Last night’s episode of the Apprentice focused our attention on one key point; and I hope you didn’t miss it. Sadly, the two teams did, in their different ways, miss the point. And the candidate who did so most spectacularly, paid the price. The task was to create an awareness-raising campaign to support the promotion of English Sparkling Wine. The teams had to do this principally by creating a website and a short video, and then pitch their campaigns to...
Read MoreTonight’s episode gave us a litany of business lessons, a further reminder of the importance of demeanour but, ultimately for me, one really important principle to focus on: decision making. The teams’ task was to select two urban artists to represent and to mount a one night show and sell to maximise the commission on sales, including to a corporate buyer. Whilst urban, or street, art is a familiar part of modern cityscapes, few of us understand the market, so...
Read MoreNearly a week late in publication, I know, but Episode seven was instructive about one of the biggest principles in business – and one of my hobby-horses. It also provided a deja-vu moment as we flashed back to the theme of my commentary on Episode 1, at the start of this series. This was the episode where the teams are given a small amount of seed-cash (£150) and told to buy some wholesale goods, sell them in a market place,...
Read MoreThat’s two weeks in a row I think Lord Sugar fired a strong candidate. Today’s show taught us the importance of what you have to say for yourself. But before I get into my analysis of what I took away from the show, let’s look at how the task played out. The Teams and the Task The task was to create gourmet street food to sell on the streets of Edinburgh. Lord Sugar emphasised the gourmet element, saying “I don’t...
Read MoreWell, I said creativity would be central to this year’s Apprentice (in my 3 April blog post) and what could be more creative than this week’s task? That task was to: Come up with a new fitness programme that will start a trend Create a promotional video and branding, and Pitch it to three health and fitness chains to secure licensing deals Both teams could claim an “expert” as team leader. The Teams and their Ideas Phoenix Phoenix quickly chose...
Read MoreTwo Roads Diverged… Once again, the cause of the losing team’s failure is absolutely clear … and once again, the same problem plagued both teams … and also, once again, Lord Sugar’s opening remarks presaged the key problem: it’s almost as if he knows what he’s talking about. Fancy that! But the response within each team could not have been more different and that, as Robert Frost said, “made all the difference”. The Task The two teams had to design,...
Read MoreCreativity in The Apprentice
A lot of Apprentice tasks require a considerable degree of creativity. It has always been thus for as long as I have been watching, and the past two weeks of series eight have both put it at the heart of the tasks. I expect many more like this, because this series, like the last, is about finding a candidate with whom Lord Sugar can go into a business partnership. Tom, Helen, Jim … Starting a new business, especially for a...
Read MoreThe Apprentice 2012, Episode 2: First Commitment
For what it’s worth, I was distinctly underwhelmed by what I saw tonight. I’m finding it hard to see any glimmers of who might emerge from the ruins of 12 weeks of tasks as a worthy winner. For my money, only one person tonight even started to impress me, and they were a long way from having me convinced. Tonight’s episode saw Azhar Siddique step forward to lead the all male team, Phoenix, while at Sterling, two women put themselves...
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