Chris Lesner
Jim, thank you so much for being here. This is so, so good to have you. I'm excited for our viewers to get to understand your story, learn about Danby, learn about all the stuff that you're doing. For those that don't know you, give them a little bit of background in terms of how you ended up now leading Danby, which I know will be quite the story.

Jim Estill
Well, thanks for having me.

Jim Estill
Well, when I was in university, I'm an engineer, needed a computer to design circuit boards, which is what I wanted to do, but got a better deal if I bought two of them. So bought two and sold one, then someone else wanted one, then someone wanted a disk drive, and someone wanted some memory, and someone wanted a printer. So next thing you know, I'm buying and selling computer hardware, software, and peripherals. And over a couple of decades, I was able to grow that business to a couple billion dollars in sales.
And then I sold the business. Along the way I invested in a lot of technology business because I was distributing technology products so I could... So I saw a lot of technologies and...
one of the most I invested in over 150 the most famous one I did this company called Blackberry where I invested in that and I was on their board for 13 years. I started on their board before they went public and stayed there till 2010 and then you look what happened to the stock after that. So then I retired and I sat on the board of Danby Appliances and you know just and the CEO resigned and I said I can come in and run Danby temporarily because it happens to be in my home.
city and I started running Danby again and I said this is what I want to do I want to run a company because I've been retired for almost five years and then they said they wanted me to sell the company I said well how much for and they told me I said okay fine I'll take I'll take it so Danby is smaller than my two billion dollar company but it's you know 400 million size -wise you know we make about two million appliances fridges freezers wine coolers.
that type of thing. And so that's how I became CEO and owner of Dambi Appliances.

Chris Lesner
When you look back at starting a company while in college, I know that's like the classic business story that everyone wishes that they had. What was that like? When you think back, did you have any vision for how that would grow at all? Or at what point did you think, wow, we're actually going to build a real company?

Jim Estill
Well...
Even when I was in university, I always said, oh, I want to start a hundred million dollar company. So I thought that was a big number and everyone would laugh at me. Oh, you'll never start a hundred million dollar company. And I didn't think I was as entrepreneurial as other of my classmates who all said, oh, we're going to go work for IBM for five years and we're going to get some background and then we'll go start a business. And they all started working for IBM and then they bought a new car and a new house and got married and had babies. And next thing you know, they're still working for, they're still working for IBM and still trying to pay off their mortgage.
but so I just jumped in and the rest is history.

Chris Lesner
And when you think through all the different jumps along the way, because you started that company, you were probably involved in multiple other companies that you invested in, not just financially, but from a time standpoint. Then Dan B running into the CEO role. What was it like that transition? I mean, similar ish, but totally different as well.

Jim Estill
Sure, it's totally different from a leadership point of view. When you go into an existing company, it has an existing culture. And of course, I had in my mind what I wanted to be the culture. And so you're trying to move the ship and it literally is a ship. It doesn't turn instantly. It takes time to get the culture to be more the culture I wanted. Now, I believe the larger the company...
the more the leader's job is to coach on culture and let everyone else make decisions. Because if I start making all the decisions, then I become the funnel point. Everyone's waiting for me. And I see this as a problem with some leaders. They don't scale because they want to make all the decisions. So sometimes I'll come in and the lines are painted in the parking lot. And if I say, why are they painted yellow instead of white? Then next thing you know, they're going to ask me before they do anything else. And why would I be better to pick that line?
in the parking lot versus someone else. So very careful on second -guessing other people making decisions, but if I get the bill and it's $100 ,000, I said, did we get three quotes on that? And do we really need to paint those lines? Because that's cultural in the spending, the frugality, and does it add value to our customers? Why would we want to spend $100 ,000? Does that mean our customers get better value? Maybe not, right?

Chris Lesner
So when you're jumping into that role, there was obviously a leader before you that you would have known being on the board. And then obviously you're coming in. How are the leadership styles different? How did the internal team take it?

Jim Estill
Yes.

Jim Estill
Well, interesting, your podcast says servant leadership. Like that's what I practice is servant leadership. And my predecessor was very good, but different. In one way, he was a little bit more dictatorial and his way of the highway. Like I end every call with any of my staff or anybody, what can I do for you? Our weekly reports are my goals this week were this, we accomplished this, my goals next week are this, things you should know and things I need from you.
And I want to know what are the things they need from me because...
I can, and sometimes the answer is, you know, they need me to do something I can't, but at least they've asked, at least I can say, sorry, I don't have any knowledge of forklifts, I can't help you on that. But they don't know that maybe my brother -in -law, it knows a lot about it. So often I do have someone in my Rolodex that I can refer them to. So a little bit on that. I also believe that every CEO has a primary style and many secondary styles. So my immediate predecessors,
was a sales CEO. I'm a marketing CEO, so my natural approach tends to be marketing. His natural approach tended to be sales. His predecessor was an accountant, and his natural approach is accounting. And I've seen CEOs which are production CEOs. I happen to be an engineer, but my primary approach is not I'm production or logistics, but all CEOs need to be rounded in everything.
I can figure out accounting, I know accounting, I know I need to have a good accountant at my side because I'm not an accounting CEO. And I need to have good salespeople because I'm not necessarily the sales CEO.

Chris Lesner
So how do you end up instilling some of those servant leadership principles or leadership principles in general in all the team members that are actually leading the things that their strengths are in?

Jim Estill
Well, the easiest way is by asking questions.
asking questions is a way to coach people, but it's like the weekly report. It just says things I need to, so the weekly reports are actually a roll -up weekly. So the sales rep sends exactly the same weekly report to his sales manager. The sales manager sends a weekly report to the vice president of sales. Vice president of sales sends it to me. And so it rolls up through the organization. There's always this line, things I need from you. And so people learn things they need from you. The other thing I have, I have a lot of
of sayings. So one of them is fail often feel fast feel cheap and what I mean by that is we accept failure. I'm not going to say we celebrate failure but we actually want that because if you don't try you will never make a mistake.
But you'll maybe have no failures, but we won't move forward. So that sort of ties with servant leadership. You don't get zapped for making a mistake. And the servant leader also creates an authenticity at all levels in the organization. I find younger leaders sometimes try to be demigods and all -knowing, and they have more power.
if they admit they're not all -knowing and even that emanates from me. So I don't know a lot of things and I just say, you know, tell me how this works, right? How does Google AdWords work? How do we get first place here or there? You know what I mean?

Chris Lesner
Yeah. So when you look back, I mean, you've been a part of some fascinating leadership teams sitting on multiple boards, been a part of many startups, even thinking back to your comment of BlackBerry days. How did you get involved in BlackBerry? Because you were one of the early people to get involved there.

Jim Estill
Yeah, so at the time I was investing in multiple technology startups and they were one of those technology startups that in this small community I was reasonably well known because at the time my company was not a big company. We were probably doing 100 million in sales so we were a big -ish company in the local, it has to be Waterloo region. So they reached out and that's how I got involved in that and the reason they wanted me to join their board,
is at that time I had taken my company public so I had already been public for a year or two and they knew that and they were taking their company public so they said what's your experience and they knew I was involved in technology companies.

Chris Lesner
What was the process like leading a private company to taking it public for the first time?

Jim Estill
Well, for starters, I don't strongly recommend companies going public like when I went public because since I went public, there's been a lot more regulation. The costs have gone up a lot. You can't even have a company that's public. It doesn't cost a million dollars in overheads to be a public company.
The process once you go public is you have another set of stakeholders being the shareholders. So when you're running a private business, you have to answer to your employees, you have to answer to your customers, you have to answer to your suppliers, but now you have to answer to investors as well. And investors can also be...
They can ask uncomfortable questions. They can think that they know a better direction to take the company than we do. They can second guess. Another big difference between private companies and public companies, and I fight this one all the time, is many public companies run their business for the quarter.
and I believe successful companies run for the decade. So at Danby we're a private company and I don't really care if the sales rep makes the sale at the end of the quarter or if they make it the first of the next quarter as long as they make the sale and I would rather make a bigger sale.

Chris Lesner
Hmm.

Jim Estill
early next quarter than a smaller sale this quarter or give away the farm the end of the quarter to make their numbers. Matter of fact, one of the tricks we use in purchasing is we actually track in our system when the quarter end is of the suppliers, of the public ones. And often they will give us ridiculous discounts on products that we're going to need anyways. So like we're going to buy that anyway. So if we're going to buy it, don't give me a deal at the end.
a quarter but they need to make their numbers so we hold the order until they give us the price and then we give them the price we get an extra 2 % off or 3 % or whatever they give us and it's a that's a purchasing technique.

Chris Lesner
Yeah, I mean, some of this stuff, obviously you've learned along the way. Some of it you've learned by surrounding yourself with good people. Were people ever coming alongside you from mentoring standpoint who were leaders for you that you were following?

Jim Estill
Oh absolutely. So I believe in having multiple mentors. Many of my mentors don't know they're my mentors. I buy them lunch, I buy them coffee, I treat them well, but I have multiple mentors for multiple areas. So if I have a logistics problem, I have a mentor who is in logistics, I'll call him and he'll help me in this. I have a mentor who is an HR person and if I have an HR stickly issue then I'll call her.
And I'm a big believer in mentors. I'm also a big believer in studying companies and people that are a level further than I am. So when I was doing 100 million in sales, I studied people doing 200 million in sales. When you're 200, you're studying people doing half a billion. When you're half a billion, you're studying people doing a billion. And so keep figuring out how do I scale the next level.
And the hint I'll give you is usually it's not doing more. Usually it's giving things up. So the key is what is it that I need to give up to be a bigger company?

Chris Lesner
Wow. When you think through that journey, what does that look like for Danby?

Jim Estill
Well, it's really no different for Dambe than it is for my technology distribution company, except that Dambe is not in a massively growth industry. We're in appliances, refrigerators. So it's not a, doesn't take off through the roof. So what we're doing is we're fighting for market share and finding niches and stuff like that with a growth mentality, but not...
not a high, not a, like when I was doing Blackberry, the sales would double every quarter or like it would be massive growth. And so they were hiring 500 people at a time and people who started didn't know what they were doing. And because the person at the next desk has only been there for a month. And so they had this extremely fast growth. Danby can be more deliberate on our growth, but I also like that. I mean,
little polish can go a long way. It's also why I like a company at my age and stage that's this size because if I increase sales by 10 % that's $40 million. If I increase margins by 1 % that's $4 million. And the problem I was having when I was retired is I dabble in little business and you could increase sales by 50 % and that's $50 ,000. It didn't move the needle. And same thing with expenses. Cut expenses by 10%. Oh great, you sold, you saved.
$10 ,000. It doesn't move it like it does in a medium -sized company like Danby.

Chris Lesner
I think most people hear your story and just think you might have like, that was an amazing ride. And when you retired, I'm sure a lot of people just thought you might stay retired, not as a full -time CEO, but just getting involved in many different things that you've gotten involved in. What was the determining factor that had you retire and then unretire from a personality standpoint and just from an interest standpoint, not just circumstantially?

Jim Estill
So when you start out, you think, oh, I'm gonna build a business, grow it to a certain point, sell it for a lot of money, retire. And I thought that was the life plan. But once I was retired, I realized...
you become what you spend your time on and what I had become as a gardener and a gopher and a handyman, none of which I liked. And so if I don't want to be a gardener then maybe I'm better off to do what I do. So coming back into a business is very liberating because I know I'm here by choice and again I comment on the scalability. So when I was retired I'm dabbling in little things and little things are little things.
like you know I could
Increase sales by 10 % just doesn't move the needle. And same thing with resources. If I need, well, I did this very large refugee resettlement project and, you know, so I could use Danby trucks to, and Danby warehousing. Oh great, you need 20 ,000 square feet. Yeah, we've got 20 ,000 square feet. Like we were able to do things on scale. 800 volunteers help with that. When you're doing 800 volunteers, it's an orchestration project, the same as running a company.
Right?

Chris Lesner
I mean, speaking of some of the stuff you've done with refugees, I mean, you people might not know this until they look it up, but you've been involved in a lot of philanthropy work. Why? Why not just keep it all for yourself? Why? Why even get involved in something that's so far outside of you all the way in Syria and other places?

Jim Estill
Well, that comes through the retirement and the soul searching.
And really it's the philosophy of wealth. You want to be worth so much money because that gives you security and I have to worry that I might need to be in a home with 24 -hour care just like anybody else or whatever. But beyond that, it's a number, it's a piece of paper, it doesn't mean anything. So beyond that, my philosophy is I should give it away. So just decide, where do I think I can have the impact? And I don't care what good you do, I just think you should do your own good.
good on your scale and I should do my good on my scale so that's why I do it and of course it's gratifying. I mean it's gratifying.

Chris Lesner
How do you choose what to get involved in? There's so many things you could do from a philanthropy standpoint.

Jim Estill
You're absolutely right. I think it comes around.
What are some things I'm passionate about? I'm passionate about base needs. So homelessness and people at the lower social economics part of it. But I have no problem if you're passionate about humane society or cancer cure or anything. I just, I don't second guess which charities you choose versus what charities I choose. I did, I do support the hospitals. I do support hospice.
And I tend to support local because I actually like local as well. And so those tend to be the charities I look at.

Chris Lesner
How do you help other leaders start opening their eyes to ways they can make a difference in the world? You went in thinking one thing and your thoughts changed over time. How do you help other people?

Jim Estill - Danby Appliances (18:49.230)
Well.
One of the things I like about owning and running Danby is it gives me a platform. And I hate to say people listen more because I own Danby and it's a company of some scale, not huge scale, but it's big enough that people say, oh, gee, we better listen to him. So I do public speaking, I do podcasts, I do things. The other thing is I don't need to change your mind or anyone else's mind. I just say my piece. And one characteristic I want for NERS is,
we don't really care what other people think. So we just do our thing and if you don't agree with me, well that's fine, you don't agree with me. I don't really care because I don't necessarily seek your approval. Matter of fact, the other day I did something and one of my employees said, oh Jim, that was good work you did there. And I just said to myself, oh, why, nobody ever tells me that. Why, that's interesting.

Chris Lesner
From that standpoint, what do you think are the key characteristics of leading in your role outside of just delegating and getting out of people's way? Like encouragement, that means a lot to some people. Do you look for certain characteristics and try to focus on them with your leadership team?

Jim Estill
I really like people who are constant learners and I like people that have enough capacity, meaning intellectual capacity, to learn and grow. Specific skills can be learned if you have basic capacity.
To bring out the best in people though, the ideal is to slot them in a position that they are ideally suited for. And the interesting thing that happens is the more competent you are, the more you're actually capable of doing a lot of different jobs, but it may not be a job that you're uniquely competent to do or you're perfect at. An example for myself, I am an engineer, so clearly I can handle some numbers. I would be a terrible CFO or accountant because I
I hate the detail, but I could struggle through and do an adequate job, but I wouldn't love it. I'd hate it. Now I have people that work for me. If I say, here, can you do a spreadsheet for me? They said, oh, I can't believe Jim's letting me do this spreadsheet.

Chris Lesner - Servant Leadership General Info (21:7.567)
Yeah, there's, I literally was just talking to an author by the name of Marcus Buckingham and he talks about what's your red threads, what's the things that you could just pull on forever and that you'd love doing. And yeah, sounds a lot like that.

Jim Estill
Well, exactly. Actually, a better example in business would be sales versus non -sales. Some salespeople think, oh, isn't it great? I get to go out and visit with customers and I get to knock on doors. Isn't this great? And someone else can say, oh, I hate it. I don't know who I'm calling on. This is nervous. It's like people's public speak versus non -public speakers. Some people public speak, oh, this is energizing. I'll go get energy. And other people lose sleep because they're going to have to give a speech on Wednesday.

Chris Lesner
When you think of your involvement right now in Danby, obviously you retired for a little bit, then you jumped back in the game. Do you have other extracurriculars that you're involved in from a business standpoint still that you enjoy, or is the sole focus Danby?

Jim Estill
That's an interesting... I'm going to say my main soul focus is Dan B.
But I own a few other companies. I am very careful to know whether I am in the CEO chair or the management chair, which is what I am at Danby Appliances, or whether I'm in the owner chair. So I happen to own another company that makes snow plows. In the snow plow company, Arctic Manufacturing, I'm in the owner chair there. So I do sit on the board, and yes, the president reports to me, and yes, I can make suggestions, but I don't run Arctic. He runs Arctic.
and I'm very clear that I'm more of a almost more board. So then I've got a couple of outside boards as you know. The problem is when you're an entrepreneur you always get your fingers in lots of things and I actually love it and I always get over busy and then I complain about being over busy and it's my own fault because I'm the one that gets myself over busy.

Chris Lesner
I've read about multiple awards you've gotten from the government in Canada. Talk to us about what some of those looked like and why you got them. Are those things you apply for? Are those things that they just find you and you get?

Jim Estill
Well, mostly other people apply for me usually or nominate me or they find me. Awards are a byproduct and I would say for leaders on the call, money is a byproduct. So I think if I set out to win an award,
I think that that's the wrong motivation. You do what you do. So why have I gotten the awards, I've gotten the honorary university degrees, Order of Canada, which is kind of like being knighted, Order of Ontario, Ersten Young Entrepreneur of the Year, that kind of stuff. That's all byproducts of what I do. It's not.
and I am getting it usually for business success and for the philanthropy that I do and for the combination of the two. Another comment I will make is none of us are as good as the outside world thinks we are and none of us are as bad as the outside world thinks we are.
So everyone says, oh Jim, you're so successful. You're so successful. Yeah, you're so successful. And I believe in exercise and working out. And I didn't work out as hard as I should have today because I'm a person just like everybody else.

Chris Lesner
As you talk through some of the wealth concepts, and I know you shared like, hey, there's basic standard that it would be great for people to think of. Why is it, do you think that, I mean, maybe this is obvious, but people are so self -focused, right? And how do you help teach your team or the people that you're leading to be a little bit less self -focused and more others -focused?

Jim Estill
I'm not sure I try to except by leading from example. The other thing is,
If you're depressed, my advice is help someone less fortunate. And so by having people get involved in some of the stuff that I do or what other people does, that generally makes people realize that any problems that you are dealing with today are first world problems. And you are not going to have to sleep under a bridge tonight. And you are not going to go home and find your house was bombed out tonight. Unless you maybe have some friends that I don't know about. But you...
Our problems are all first world problems and helping those less fortunate creates a gratitude. I actually learned from my refugee project that the secret to happiness is to be grateful for what you have, not ungrateful for what you've lost. Because many of these refugees, they lost family members, they lost prestige, they owned their business, they were a doctor and all of a sudden they can't practice medicine in Canada and not ungrateful for what other people have.
have. So gratitude is tied to happiness and so I always talk about and preach gratitude but I don't try to change people's views I just tell you my views and and I don't always even tell you my views unless you well you asked I told you but you didn't ask I'm not gonna sit and twist your arm and listen to me.

Chris Lesner
some of these people whose lives you've directly stepped into using the refugees as an example, how do you see them leading through such tough circumstances? And are you able to give them input? Are you learning along the way yourself? How does that look?

Jim Estill
Oh, I'm learning tremendously. And that's one of the things I am a constant learner. And so any situation I can learn from and I in wisdom, true wisdom is learning from other people and other people's mistakes. I'm not good at true wisdom yet. I often like to make my own mistakes three times before I learn from them. But, um,
So I definitely learned from them. And when you hear stories, it drives home, you know, I just don't have any problems, even though I think I have some problems. They're literally not, they're not the problem. You know, I might not have exactly the dinner I want tonight, but it's not going to be that I don't have a dinner tonight, right? It's...

Chris Lesner
When you think through some of those life lessons, what's one of the biggest life lessons you've learned along the way that you think would be useful for people who are listening about servant leadership, leadership in general?

Jim Estill
So I'd say the biggest life lesson is to be authentic. And by being authentic, I mean showing weakness. And it's not weakness to ask for help. And it's not in most leaders nature to ask for help. And I'm not perfect at it. But asking for help.
allows others to servant leader you and making sure that other people know they can ask for your help makes people say, gee, I will use my servant leader to help me get further along. And really, what's the job of a leader? To help the team succeed. So my job is to help every salesperson sell more. My job is to help every shipper ship more product. My job is to try to facilitate everyone being better at their job. Because if everyone's better at their job, we'll sell more and we'll make more.

Chris Lesner
There's so many things that I could ask you. I want to ask you 10 rapid fire questions and just say the first thing that comes to your mind with these. No right or wrong answer. So who's the first person you think of when I say servant leadership?

Jim Estill
Perfect.

Jim Estill
My father.

Chris Lesner
Five words that most describe yourself.

Jim Estill
Well, you're not allowed to ask difficult questions.

Chris Lesner
Hahaha.

Jim Estill
I would say persistent, high work ethic, health focused, and I believe that health helps us accomplish what we need to accomplish. I like to think I'm altruistic. And fifth, I'm a bit of a thinker.

Chris Lesner
This isn't one of the rapid fire questions, but on the health topic, how do you think leaders should be viewing health and how has your view of health changed throughout the years?

Jim Estill
Well, see when you're young, you live on past health. So when I was in my 20s and 30s, I didn't really think about health. It's not until I get to my 40s and wake up and say, gee, that was tough climbing that flight of stairs, and gee, there's this extra few pounds sitting here, and whatnot, that I kind of wake up and I realize that health...
helps me be more productive. So I focused in my lifetime a lot on health and time management and efficiency and I realized I'd be a lot I am a lot more efficient if I am healthy and so that moves the health part of my life up to a higher priority than some other things.
And health is mostly about habits. So I just have a lot of habits around health that in aggregate add up. So it's not that I, it's not doing the one hour workout every day. It just is park a little bit through the door and take the stairs instead of the elevator and just eat a little better than not.

Chris Lesner
Yeah, that's good. All right, favorite author or book?

Jim Estill
Daniel Pink would be a favorite author or Malcolm Gladwell. I like his stuff. He's a really good thinker so those would be two and any of their books.

Chris Lesner
Favorite movie.

Jim Estill
I don't watch movies.

Chris Lesner
Really? Okay. TV shows or no?

Jim Estill
I don't have a television. I don't watch television. I don't watch movies.

Chris Lesner
Really? Okay. Favorite food?

Jim Estill
I'm going to say sauerkraut and I'm saying that for two reasons. I make sauerkraut. So, uh...
It's so economical and so good for you and it does add spice to everything. It's just easy, but if you say favorite food, it's not like I'm going to say, oh gee, I'm going to go eat a bowl of sauerkraut. If you're talking that, it would have to be chocolate almonds or something that's not as good for me.

Chris Lesner
Yeah. Favorite thing to do in your free time.

Jim Estill
I would say read or walk or garden or workout. Workout.

Chris Lesner
surprising or what?
surprising fact about you.

Jim Estill
When I immigrated to Canada, I didn't speak any English and I was illiterate.

Chris Lesner
Where did you immigrate from?

Jim Estill
well, United States, but I was nine months old. See, that's the, and I've used that line with my refugees. I said, look, when I immigrated to Canada, I didn't speak any English. You'll learn it, right? Well, of course I was nine months old. I didn't speak any English.

Chris Lesner
Yeah.

Chris Lesner
Love it. Favorite place you've been.

Jim Estill
Um, you know, it's probably Woodstock, Ontario, which is where I grew up just because I have a fondness for that.

Chris Lesner -
where somewhere you want to go that you have not been to before.

Jim Estill
That's a good question. I'm thinking right now it's Bangladesh and the only reason I say that is I have a factory that I do business with there and I've been thinking I should go visit them.

Chris Lesner
Great. And best advice you've ever gotten.

Jim Estill
Be zen. Or the gist of that is nothing is as bad as you think it is. Nothing is as good as you think it is. It's just be zen. So I can insult you, yell at you, it's like be zen, right? Or you can go out today and my car's been wrecked or, you know, like, okay, it is what it is.

Chris Lesner
Yeah. Wow, this has been awesome. Thank you so much for sharing with our audience just about your life, about your story, some of your learnings. Is there anything else that you want to leave people with on the way?

Jim Estill
Well, thanks for having me. No, I think you've pretty well covered. Actually, I'm going to let all of your listeners steal my tagline. So, Dan B. Appliances' tagline is, do the right thing. So, that's on my business card and on my literature. And I originally started that because you...
You can't have a manual that says everything, but how do you treat your coworkers? Do the right thing. How do you treat your customers? Do the right thing. How do you treat your suppliers? Do the right thing. And then it extends into everything you do.

Chris Lesner
That's good. Well, thank you so much. Excited to have people hear your story and look forward to talking again soon.

Jim Estill
Thank you, Chris.