Movies About Sales Are About Something Else
DOROTHY
Are you doing that on purpose, or can't you make up your mind?
SCARECROW
That's the trouble. I can't make up my mind. I haven't got a brain -- only straw.
DOROTHY
How can you talk if you haven't got a brain?
SCARECROW
I don't know. But some people without brains do an awful lot of talking, don't they?
DOROTHY
Yes, I guess you're right.
The other day someone sent me an email asking me for my thoughts on the best sales movies. I think he had in mind to use some clips at a sales meeting. I know what he was looking for. He wanted a list of scenes like this:
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Alec Baldwin going off on Jack Lemon in Glengarry Glen Ross about leads, steak knives, and coming in second place (“coffee is for closers!”).
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Ben Affleck ranting in Boiler Room at the new recruits. “Whoever says that money doesn’t buy happiness doesn’t have any [money]. Look at my grin. Ear to ear.” Actually the quote is a bit spicier than that, but you get the idea.
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Tin Men is full of fun scenes. The scene with John Mahoney and Richard Dreyfus taking pictures in front of the house (“we’re taking a before picture”) is especially fun.
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The scene towards the end of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles where John Candy is running around the train station selling shower curtain rings to get enough money to continue the trip.
The problem with these movies is that they are cartoons of what really good sales people do. Selling is a journey—for both the seller and the customer. Powerful sellers operate with head and heart completely integrated. Yeah, they’re goal oriented and focused on making money. But the really good ones, the ones that actually enjoy selling and do it year after year, think and feel: How do I reach this person? How do I find the real need, the one that will really lead to a satisfying solution? How do I do my job with honesty and integrity? How do I make every interaction—with my customers, colleagues, and supervisors, just a bit more pleasant? The money takes care of itself.
So my thoughts went in a completely different direction.
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The scene in the first Indiana Jones movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark, where Indy runs into the marketplace and sees the guy in the black turban twirling his sword this way and that. Indy watches him for a moment and then takes out his gun and shoots him. Lesson: Putting on a good show is all well and good, but at some point you just have to act.
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The opening scene of the same movie. There are spiders, dart things, skeletons, other weird stuff, and an obviously disreputable assistant. Indy successfully makes it to the idol which he switches for a bag of sand. The imagery and meaning fairly washes over you! But alas, the earth shakes, things come crashing down, and general mayhem ensues. Big rock, lots of running and jumping, a nasty turn with the conniving assistant, and finally, “once again Mr. Jones, what was once yours is now mine?” Lesson 1: Even when you think you have all the contingencies covered, you don’t. Lesson 2: We all knew it was going to work out for Indy because he had the greatest screenwriter, director, and producer doing his movie. Who’s doing your movie?
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The closing scenes of the third Indiana Jones movie, The Last Crusade. Indiana takes up his father’s cause, the search for the holy grail (which most people assume is the cup of Christ, but is actually the ark of the covenant, the subject of the first movie, but that is another topic), to both rescue his father and prove his worth in his father’s eye. This, of course, is the ultimate son’s journey and heroic journey rolled into one. Towards the end, he finally meets the templar knight who’s been watching a collection of cups since he was a young crusader. “Choose wisely.” The bad guy doesn’t, Indy does, and dad is saved. Later, the cup falls down into the big crack across the seal in the floor. The bad gal falls in and Indy nearly goes in after her. It is the voice of the father that saves him: “Indy, let it go.” In the end, Indy finds what he was really looking for and had all along: his father’s love. Lesson: there are about six and they should all be obvious.
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Almost any three minute sequence from Apollo 13. I especially like the one where Ed Harris dumps a bunch of stuff on the desk and tells the people in the room that they have about twenty two minutes to figure out a solution to the oxygen problem using only what’s in front of them. Lesson: There’s always an answer, always a way. You just have to stop looking at what’s in front of you as a pile of junk. Reframe the problem. Write down your assumptions and then throw them away. Be quiet. Think. Listen. Try stuff. There is always an answer.
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Same movie, the scene towards the end where people are mumbling that “this could be the biggest disaster in NASA history”. Gene Kranz, played by Ed Harris, straightens all the way up and says that he disagrees, “I believe that this will be the finest moment in NASA history.” Lesson: There is nothing to fear but fear itself. Plan, prepare, execute, and have faith.
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Any movie involving a heroic journey, especially the first Star Wars. The scene from The Empire Strikes Back with Yoda raising the star fighter from the swamp is especially good. "No! Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try." Lesson: Should be obvious. See Try vs. Do for more on this point.
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Kevin Hoffberg
Last modified:
05/03/06