facts are we missing, what facts are we missing that lead us one way or, or or the other. And when it comes to gut, we have those moments where one of us just needs to disagree and commit.

Michael Koenig: ** Sure. Well, and that's the key there. Disagree and commit, isn't it? Thanks to Amazon for giving us that. I think it was Amazon. Mm-hmm. Wasn't it in terms of the leadership aspect, you know, setting aside the relationship with your co-founder, just in terms of the leadership [00:18:00] aspect, how do you keep the troops feeling confident and happy when there can be so much uncertainty, especially if you're. ** Which has a whole different host of challenges. What's your secret and what have you learned from your leadership? Coaches?

Dave Weiss: ** We are widely transparent. I find that the, uh, sort of fear of the unknown is stronger than really understanding the facts. You know, we, we are big communicators. Meet with our team really often. ** We meet with our entire company, uh, weekly, and we're very transparent about what's going on. When we're doing a fundraise, we show them the deck. When we have our financials come in at the end of the quarter, we show 'em our financials and, um, it produces a little bit of comfort and discomfort that you, you know, it's, um, at first, if you come from a a really large company, it might be [00:19:00] uncomfortable. ** But you get acclimated pretty quickly because you realize that you are an owner of the business. And this is how businesses, this is how businesses work. And we certainly have our moments of ups and downs from a who we're as humans. I am, uh, I'm very steady. And so I think people find some comfort. And the fact that I don't get rattled very often. ** Uh, my wife has very, um, you know, excitement and energy just pours off of her. So when we have something new, people are just sponges to, you know, she makes whatever we're doing sound super exciting. And so that's, that's our, a little bit of our sort of personal brands, but the, um, uh, I, I think the, I think sort of living through those moments, I also think the, you know, there's some old school illusions about. ** Start the startup rollercoaster or the startup, you're gonna have to work 24 hours a [00:20:00] day or you're working in your garage. And, and the comfort of the big company. And more and more the jobs are fairly similar and, um, uh, once you reach a certain size, I do think the early days, the first five, 10 people, it requires a certain level of, of jumping in with two feet. ** And you look for people who. That's fun for them to do that where, where you say, Hey, we have to produce our first retail box and outta your 10 people, you have six of them raise their hand and say, I'll do it, and zero of them have ever made a retail box. You hire the people who are excited about a new challenge as opposed to, oh wait, that's not my area of expertise. ** I might fail. That's, that's the, the composition of folks that do well at that stage.

Michael Koenig: ** How do you screen for that? How do you find that? How do you dig down and find the people who are just ready to jump in with both feet?

Dave Weiss: ** We, uh, we went through this exercise and, and really it wasn't until we were about 40 people where, um. ** Uh, we [00:21:00] were, we were going remote and growing really fast and we, we broke down our values and we were very intentional and it took a very long time and it was the stuff that makes us unique. It was not, you know, traditional, we believe in customers. It was, it was very, very much the stuff that makes us unique. ** And, um, we've brought that to life within our company and it's part of our recruiting process. So every interviewer takes a value and, um, and reads the value and talks about examples about if this is how this manifests at, at Hatch, how does this resonate with you? I found that that, um, not only is it good at screening out folks who might not be a good fit, but it really attracts folks that are, you know, super talented and, and look at one company versus another company and say, you know what? ** These people are really intentional about who they are and the kind of culture [00:22:00] that they want to create, and this is what I want.

Michael Koenig: ** Do you mind sharing those values?

Dave Weiss: ** Sure. Um. The, uh, the first one is, um, we call pick up a shovel. Um, and pick up a shovel is exactly that moment of the retail box. It is biased toward action. ** It is stepped forward. It's not looking over at the ditch and saying, wow, somebody should really dig something there. It's walking over and picking up a shovel and just starting to dig. And, um, it's who we are. I still fire up my drill press and drill holes in the back of products to get access to program reports. ** Like this is what we do and, um, we're very roll up our sleeves kind of company. The second one is we believe in wet paint. And again, the, we try to use sort of these visceral. You can see it. And so it, it's become a little bit of a meme in our company where, where, where people will put like wet paint in [00:23:00] their figma with like dripping paint. ** Um, because not everyone is comfortable sharing early. And, um, you know, if you have a, a, you know, a creative background, sometimes you're used to, you know, sort of the big reveal. And that's not how we work. You know, we create a safe space for people and you know, we really encourage people to share. Our, our last few and, and I won't, um, I won't go through all of them, but our last few are really about humans. ** One of them specifically is, uh, humans over process. And again, with all of these values, they can, they can be misinterpreted. But if you really understand the spirit, this is, this is the kind of company that I wanna wake up every Monday morning, come to work at. And what humanness over process means is success is built on the backs of human relationships. ** And, um, human relationships can overcome the gap in any process, but the, even the best process will not overcome a gap in human [00:24:00] relationships. And so we want to know each other and know each other's kids' names and laugh together and spend time together. And, and, you know, we've, our last few values really are all about people. ** We make a big bet on people that it's okay to be a human. And it, you know, success comes from, from knowing your teammates. I, um, I often tell people this story about the US men's Olympic basketball team, Olympics just happened and they got together and all these all stars. And guess what? They lost a hungry in an exhibition game. ** And there's a moment where, what are your, what are your odds if you're hungry a thousand to one? Well, it's because they didn't know how to play as a team. They didn't know each other. They didn't trust each other. Through that time, through their Olympic journey that they figured out those things and they wound up winning the gold. ** And uh, we are not going to be the USA basketball team losing to hungry. I don't care how many talented people we have, the value of team is [00:25:00] so much higher than that individual talent.

Michael Koenig: ** So how do you build that? You mentioned that you've gone remote. How do you build that comradery and that sense of belonging, that sense of team and understanding?

Dave Weiss: ** Um, I'd say the first, uh, and mo and, and biggest challenge is creating space. So whether or not it's a team room where, where people can just join or, um, or one-on-one meetings or making sure that when somebody is doing onboarding, that they've got 30 people that they need to do one-on-ones with. It's and, and a lot, a ton of them have nothing to do with their job function, but it's just, you need to know people and they need to know you in order to be successful here. ** We try the same kinds of experiments that every company does as they're going remote and trying to figure it out. I'm much more an in person walk to Starbucks and get to know people, kind of human. But I think it started with [00:26:00] realizing that some of our best and brightest. A plus students, they wanted to be as efficient with their time as possible and their efficiency got in the way, you know, of, of really getting to know people. ** Uh, and, and this is a lesson I learned when I was a teacher. You know, I spent 15 minutes of my Monday morning class talking to people about their weekend and asking them about their, uh, you know, their tennis match or, um. Uh, just generally things we, they did and I shared a lot myself, and we just normalized that conversation. ** And guess what? The, the, the rest of the 30 minutes, everyone was really connected and zoomed into what we were talking about as opposed to saying, all right, take out your books and let's open them. And, and that's what, you know, that that's one of the lessons that we learned is that we have to create space for that conversation. ** Especially when we're remote.

Michael Koenig: ** Remote. So you can't just rely on [00:27:00] hoping that it happens by creating a Slack channel where people can share pictures of cats. It's more active where you go hands-on and you yourself are participating in setting that example. Absolutely.

Dave Weiss: ** Uh, you know, we have, um. I encourage everybody, um, on our leadership team to have a list of folks that they're meeting with. ** And it's not just the people that you have as your direct reports now. You don't need to meet with everybody every week. You just can't do that. There aren't enough hours. Should, should, you know, three months go by and you not talk to anyone on the marketing team. Like, absolutely not, right? So be intentional about it if it's not something you would naturally do and think, yeah, I wonder how Katie is doing. ** I haven't talked to her in a while. Be intentional about it. Say, I'm gonna meet with these people, at least my, my directs. I'm gonna meet with them every week. I'm gonna meet with these people once, once a month. I'm gonna meet with these people every six weeks. You create this sort of rotation [00:28:00] where, where you know you at least get some one-on-one time with folks and you also have to participate in, you know, I've been known to just put a a Zoom link in our random channel in Slack and say, Hey, anyone else eating lunch? ** I really wanna normalize just people. Saying hello, people talking to each other, people, people doing that. And I think once you, once you're intentional about that activity and people realize, oh, actually, this isn't just, this isn't just fun for fun's sake. The business, we are a better company because of these relationships. ** It winds up being a virtuous cycle

Michael Koenig: ** going from you and your co-founder, you and your wife, to now 80 people and 2 million units sold. What are some, and I'm sure there are plenty of these lessons, but what's one thing about that growth, about that scale, a lesson that you wish you had known or just a piece of advice that you would pass along to another [00:29:00] COO going through that growth journey?

Dave Weiss: ** I, I think the, um, I, I have heard many, many times before, this is a marathon, um, now a sprint and, um, really try to enjoy the moment as it is now. Um, there's always something special to take out of the size your company is. Now. Sure you have a bunch of difficult things coming up. You have a bunch of craziness, but I often go and I'll, I'll, I'll read, um, some Amazon reviews or I'll look at some NPS comments and there is a human on the other side of that who we've helped, probably some humans who are upset too. ** And, you know, I think, um. You know, the, the, my advice would be to, to, um, to find sort of enjoyment and gratitude in the moment that you're in now, and realize that it's a journey and, and as you get bigger it's just different. There are different moments of stress now, and I [00:30:00] look back and there are lots of things that I'm glad I'm, I'm glad I, I don't do because I wasn't qualified to do it. ** Uh, I'm glad we have an expert there, but some of them I miss. Uh, and so just really trying to be present and enjoy the moment. In terms of the, the journey of growth, I really think the, um, the key for us has been, uh, our values and transparency. Those were things that I'm not sure I knew earlier in my journey. ** We just did them because it was who we were. And um, and at some point as we started to grow and we felt like things were maybe not quite going in the right direction. We realized, well, what was the missing secret sauce? It was that it was that moment of us being in the office and getting talk to each other and getting to know each other. ** And so we became intentional about that. Um, and um, that's been the real key to growing and still being a place where I wanna come, you know, come to work every morning.

Michael Koenig: ** You have such a, an emphasis [00:31:00] on human connections and on the people part. And what I'm taking away from this is if you invest in that, it doesn't matter what the challenges are that you're going to face. ** You've got a team that's together that's going to rebound from losing to hungry and go on to win the gold.

Dave Weiss: ** Absolutely. We, we also have very few regrettable losses. Um, and there are some people who have been here for a very long time and are extremely talented and, um, I think they feel like there's a little bit of an element of this is. ** It's a company, but it's also a family. And I think that's what keeps them here. It's certainly what keeps me here.

Michael Koenig: ** Fantastic. Well, Dave, thanks so much for coming on the podcast. Where can people go to learn more about Hatch and keep up with you

Dave Weiss: ** hatch.co sleep for your, uh, sleep for your entire family.

Michael Koenig: ** I love it. ** There you have it, everyone. hatch.co. Well, thank you very much for listening to Between Two COOs. I'm your host, [00:32:00] Michael Koenig, and a very special thank you to our guest, Dave Weiss for joining us. Tune in next time for our next COO chat, um, between two COOs and be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. ** So you never miss an episode, just visit between two coos.com for more, and if you have a minute. Please leave us a review on our podcast and tell others about the show so they can get great advice from phenomenal chief operating Officers. Thanks for listening, and until next time, so long.