#244: Sanjit Biswas, Cofounder and CEO of Samsara – Big eyes, big ears

How Leaders Lead with David Novak

David Novak Leadership

Entrepreneurship, Business, Management

4.8 • 596 Ratings

🗓️ 19 June 2025

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you want to build smarter solutions and truly serve your customers, you’ve got to get closer to what they’re struggling with. In this episode, Samsara CEO Sanjit Biswas shares how his “big eyes, big ears” mindset helps uncover those opportunities. You’ll also learn: How to make your engineers love sales (no, really) The one thing you’re missing about curiosity Practical ideas to put your core values into action A helpful formula to prioritize your R&D budget Take your learning further. Get proven leadership advice from these (free!) resources: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The How Leaders Lead App⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠: A vast library of 90-second leadership lessons to stay sharp on the go ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Daily Insight Emails⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠: One small (but powerful!) leadership principle to focus on each day Whichever you choose, you can be sure you’ll get the trusted leadership advice you need to advance your career, develop your team, and grow your business.

Transcript

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0:00.0	When we get on site, I always tell people like big eyes and big ears.
0:03.5	Like, let's see how these operations really run.
0:06.2	Let's listen to where those pain points are.
0:08.7	So I love it in terms of helping me understand what problems need solving next.
0:17.6	You can build fast. you can scale smart.
0:24.8	But if you're not solving the right problems, what's the point?
0:28.5	Welcome to How Leaders Lead.
0:30.2	I'm David Novak, and every week I have conversations with the very best leaders in the world
0:34.7	to help you become the best leader you can be.
0:39.0	My guest today is Sanjit Biswas, the co-founder and CEO of Sam Sarah. It's a company that helps digitize physical
0:45.2	operations and logistics so they're safer and more efficient. This isn't Sanjit's first rodeo.
0:51.5	Before this, he co-founded Maraki and sold it to Cisco for over a billion
0:56.3	dollars. And what drives him is the mindset he calls big eyes, big ears. I got to tell you, I love this
1:04.0	phrase so much, and I just wish I to come up with it. And you're going to love it too, because it's all
1:10.2	about staying close to your customer.
1:12.3	You watch what they struggle with. You listen to what they can't quite articulate. And when you do,
1:16.8	you uncover the problems that actually need solving. Stay tuned to see how he does it. Plus,
1:22.3	how Sanjit is thinking about AI and his business and a hiring tip you're going to want to use in your next interview.
1:29.3	So let's get into it. Here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours, Sanjit Biswas.
1:40.3	You got to ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange in December of 2021 when you took Sam Samaura Public.
1:50.4	What's a behind-the-scenes story of that experience that you've never told anybody before?
1:55.3	Well, first of all, it's definitely one of those milestone moments.
	...

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