Episode 10 - When the chips go down...

Flanked by henchmen Nick and Margaret, Siralan greeted the contestants at dawn at Ally Pally with the menacing demeanour of a mafia boss from a Guy Ritchie movie, about to punish some people who owed him a lot of money.

The punishment was not delivered as a nasty beating round the head with a golf club.

It was something far worse...

Not in a million years would we wish "presenter of a home shopping channel" on our worst enemy. Not even if they kicked puppies for pleasure. A thankless, difficult, nerve-wracking - and frankly humiliating - task, and therefore the perfect challenge for the put-upon contestants at this stage of the game.

And sure enough, the moment the cameras started to roll, things began to fall apart. Lorraine's "car crash" demo had us gnawing our knuckles up to the wrist.

But it was the discussion between Lorraine and Howard that gave us at OPP Towers the most pause for thought. Lorraine reckoned the products chosen should "reflect our personalities", whereas Howard said they should "reflect the target audience".

This represents the classic MBTI "Feeling" (F) versus "Thinking" (T) preference dichotomy. And in a way, they were both right: while it would be absurd to traipse around Newcastle knocking on doors and trying to flog a lump of coal, if you are going to do sell anything face-to-face, you really need to be behind the product. In most businesseses, sales and marketing people may not truly believe in the products and services they sell; yet they are usually able to enter a strange half-world where they have convinced themselves of a fundamental validity, and their professionalism allows them to go along with this minor delusion.

In front of the camera, however, it's something of a different story. Unless you're a seasoned professional, it is very difficult to convince others of the utility of a product that you personally think of as a dreadful bag of crap - as evidenced by the contrast between Kate's woeful attempt to flog a polystyrene kitten, and her air guitar heroics. This is where Lorraine's "F" preference would have helped: products that are commercially sound, but about which the presenters can actually enthuse.

Howard also had a point, however, in terms of demanding structured pitches that each product must receive. In a good presentation, while the presenter's personality should shine through, the background knowledge must be there to facilitate this. Research and a solid grounding in your subject cannot be faked. And it was this lack of knowledge of the products that led to Lorraine and Howard abandoning any USPs, calls to action, or benefits of their expensive deep fat frier, in favour of stuffing their faces with chips.

"You can have them with beef." Really, Howard? We never would have guessed. I always eat mine with chocolate mousse.

What a mistake, too, to go for high volume sales. Howard was been characterised by Siralan as "risk averse", which something the 16PF instrument could reveal in a recruitment situation (in 16PF terms, a risk-taker would score highly on the 'Social Boldness' and 'Liveliness' scales, whereas Howard would probably score low on 'Liveliness' - indicating caution). However, he inadvertantly took a gigantic risk by attempting a large number of sales in an untried medium, rather than one or two high value wins. Since the winning team was to be decided by revenue, not margin, this should have tipped him off to such a strategy: there are always going to be one or two mugs out there in TV land who'll buy any old tat - not hundreds of them.

The teams should have also tried harder to fit the message to the medium. It's television, and there was nothing more telegenic in that warehouse than the affectionate dinosaur (though we were pleasantly surprised to see how well both Deborah and Yasmina came over in front of the red blinking light!). Despite its high ticket price, two or three sales of something that packed the punch of novelty would have made all the difference.

What a shame that as team leader, Howard couldn't have combined both the T and the F components of the team (together with some strategic thinking).

Thence to the boardroom! While his being given concrete boots and sent to sleep with the fishes at the bottom of the Thames may have been debatable in some quarters, it did seem inevitable, given the level playing field that projected his head above the parapet, willingly or no.

There's no real muppet of the week - it would be too cruel on people who have suffered a terrible ignominy - but we will allow Siralan a "plonker of the week": the bumbling and bungling James spouting the wrong price on live TV, in direct contradiction of the on-screen numbers. Ouch.

OPP

(You don't mess with the Don. But when Siralan declaimed to Lorraine that "It's not a game show," we felt like risking the loss of a finger or two by whispering: "er... yes it is.")

Episode 9 - Coal, zircon or diamond?

Not too much outrage to report on this week...must be getting towards final time when only the decent ones are left. Hmm - having said that, does that mean Debra would count as 'one of the decent ones'?! Siralan is seeing some sort of dim and distant glimour of potential in Debra - where on earth is his evidence for this? If a good part of potential means being able to learn and adapt your behaviour, then Debra has shown none of this - she's stuck in a rut (which may indeed make her a very successful sales person at a FTSE 250 company as she says) and the rut involves not listening to others, an aggressive tone, and thinking you're right all of the time. Siralan said zircon, Debra said diamond, we say coal.

So Ben bit the dust, despite his 'leadership qualities which got him a place at Sandhurst'. In the end, we had a 'mind the gap' situation - often found when the talk doesn't match the walk. The talk was all about confidence and an unerring self-belief (which can be good) but the walk - his abilities - were not matching up. He's definitely capable, but perhaps not experienced, as Siralan pointed out. He needs talk AND walk. In other words, belts AND braces. Which funnily he actually physically has...odd...who does that nowadays? All part of his slightly juvenile misconceptions about business where being ‘TOUGH’ is what it’s all about. He needs his competency expectations bringing up to date – he’d be surprised how little demand there is for Wall Street-stylie naked ambition nowadays. We can point you in the right direction with a 16PF Career Development Report any time you like, Ben, now that you are a free agent.

James seems to be getting more comfortable in the Boardroom, we loved his witty response about wanting to bring Debra back in…twice if he could. He's one of the few which appear to be listening to Siralan and developing professionally- protecting himself by answering questions well and giving evidence for this own behaviour. Moreover, he seemed to maintain an extremely good grasp of the pelvic mechanics of ladies having babies, though, touchingly, he did express a preference for X-Box over partner-breathing, giving back rubs and innovations in supportive labour. Perhaps he's on his way to being a diamond geezer? Although his 'niceness' probably won't get him to the final.

The way they approach and view work is important. For Debra, it appears to be about 'winning' in a very individual way. For James, it appears to be about working with people and creating harmony to get things done. It's a shame really that The Apprentice is about an individual being picked. Wouldn't it be fun if it was about picking an ideal team? In that case, might there be space for both Debra and James? Each having their own way of doing things that are SO different but potentially as a team, they could get stuff done. If they didn't kill each other first.

And muppet of the week goes to Lorraine for her efforts in putting up the buggy - nice demos Lorraine! Where do we get one? Can you give us a discount?

Episode 8 - Punch and Judy

Does Debra realise that the words ‘team leader’ actually include the word ‘leader’? For her, leadership seems to mean louder-ship: like speaking louder whilst on holiday, but still in English, to hope you can be understood. What happened to providing direction and planning for the team – isn’t this a core aspect of leadership? Of course, there’s more than one way of being a leader but increasing trust and communication is so central and Debra seemed to think this was more about increasing trouble and volume of communication.

It appears that Howard actually did most of the work on the task and had the most creativity. Creativity was so central to the task but it’s not just about coming up with the bright ideas – it’s also about how you execute them, something which the IPI looks at. Howard could also do with a booster in the influencing skills department – he could have led the task if he’d only influenced Mona and James to support his leadership bid, rather than solely concentrating on Debra and her robotic ‘I am the leader. I am the leader. I am….’

So Debra’s team misunderstood the task in hand. Did they think the brief was to create something that looked like “Marketing for 5 year olds”? Had Debra ever seen a leaflet before in her life? It’s not rocket science to plan the leaflet and work out what you want on each page: and isn’t time management the class-101 of managing yourself? To leave the leaflet blank was outrageous, and surely any client of hers would have sacked her immediately. Where was her customer focus? Did she even think about who her customers were – the Margate officials and residents and the branding agency – surely customer focus is a vital competency as business gets harder for us all right now.

And in chapter 2 of the rather large volume wending its way to airport bookshelves as we speak 'What IS it about Lorraine that is so darn irritating?' we wonder whether there has ever been a better living example of the word 'sanctimonious'. Off the hook this week for having somewhat coincidentally been in the winning team, she nonetheless managed to alienate her colleagues when, on returning from a seaside jolly with Ben 'David Bailey' Clarke, she pronounced: 'I don't like them!' on a second's sight of the posters. Being 'right' (they were far too full of words) doesn't always make you right, but somehow Lorraine's 'instincts' are a justification for every sanctimonious pronouncement she makes. Yasmina thinks she has her pegged - 'She's crazy! She has issues!' - and not a business psychologist in sight. Oh for some real insight of the kind a psychometric might give us (try the FIRO-B for starters if you want to work out what someone really needs from others to bring out the best in them - and please tell Lorraine!)

At last Siralan is now concentrating on picking ‘for the future of his organisation’ – a nice aspect to work into your selection criteria. Still, if he really had been selecting on this basis, surely he would have fired both Mona and Debra. He seemed somewhat non-plussed this week, struggling to decide between which would be more of a waste-of-salary in his organisation, a Mona (boom boom) without the assertiveness to articulate her own objections to the 'Margayte' plan, or little miss bossy Debra. What a missed opportunity - we’ve not had a double-firing yet this season and it at least would have spiced things up a little.

Finally, to borrow from The Guardian, this week may have been much more fun if the task brief had a typo and it was actually about re-branding Margaret! And is it true that Nick is a secret member of the 'Alternative Rodent's Gurning Society'? Do that vole-with-a-thistle-stuck up-its-nostril impersonation for us again, please Nick...

Oh, and our muppet of the week? It just has to be Ben for the constant photo framing using his hands –did he not realise that’s what the camera is for?!

Episode 7 - Empire Strikes Back!

Siralan says it every week: “pressure – that’s what business is all about” and it seems that Phillip cracked under it – losing his focus, his sense of urgency, and generally STILL (true to form) getting into a pickle over Lorraine and a tingle over golden girl Kate.

In the grubby café, Lorraine is aware that pressure is the key “it’s what we signed up for – a bit of pressure”…but Phillip had long since opted out – his suggestion when he couldn’t focus enough to make any more appointments “let’s go to the pub”. We all love the pub – but that’s when the work’s done, surely! Did Phillip derail due to his obsession with Kate? Was it lack of ‘privateness’ – the tendency to keep personal information to himself (or not, in the case of him and Kate)? Kate certainly knew the importance of ‘privateness’ and clearly stated it in the Boardroom – “I wouldn’t let my personal life interfere with business”. Privateness has certainly been found to be, amongst other things, a clear leadership derailer – perhaps Phillip would care to read our article on it now.

Anyway, the predictions of fellow housemates proved accurate. Kate did not let her attachment to the rambunctious Philip of The Pants stand in the way of the competition, unceremoniously dumping him right in the fire of Siralan’s wrath in the boardroom. A quick farewell peck on the cheek was all he got for his attempts to woo her with his Cat-House antics and she was dust….I don’t think we’ll be seeing a ‘Hello!’ wedding there then…clearly a girl capable of logic and detachment, key skills in business decision-making.

It all comes back to trust – so basic, but so often forgotten. Why is this so tough!? Mona takes the PM job on simply because she “can’t trust anyone to do a better job than me” – ohhh. Where’s the trust Mona? Let’s hope that’s just the context of the competition and not her usual business behaviour.

Instinct: sometimes it works in business…but surely it’s about knowing when to use it and not – Lorraine – just repeating over and over that that is the way you do things so it must be right. Instinct about products can sometimes work but if the customer quickly realised “it’s a cardboard box in the end” – why didn’t the team?! And being disparaging about your customers must be a business no-no: did I really hear someone say about the ‘northern’ pet shop “wages are a little bit lower up here” – just where did they think they were?!

Why is it that some people are just so hard to like, and by association, work with? There’s nothing really WRONG with poor Lorraine, a grafter if ever there was one, and doubtless a marvellous mother and partner to someone, although she derides herself as being ‘a slow burner’ on the intellectual front. She describes herself as ‘very instinctive’. She talks about her ‘business instincts. She defends herself as ‘the victim’…wait, am I spotting a trend here? Of course, we think psychology has a huge amount to offer business, but the endless and self-obsessed self-analysis-thinking-out-loud is precisely what makes her so DARNED IRRITATING!!!! Stop telling us who you are and just be! Letting people take you or leave you as they find you, and then just Being, is a great lesson from true self-awareness that, for example, a psychometric feedback gives you.

Ben gets this week’s award for top marks on aptitude with the glorious deduction that “Gateway suggests it’s the gate to somewhere” – 110% for that observation Ben! I’m not sure how he’d stack up in our ability tests! Again we wish we’d be able to assess the candidates on their way into the competition – such geeky fun to be had!

Whilst trying to work out who is muppet of the week, we started to think that Lorraine should get this award – just for the open-mouth jaw-dropped pose she so fondly loves. A bit like a guppy fish- does that make her gup-pet of the week?!