Does role playing work?

Is role playing and videoing a good tool to use on sales training courses? This is often a question I am asked when meeting prospective clients who are looking at the possibility of running a sales training course.

Well think of it this way, it’s a Monday morning after the big match at the weekend and the premier league football coach brings the team in to review the match. On goes the video and the coach and players watch, each move is analysed, the tape is stopped and the coach asks the group what was good, what was poor and what can they do different next time.

If video evidence is good enough for premiership footballers to see their strengths and their development needs then surely it is a tool that should also be used for sales training courses.

I was in Spain recently and I decided I would go and get some golf lessons. I used to play a lot of golf but moved a number of years ago and really got out of the habit. I decided now is my chance to get back into it and guess what, the first thing the professional golf teacher did was admire my swing and then video it.

The video was then played back and the professional golfer slowed each part of the swing down and analysed each part—he pointed out the good bits and then the areas I need to work on, the amazing thing about it was that I did not need him to point out I moved my head as I saw it myself.

I suppose the real point of this article is to say we all need to take a step away from what we do every day and analyse the good points and the areas we need to work on.

It is a known fact that on sales training courses when the experienced top salespeople sit down and analyse what they do, they will find areas where they can improve.

We really do need to take stock every now and again and check are we cutting corners, are we missing opportunities for up selling are we really dealing with objections as effectively as we can are we missing buying signals etc. So to answer the question is it a good idea to video role plays on sales training courses, I again say if it helps professional footballers and helps professional golfers then surely it will help professional salespeople