This one’s another Book Club episode with Jason Cranswick, talking about the books that actually change how you think (and how you run a dealership).
We recover The Chimp Paradox (Steve Peters) and how your “chimp mind” shows up on the showroom, The Mindset Workbook (Carol Dweck) and why fixed vs growth thinking changes performance, and A Path Through the Jungle (Steve Peters) for handling pressure and staying consistent.
If you manage people, sell cars, or you’re trying to stop the same problems from repeating every month, this episode will give you a few simple ideas you can put into your next morning meeting.
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About Symco Training:
Symco Training was founded in 2000 by Simon Bowkett and it was his belief that the business had to offer its clients something different. That difference was clear to Simon from his days in the dealership when he experienced many sales trainers who had all the answers, but were unable, unwilling or both to actually show the delegate how they could be implemented. It remains the ethos of the business today. You see, Symco only employ trainers that are committed to delivering not only in spiring and insightful training, but are equally as happy to demonstrate these skills and techniques with real customers in your own showroom. We believe in order for sales training to be effective and in Simon’s words ‘real world’, it needs to be tried and tested in the only place it matters the showroom floor. There is no room for theory when your goals are for your team to sell more cars, hours or parts and retain more profit. In dealerships around the world the focus applied by many of the sales executives is to try and sell a deal. Symco specialise in getting your teams to focus on selling themselves, the product and then supporting this with the deal.
To find out more visitwww.symcotraining.co.uk
Welcome to the Selling and the Motor Trade Podcast, an association with Symco Training. This is the weekly podcast where we share best practice tips and ideas on how to sell more cars, improve your service department and generally put more profit into your dealership or dealer group. I'm your host, Simon Bowkett. As some of you probably already know me as Skipping. I will start by saying thank you for taking the time to listen to this podcast. Hi, welcome to another episode of Selling and the Motor Trade. Now this one's all about book club. And we have to welcome back Jason Cranwick because we, Jason, when is the last time we did a book club? It's got to be, oh. Mate, the time to go. It's always more than six months ago because I've changed my life since then. I don't think we've done a book club. I think we might have only done one this year. I reckon at the beginning of the year because I remember doing it. So yeah, it's a bit of another. So if you're new to selling a motor trade podcast and you don't know what book club is, go back and have a listen to where Jason and I, we just talk about some of the books that we've read that we really liked and think, ah, you've got to go and listen to this. So I've got one I want to talk about today. And Jason and I do this slightly different. I tend to listen to my books because I drive along in the car. I know Jason likes to hardback him, read the books wherever possible. And this happened because when I first interviewed Jason, we, we found out by accident, we read lots of the same books that shaped our early careeders. So Jason, welcome back to book club. It's going to be good to see you, mate. So the book this time, your world has changed. You're going into coaching now as to running a business. So I see sweet to coaching with a crandwick consulting. So let's talk about what books you've been reading during this journey. That's really, ah, what, which ones have you read and which ones are we going to pick on today? Do I have, I've really enjoyed the last six months been great for me because I've had time, which has been lovely and I've kind of gone back to school after 38 years, which was a stretch, you know, for someone that's not been school since they were 16. But yeah, there's a few different books that I've been going through. Day Stoic, I really enjoy. That's one I've recommended to a lot of people as we're trying to navigate our way through the chaos that is, that is life. The day Stoics good. I spend a lot of time in my coaching, talking about thinking fast and slow, which is, which is all about sort of system thinking, noise, which is another one by Canamom, which is great because there's too much noise going on. Surrounded by idiots because we think we are. We're not. They're just different. From my academic, I have to study the boards book, which if you want to sleep well, there you go. That's where you go. But my absolute favorite and the epiphany I've had is the path through the jungle. The path through the jungle. I don't know this one. You need to tell us about the path. You kind of do, Skimpy. I would challenge you there. Okay. You and I have both read Chimp Harrods. Oh, great. Great. Okay. Mr. Peters, what a brilliant book. Yeah. Professor Steve Peters. So I stumbled across this one. I was listening to, I thought my daughter was listening to a pod. She said, Dad, you need this book. And it's called the path through the jungle. And this is part two. So Chimp Harrods, a lot of people are familiar with that. Again, if you're not going, listen to the podcast. Jason and I talked about the Chimp paradox as one of the first books that we saw. It was. Yeah. Yeah. And it's great, I think, for our business because Chimp Harrods talks about the fact that in our minds, in our brains, there's three different entities. There's the chimp. There's the computer and there's the human. And you'll all be familiar with the concept of fight and flight. All that chimp. You know, the chimp is always the first to react. The chimp will try and take a reference from the computer. If computer says no, it then just acts invariably. That isn't good for you. But if it does consult the computer and says, hey, get out of the way, get the human involved. That's where things get a lot better. So in the first one, Susteep Peters, Professor Susteep Peters, I think is his full title, kind of explores that. He gets the concept of the chimp. And there's a lot of people that kind of scratch the surface and quite like that one. But it leaves you with more questions than answers because it kind of introduces the concept that there's the chimp. It shows you kind of how the brain works. But you kind of leave it going, I need to know more. The path through the jungle is the knowing more. This is intended to be kind of like a six, 12 month personal development journey of how you get to really understand your chimp, how you can reprogram the computer in your brain, and how you can get things into the hands of the humans so much quicker. And it's brilliant. I really cannot stress this one enough. This is a must read. And you can skip the first one, go straight to the center. You don't need to know the first. No, no. Okay. So what did you get from that second book then? What are some of the specific learnings you've took around? It really goes deeper, I guess, into the neuroscience, if we call it, of understanding, you know, kind of the, and it goes back to our survival instincts, our caveman days, that fight or flight that we spoke about. And it's a very natural thing. And I guess in today's world, we're surviving on it a lot that we survive on instinct. We react, as they invariably, it's the, it will always be the chimp that acts first. And don't be wrong, the chimp's not the enemy. It can be your friend. So the chimp can be the emotion. And that can be great fun and so on. But we've all seen it when we've done things, said things that suddenly we go, oh, I wish I could just put that back in the mouth. I wish I could have not done that. And that's because it's the chimp that's gone first. What the path through the jungle does, it gives you some really interesting methods and strategies. Say, okay, how do I get the chimp to check the computer, which, well, the logic is kept. How do I get it to know the signs of this isn't a chimp thing now? You need the human involved. This is a, this is going to inflame, you know, I'm in a, I'm in a meeting with a colleague and it's not going, well, how do I pause, breathe, regulate, get human to now respond on my behalf, because that's where the rational, less emotional, more logical responses will come from. And this book is, is great for giving you those strategies. But, you know, it's a heavy read. I mean, I don't know. Let's have a look. It's, oh my God, it's, um, yes, 400 odd pages. So it's a tone. Yeah. And it took me a couple of months. Yeah. But as you said, it's something that's designed that way for you to work through it. Yeah. What I love and I'm just going to try to find an example here. It's full of pictures. Good. Oh, great. I know this is a scar to that. Yeah. It's great for me, then, if it's pictures. Yeah. But, you know, through it, he does a great job of illustrating kind of the point, the chapter structures and really good, you know, it'll kind of introduce kind of the topic and it'll explore all of the, you know, the, the, the philosophies. Um, it'll give you some real life examples. And then at the end of each chapter, it'll give you kind of a two or three takeaway points as well. So you do genuinely go through a journey of learning. And I think the whole point behind this is look, we are all in the jungle. The jungle being our, our world we exist in. You know, the market as it is, you know, the kind of challenges we're facing. And the natural habitat for jungle, you know, is the gym, you know, so we're in a safe space there, but actually probably the more often than not, we need to get a more human, more considered less emotional, more rational response to situations, which is where there in that link between the computer and the human kick in. So it's not heavy reads. It's described as a psychological health and wellbeing program, which we could all do with. I'm sure. Um, but, uh, you know, I really, really do urge, you know, the listeners and, and, and the watchers. When was it written? How long has that been now? I just, I just, I'm scared. Yeah. I'm, I'm going to let me just have a quick look here. Yeah. 2021 2021. Okay. Good. So suppose you think about it logically, it's in our current era post-war era. Yeah. Yeah. It was very much written, you know, when you, when you look through it, you know, as a high level of empathy in this one, which is, you know, the world is a bit, a bit crazy. You know, it's, um, they call it vuka, don't they? Volatile uncertain and ambiguous and so on. I think this, this has a high level empathy as to the fact that, you know, cognitively, there's a high level of overload will feeling high levels of fatigue, whether it's digital fatigue or process fatigue. And actually we all want to be sort of instinctive in how we operate, but sometimes, you know, having a bit of, um, a bit of consciousness in there is no bad thing. Um, there's another one, uh, I said about before thinking fast and slow, which is all about system thinking very, very deep state. Let's not go into it. Yeah. That's what this is. It's all about reprogramming how we do things instinctively. Yeah. Very good. Okay. That is going on my reading list. Now, is that one I can listen to or it sounds like it's pictures there. I really need to study it, work through it. Yeah. I think you need the book. Um, I spent a lot of time in it. This version, I took the stickers out in the end, but you know, you end up with lots of little stickers in it, little notes. Um, I think you should take it as like a course book, you know, like a, like a notebook and use it. Say it's not a, it's not a heavy read. It's just a long read. Um, and I think it was a say originally intended to be maybe a six to 12 month program that people work through this development, but it, it really does a lot of myth busting. Um, and I use, I did a, I was in Turkey, of all places, about a month ago doing a global conference for a client. And we, we referenced back to the chimp right away through it over, you know, over, over a workshop we were doing out there. So it transcends lots of different languages. Yeah. I think it's, I think it's a really good thing. Um, 9.99 I think it was on Amazon. So it's not an expensive thing. That's the best 10 quid of self development. I think you spend other than, um, other than the kind of money or programs. That's going to go on my, um, well, actually my book is 1495. So it's, um, but let's not review words that sell cars. Okay. I think, I think people listen to this will know words that sell cars, go and get it from Amazon, come and speak to us. But I'm not going to talk about that book. That would be wrong. Okay. But the book I'm going to talk about is the psychology of money. Oh, no, that one. Okay. This is a bit different. Okay. Now, you know, because we know each other well enough that, um, there's money I've been looking to invest. Okay. And, uh, I've been looking at buying into companies. I know you've been helping me talk about different companies are looking at and strategizing. Is this the right company to look at whatever? What can I bolt into some car? I've, um, we've been looking at lots of different stuff there. So that's why I started reading the psychology of money. And what did the wealthy do? How do they invest? What do they put their money into? And this is something that kind of shot me. Um, one of the themes that comes out is some of the best people who invest in an American stock market. Yeah. A people who are dead. Okay. Yes. I know people can't see Jason's look as what, how did that work? What I mean by that is they've bought some stocks or some shares. Okay. In a fund. Yeah. And forgot about it and didn't play with it. Yeah. And the time because I'll sit there and look at virtue shares of the going up or down. What should I be in there? Should I not? Okay. What about this one? What about that one? I have a look at where you'll know this, Jason, but we make a lot of money out of property. I still invest in property quite heavily. But actually, that's because I buy it, leave it and don't touch it. Yeah, hold. Yeah. And then I, this, um, this way as well where someone else bought some Bitcoin and forgot that actually bought it. Yeah. Whereas the people would try and go ride the ups and the downs. Is it good? It's bad there, but it's actually buying and holding and it goes into the psychology of money that when people invest full time, these, these fund managers, they do it full time. Do we think we can try and pick the right stock on half an hour? Okay. Listening to a podcast on how to do it. No chance. Okay. And then it goes into Warren Buffett. He's Warren Buffett. He knows what he's talking about. Charlie Munger as well. They know what they're talking about. Warren Buffett said, if he had these time again, he would just put it in the foot. He, oh, sorry. He didn't say this. He said if he passed away or his children or family needed to look up stuff, he would put it into the S&P 500 or something like that, hold it and leave it because over time. Yeah. Now here's the thing. Then it goes on to when do we invest in? But you know what? Thankfully, I read a book, richest man in Babylon when I was 16, 17 years old by accident, by fluke. Okay. richest man in Babylon. I thought, see, I wanted to be rich. Okay. I think this is what I'm going to do. richest man in Babylon. And they said, beauty of compounding interest over time. The set and forget. And I can see that so many times that people sometimes maybe say what's left at the end of the month. And they said, you need to automate your systems. You need to turn around and say that amount of money is going into this fund. And I'm not going to look at it. I'm not going to touch it and just keep on doing it again and again and again. And listen, this is not what we normally talk about. But I'm in for the book. Listen to that, not reading it. And there's so many aha moments in there. Where things that I actually have done. Okay. And I bought my first bicycle at home. You know, I was 17. Tony Island was my first real boss. I would have been 18 then. And he dragged me into his accountant, his solicitor. He said, listen, you're a great salesperson, but it's just be your money for you. And I got on that track there. And I tell you what, that very first bicycle at home, how well hit has done over those years because of time. And I said it and forget it. And the great news, it's in Australia. I'm in the UK. I can't get to it. I can't meddle with it. I can't meddle with it. I can't meddle with it. Bit different for us today, but that. Have you ever read free economics? No. No. You need to read free economics. It links back to yours. And again, really, really interesting read. It's all around kind of the law. Sorry, for Cabot, can I just throw in a business books, Bormie, on finance and even does. And that's why psychology money is not. So is it a business like this psychology money? This is like the law of unintended consequences. What it does, it looks at some of the economic upsides or downsides and what the true drivers those are. And it's a bit like some people might have heard like broken windows theory, which is cities in America where they have broken windows and then it drives them down a downturn in economic performance. Yeah, if you just go repair the window, then people feel better and the economy grows. But the thing you fix to the broken window, not the economy. It's the pre-economics is brilliant. It's a really interesting money. There's some of the linkages in there. There's one in there, I seem to think, that there's links to the sale of pop tarts, you know, the jam-filled things you put in the toaster. Yes, yeah. The price of oil. It's really sort of tenuous link in there. But free economics is a really, really good read. Well, I suppose this ties us into how do we as humans talk ourselves into and out of recession? Is that what is going down that sort of view as well? Like, because I'm trying to get my head around how these jam tarts affecting the food. Yeah, yeah. Do you know what? I think it's a really interesting one, Skip. And when you look at why we do these book reviews, we don't do it just because we're bookworms. We do it because we want to share some reflections and learnings of people. Our job as operational people manages leaders within the car industry is about trying to generate performance and growth, whether it's a sale of cars, parts or hours. Understanding the drivers of economy is important to us. And do you know what? It's really interesting because we're all trying to motivate people to do things. There's a well-accepted fact that the fear of loss is more powerful than the opportunity of gain. So we've all come up with new incentive programs that haven't worked, but probably because we're trying to address that gain mentality, whereas actually, you know, kind of the inertia of thinking we're going to lose something is even more powerful. Yeah. So I think in all of this, you know, we've all got a job to do, which is understand what are the levers we can pull, what mechanical processes that mean performance occurs, and actually what are some of those unintended consequences of the actions we take, which is why we joke about things like surrounded by the earth, pass through the jungle, you know, psychology of money. It's because you don't choose to try and understand these things. The likelihood that you never get the performance gains that you're looking for. I found that. Skip. Love it. Love it. Love it. Okay. So pass through the jungle. That is on my reading list. Okay. And free economics. So free economics, we're going to be there. Listen, love this, love this book club idea. So let's, we'll keep on doing this. And thanks again for coming on the podcast. Just kidding. That just leaves me to say that all details of this episode and other episodes on the selling in the motor trade can be found on our website simcotraining.co.uk. Go there to get a copy of our book, Words That Sell Cars. Go there to sign up to a free trial of our sales fitness online sales training program. And this way to get hold of me is Simon Bowkett through LinkedIn. Thank you.
