From Leaving Dyson to The Washing Machine Project | Navjot Sawhney

What Washing Machines Teach Us About Leadership | Navjot Sooni & The Washing Machine Project

This time Hayaatun is joined by Navjot Sawhney, founder of The Washing Machine Project, about how engineering and leadership intersect through a mission to reduce the unpaid labor of hand-washing clothes.

Nav describes being raised by his mother and sisters after his father died when he was eight, early leadership roles encouraged by his mother, and values of Sikh seva and Jugaad problem-solving.

After working at Dyson, he quit to work with Engineers Without Borders in India, where he met Divya, whose lack of electricity and running water inspired him to create a manual washing machine. The patented flat-pack Divya machine saves 75% of time and 50% of water, has impacted over 100,000 lives, won Time Invention of the Year, and is scaling with partners like Whirlpool and JCDecaux, aiming to reach 1 million people by 2030.

00:00 Intro 00:27 Meet Nav 02:45 Founder Life Today 03:52 Curious Childhood Roots 05:24 Loss and Raised by Women 07:12 Responsibility as Leadership 10:13 Seva Scouts and Service 11:26 Engineering and Jugaad 13:08 Dyson Dream and Culture 16:23 Purpose Crisis and Leap 19:49 India Fieldwork Reality 23:07 Washing Machine Born 26:41 Scale of the Problem 28:12 Humanitarian Training Tests 29:42 Divya Machine Impact 30:37 Leading a Blended Movement 31:12 Building a Movement 33:26 Keeping Divya Central 35:08 Billboards and Partnerships 36:41 Frugal Innovation Matters 39:21 Identity and Team Space 40:52 Resilience and Chardikala 43:58 Learning to Scale Leadership 46:06 Aspirations and Legacy 48:01 Salad Spinner Origins 49:03 Iterating with User Feedback 51:20 Pitching and Funding Reality 54:01 People Who Inspire 55:18 Quick Fire Round 01:00:08 Reflections

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Credits:

Producer: Sunny Winter Producer: Thuy Dong Producer: Jimmy McLoughlin OBE

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