“Field of Dreams”. A great movie. A stupid strategy.

Transcript

Hey there! It’s Peter Winick. I’m the Founder and CEO of Thought Leadership Leverage. And today, I wanted to share with you a recurring theme, an issue, a struggle that I see thought leaders deal with over and over and over again. And that is confusing a great movie for a great strategy.

What am I talking about? So in 1989, Kevin Costner came out with Field of Dreams. Field of Dreams, the premise of the movie, if you remember way back in in the stone ages of 1989 was that if you build it, they will come. So this was an Iowa farmer that was going to build this amazing baseball field in the middle of a field in Iowa. And all of the amazing players, Sleepy Joe, and all these things, Shoeless Joe not Sleepy Joe, would appear. Right. And fulfill all of his wildest dreams. Because it’s a Hollywood movie, it obviously ends that way.

The analogy or the parallel for thought leaders is it is often more fun, more satisfying, easier, if you will, to build stuff than to sell stuff. And you know, therein lies the conflict of the strategy. Right. Build it and they will come. Great movie. Stupid strategy.

What I would suggest for thought leaders is before you invest your time, your energy, your effort, your money, the opportunity cost. Fully loaded. Be honest with yourself on what the nature of the investment is. Make sure there’s a market for it. Make sure you can pre-test the waters. Do pilots. Pre-sell solutions before you make the investments. So again great movies don’t make great strategies necessarily.

Love to hear your thoughts Thank you.