Blog Posted : 17th July 2020
How we kept learning about selling from watching great movies!
Someone (unfortunately I can’t remember who!) once said to me that ‘Movies are a window on the world!’ And it was with this idea at the back of my mind when I set up the ‘Movie Project’ to provide some enjoyable ‘professional development’ for people who sell during the lockdown.
The idea was simple. We shouldn’t waste the lockdown. I wanted to see the lockdown as an opportunity to learn.
How? I would curate a selection of movies that had a sales theme as part of their plot so that people with an interest in selling could both enjoy watching and have fun learning about sales. I would then invite a group of people (who I knew had an interest in selling) to join me in watching them.
After watching each film, the people participating would meet up at the end of the week to take part in a discussion (using Zoom obviously) where we could talk about what we had seen and what we had learned. The six movies we watched together and learned from were:
Was it fun? Yes! Did we learn anything? Well….
My friend Alan Southcombe has created a really neat little software proposition called ‘your2050’ that collects and collates people’s ideas and thoughts remotely and anonymously.
I asked him if he would help me find out. This is what your2050 discovered….
….”the greatest value from the Movie Project to participants seemed to be the opportunity of hearing what was most important to the other viewers when selling. ‘Made me see things from very different angles’; ‘The wide variety of views on the films was brilliant’; and ‘The discussions were enlightening’ were typical comments. This demonstrated how sharing personal experience and perspective on a specific topic offers others a fuller picture with new dimensions to explore and values to appreciate.
So whether the participants already knew, or learnt through the Movie Project, ‘to have a genuine and very inquisitive interest in what your customers need’, ‘ “taking it away” gets them hooked!’, ‘to believe in what you are doing and keep going!’; ‘[having] trusted advisers are key to success’; ‘to persevere using every piece of luck’; or ‘to be adaptable’ would help sales, they all found something new to take away.”
A follow up Movie Project is running on four Thursday from 6th to 27th August, 2020. Places remain available, so please contact me as soon as possible if you would like to join, watch and learn something new about sales!
your2050 is a text only, anonymous, ideas sharing and collaboration platform hosting private Communities and a common Public Area. The website is designed to promote grass roots suggestions and proposals and to encourage full participation in the advancement of thought within organisations and amongst its users.
Paul Essery Alan Southcombe
Director Director
My Sales Guru your2050
paule@mysalesguru.co.uk alan@your2050.org
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