When it comes to innovation and creating whether businesses or start-ups, there are select books and courses one is advised to read and watch out for but this could also be taken further. You could also as an entrepreneur get your inspiration from these compiled set of movies entrepreneurs should watch and in this post covid-19 world, there hasn’t been any time better. These are movies that tell a similar tale of grit and fortitude as seen in the lives of the greatest innovators of all time, here we have names such as Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page of Google, Jack Dorsey of Twitter and others to mention. Quoting Albert Einstein “Logic would take you from A to B but imagination would take you everywhere”, sure there is a hidden nugget in such a statement!. The role of imagination which is the starting point of all dreams and all that is created and birthed to fruition and as a creative you might just be stuck in your first and starting days. As they popularly say ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’. There’s an importance to connect with these select humble beginnings and apart from the documented stories it even comes more to life as you connect with a creative, down in the dumps trying to hit a breakthrough.

Given with the likes of start-up series like Silicon Valley and movies like Joy starring Jennnifer Lawrence there are also given awesome movies for entrepreneurs, here is the definitive list.

Movies for Entreprenuers

Here goes…

The Social Network (2010)

Written by Aaron Sorkin and won an Oscar for best adapted screenplay, The Social Network shows the rise to glory of one of the world’s most powerful companies, Facebook and it’s creator Mark Zuckerberg played by Jessie Eisenberg.

The story shows the brutal severing of Zuckerberg’s co-starters and his loss of friends and gaining of enemies, that is a norm if you want to succeed and change the narrative.

The Social Network is an awesome movie entreprenuers should watch because it also shows Mark’s initial days as a student in a dormitory armed with a single laptop and Facebook was born. starting as a simple dating site called Facemash. Following the story which marks the beginning of the dotcom boom and rise of the ‘social web’ or web 2.0 which features interactions between humans for the first time and not just static websites, The Facebook story most importantly shows the benefits of a First mover’s advantage. This is the abiliity to recognise opportunities and seize them. Though the movie predicts the idea of Facebook (FaceMash as of the time) as a website to rank beautiful ladies on campus after going through a bad breakup. Breaking the norms of conventional internet model this becomes something new on the table. Popularity grows and the websie gets a total and even better makeover and progression with the actions of the Winklevoss brothers.

Managing people as a rising entreprenuer is an important attribute, somehow the rising founder finds his way accross obstacles and even a massive lawsuit.

Lessons to be Applied from The Social Network

1. Do not be intimidated by usurpers – building something successful is messy and a lot of loopholes can be discovered down the line. If these loopholes are not managed they leave room for exploitation. You can take the story for an example.
2. Make your move, fast – The success of Facebook can massively be attributed to movers advantage, Zuckerberg recognized the idea and acted quickly with whatever resources he could find.
3. This is going off book but we should mention the importance of ‘doing it better’, before Facebook there was MySpace but the latter failed to pull through. Recognizing an idea and doing an even better job would serve you greatly as an Entrepreneur.

The Intern

Sometimes being an entreprenuer can bring many scenarios to light such as learning to manage people and adapt to different changes, that is what The Intern is all about, you can find out more here.

When a retired member in the work force, played by Robert Deniro applies for a senior internship program in a youngster’s company (Anne Hathaway) it’s a whole new experience.

The Intern would be a classic every female entrepreneur should watch as it shows the age old rivalry of women balancing career with motherhood. This story is a little out of context for the conventional hard and grind founder. Apart from delving into the familiar ‘career or family’ for women in corporate structs.

Parenting, playing the role of a caregiver becomes a target in the crosshairs of trying to play a role in buisness. The Intern raises the question of gender equality in the workplace well, a little subtly. No one should question the choices a woman decides to take to greatness. She can be a great Fortune 500 company CEO and also at the same time be a great mother.

Lessons to be applied from The Intern

1. Be Willing to listen to advice wherever it comes – When Jules meets Ben we can’t agree that there’s smooth symmetry, apart from the wide generational gap between them which would definitely affect the communication and understanding between them yet there’s an aura of understanding between them and the Founder yields to advice and directions that greatly affects her company.
2. Be open to ideas – when it was suggested that the young CEO take in an interim though the reaction was off par, still be open to ideas! you never know just how good something could turn out to be. Positive and upbeat company culture greatly affects productivity, that which is gotten if the company applies a flat structure and approach, kind of similar to the tech titan Google.

The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)

This movie is a must watch for the struggling, passionate entreprenuers. A true life story of a stock broker named Chris Gardner, played by Will Smith.

The movie, relatable to entrepreneurs shows the pains of believing in a dream and taking a shot against all the odds. Abandoned by his wife and left in custody of his only son, Chris Gardner goes through heartbreaking poverty and failure and claws his way to victory, there’s really more to this beautiful story.

Gardner has grit, the ability to talk smart and almost out of any given situation, these are traits that are priceless

That said this story is not necessarily about talent or creativity the story purports ‘old man persistence’ as Napoleon hill stated in his book. It would be important to highlight the role of luck in the life of this young man. Success we all know has the underlying luck factor though as they say ‘The harder you work the more you increase your chances of success’ the latter could not be more implied. Entrepreneurship is an activity that requires the act of fighting for what you believe in despite the odds. No one can predict the success of an expedition despite the number of metrics and curated analysis but there are some things which are just meant to be and such is in the story of Chris Gardner.

Lessons to be applied from The Pursuit of Happiness

Persistence pays off – Though Gardner did not start out with a business prospect at the beginning, we can see a trail of marked persistence throughout the story. Only if one could take these little but really hard to pull of habit of not calling it quits when thing starts to go south and turning the other way or even stopping all together the results at the end would be greatly rewarding.

Learn to Adapt Quickly to changes – I give it that this is more sounding like a life handbook but there’s a lot to be taken from here. Changes come in every venture. There will be rosy years and days of storms. What a benefit it would be to one at these crosshairs to be willing to adapt to whatever changes!. This is an important attribute as we see in Gardner how he blended quickly from living in his home to sleeping on the streets.

The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)

This movie is a must watch for the corporate entreprenuers. Showing the success of Jordan Belfort (Leonardo Di Caprio).

The movie shows the entrepreneur the spirit to have, be success motivated, have faith, drive, integrity and patience in your rise to success. This story a little similar to the numbers game played in The Pursuit of Happiness except the story focuses mainly on investing.

Joy (2015)

There’s no greater entrepreneurship tale of rags to riches like the one that’s pulled off in Joy. Here we have raw grit and ingenuity of all sorts. More importantly Joy portrays some thing that’s rarely often never talked about in the journey of entrepreneurship – Relationships. The value of meaningful friendships is shown at a point in the movie and also much possibly at some point should be seen in the life of a rising entrepreneur.

Joy does well to break the boundaries of women in business as a whole and also the corporate life in that particular industry.

Lessons to be learned from Joy

The value of relationships – The power of valuable networks which can be applied in entrepreneurship is shown.