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October 24, 2004

The Apprentice 2: Trump silences the Whiner!

The Apprentice 2, Trump silences the Whiner!

OK, I have been in India for the last two weeks, so I am WAY behind on Apprentice, I will catch up next week when I am bedridden after surgery. Tivo will be my best friend. Went to the launch party for The Marketing Playbook last night but made it home in time to watch the show. The Donald and his producers are obviously becoming enamored with staging some drama into the process. This time he called the teams just after the last board meeting and told everyone to come down to the board room. There with half the people in business attire (fresh from the boardroom) and half in sweats (got a comment) he made each team immediately choose a leader. Then he made the leader of each team "fire" over to the other team his three worst performers. Thus new team mix. He needed to do this since the Men were killing the women. Now teams are mixed. The sending over of the lowest performers was an unusual way to balance the teams. Usually you would start from the top down. Those who had been "fired" got fired up to prove their former teams wrong. Good for overall morale. A better system actually than top down. It is always a total bummer to be the last person chosen (as I often was for basketball). The task this time was to take $1000 and start a pet business for one day. No obvious brand tie-in. And of course both started dog washing services (LAME!), not much else you can do with just one day. This task is measured on gross profits (finally!) instead of gross sales. Oh, and there was no obvious set-up in the start of the show as to what the firing criteria would be this time. I like it better that way. More of a challenge.

OK, so Mosaic Wes as a project manager. He fired Raj (mistake), Chris and Kevin. So Wes gets stuck with Stacey who immediately starts being her annoying self which prompts Wes to groan (to the camera) "Why won't she just shut the **** up?" (my feelings exactly). Stacey is totally overlawyering and overthinking it. It is a DOG WASHING BUSINESS you silly git! The team decides they need some kind of angle to get people to buy their service so they fall back on the old stand-by a portion of profits to charity. This is LAME and never works. First of all, you never know if your contribution to charity may be the few dollars that make you loose (there have been some TOO close ones here). Second, customers don't really care about the charity. They care about the service or product. Unless you are a girl scout with big weepy eyes, you ain't gettin' my money out of sympathy. Three people waste hours trying to get the NYFD to take charity but they have their procedures. So little orphan Andy lines up a CAT charity (but this is a dog wash folks!) and promptly after closing the deal, he drops his cell phone in the cab which drives off. That half of the team is now stranded without communication. I see disaster ahead. Even if they win, this tactical error could be fatal in the boardroom. So after alot of wasted time, the team gets to their location in Central Park AFTER the lunch rush (1:00). Silly, silly, silly. They also price their wash at $15, $5 below the other team, but I am getting ahead of myself. Stacey has a stupid idea about doggie photos which Wes rightly vetoes as too expensive in COGS (more wasted time looking at doggie costumes). Team does mostly washes. Stacey doesn't touch a dog or do much of anything but scowl. They end with $122.12 in profits. Pathetic!

For Apex, Jennifer gets the nod (great!). I have been saying Jennifer is a sleeper with finalist potential. She fires Sandy, Maria and Stacey, all the right people to let go (although I would have fired Stacey first rather than last). Immediately she organizes the process, sets on a dog washing service with some service extension and sets wash price at $20 (told you she was a smart cookie). They set up BEFORE lunch but it starts slow as many dogs don't want a wash. Less than 30% of the dogs want a wash (duh!). That immediately leads Jennifer to start pushing other services like dog massages, nail clippings, etc....) to capture some of those wary dogs. Chris starts whining that dog washing is too degrading for him and his Rolex Presidential. Shut the ***** up Chris. You are on a TV show that is built on humiliation. Grace under pressure and humiliation is one characteristic of a great leader. Complaining that you are too good for the task is not. Ivana continues to make stupid random comments (I swear she is not really a VC). With sales slow, the team wants to open a second location and after some thinking, Jennifer agrees, good decision. They walk away with $307.41.

The Boardroom. I predict Wes will take Stacey and Andy (Maria was no peach, but she has a bye from last week). Right, 100%. Wow, I am getting good. I get ready for Stacey to start with her "it was the project manager's fault" tactic that she has used the last umpteen times in the boardroom. Never has taken any blame at all. Acts surprised she is even there. Trump starts out aghast that Andy lost the cell phone, "Andy has been a disaster". Trump thinks the cat charity was "stupid" (told ya orphan Andy). Stacey starts her "Wes made me do nothing" tirade. Trump asks why she can't keep quiet. Unless Trump takes out his frustrations on Andy for inexperience and incompetence on prior tasks (on this one he sold 45% of the revenue actually), he should still fire Stacey. Carolyn asks Stacey what she did since it looked to her like nothing. Stacey says "I was promoting". Carolyn "four feet from Maria?" "You didn't do anything." Trump piles on too asking Stacey why all she does is complain. Out they go. Both advisors say Stacey. Trump fires Stacey. She tries to act surprised. She is so unbelievably un-selfaware. Self awareness is a key characteristic of any good entrepreneur or leader. Stacey didn't know that she was annoying and didn't change anything.

Wow, this is so easy. Trump did the right thing. Stacey wasn't even entertaining in her complaining. Bye Bye birdie.

So I am 4 for 6 (excluding last week), batting 666%. Up this week!

Andy, Ivana, or Elizabeth should be one of the next to go.

My choices for top finalists are still:

Raj
Jennifer

My choices for most likely to go sooner rather than later are:

Kevin - Still haven't seen anything great.
Andy - On Donald's shit list and will mess up again.
Chris - He is a boisterous blowhard.

Posted by Martin at October 24, 2004 10:58 PM

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