The Apprentice – Week Two Roundup

Here is the second installment from Chris Bates (last year's Apprentice finalist) writing about the new series of the Apprentice for us…

So we’re treated to two episodes in a row this week, and the task of week 2 is possibly the most exciting one I can remember seeing. A lot of people ask me what I learnt about business doing the Apprentice, and sometimes you do have to question how making sausages, crisps and bread rolls has really influenced my career in private equity. So to get a task that is hugely prevalent and addresses the massive growth sector that is digital is really refreshing. My hat’s off to the editing team for embracing a new type of task and boosting the relevance of the show to real business.

Well that was I thought anyway, until I would see what they’d go on to produce. In the car on the way to the brainstorm, Vincent hilariously drops a joke a bout ‘App-les’, and for once there is a bigger ball of hair than the greasy do on his head, namely a massive tumble weed that floats past. The boys nominate Leon as PM, and Gavin once again does his good old routine of slagging of the person who puts themselves forward but failing to show any desire to do it himself.  Alex on the other hand doesn’t feel his skills are quite right for the job, probably as it doesn’t involve preparing a sandwich. In the end however, Leon’s background in kebab shop fliers is deemed the most relevant experience, and the boys opt for him to lead from the front. For the girls on the other hand Edna wins the vote by virtue of the fact that no one else fancies it.

The brainstorming commences and as much as I appreciate that the situation is tough, having been in their shows with the very limited time constraints they have, the ideas both teams came up with were absolutely appalling. Thomas suggests an app that can bring the inconvenience of stopping at a red light when you’re not even driving, and a tool that will tell you what the weather was like on May 17 1983. Susan on the other hand, after breaking the Guinness Book of Records for the most times someone can say ‘erm’ in a sentence, proposes an app that can tell you and your friend next to you where you are, in case you should by a stroke of bad luck go blind, lose all memory, and find yourself perplexed by your surroundings. Edna quite rightly shoots this down, something Susan can’t seem to grasp why, and Melody, who is quickly becoming one of my favourites, rightly tells her to ‘squash it’.

Eventually the teams settle on ‘Ampi App’, and ‘Slang-a-tang’. Quite why the boys felt that inflicting racial profiling onto the internet was a great business idea escapes me. It also had no appeal outside the UK, and frankly the accents were so bad I don’t think it had any appeal within the UK either. Given all this, it’s amazing that the girls produced, in my opinion, something even worse. For some reason, 8 bright successful business women felt the app market is screaming out for something to fill calming periods of relaxation or enjoyable social moments with the most irritating noises imaginable.  Perhaps they could have given Stuart Baggs a call for some endorsement?

The teams develop the ideas, and then it’s time to pitch them to three appointments Lord Sugar has laid on. Frankly these tasks are always won or lost in these pitches, so it’s crucial to send the best people along. Vincent leads the male pitches and asks ‘what is slang-a tang’, a rhetorical question to which he doesn’t know the answer (and after having watched the episode, neither do I), and Jim has to help him. In fact Jim does appear a bit of a dark horse, who I was starting to quite like (you’ll note ‘was’, this would soon change). The girls on the other hand have Melody leading, and despite getting some facts wrong (which in fairness are quite often given to you deliberately to make you make mistakes), she did a nice job, so much so that even though the boys somehow won two of the three, she won the one that actually mattered.

The worst pitching of the day award however is definitely reserved for Edna. She decided to ignore the advice of her fellow peers that Melody pitches to kids every day as part of her job. Edna on the other hand is a business psychologist, so your guess is a good as mine as to what she does on a day to day basis. And she certainly should have listened, as her insistence on sppeaaaking soooooo slllloooowwwlly meant that she only said about 10 words, none of which actually explained what the app was or how to download it.

Back in the boardroom, I was convinced the boys had won. Yes their app was cr-app but not as bad as the Ampi App, plus they actually pitched the event very well. Yet, once again the laid on pitches would prove to decide the outcomes, and somehow 10,000 people downloaded the girls offering. If any of you did download it, I would suggest you renew the prescription for your medication.

You’ll remember I said earlier that I was starting to like Jim, well that would all change once he’d get back in the boardroom. Upon quite rightly being put in the bottom three for producing some pretty dull marketing literature, he proceeded to tell Lord Sugar he should win the show through pointing out individually how useless everyone is. My view is always that if you are good enough, you can sell your own merits and not worry about anyone else. That leads me to conclude Jim is probably out of his depth, and his comments made him fall a great deal in my estimation.
Leon really didn’t shine in the boardroom either. Why he was convinced by Jim to not take him in I don’t know, and he showed a real weakness of character and indecisiveness.  I honestly feel his card’s definitely marked, and can’t see him progressing much further.

Yet Leon was saved by the least inspiring person on the show this year; Alex. Over two tasks, he managed to do the worst Welsh accent ever attempted, and cut a loaf of bread, from what I could see, quite poorly. He is a prime example of passengers simply not doing well in the process, and quite rightly so, as ultimately Lord Sugar ain’t no bus driver.  I’m not entirely sure how Alex got on the programme in all honesty, however it was obvious even from his audition tape he didn’t have much going for him. Perhaps if Lord Sugar was looking to open a café he could put those bread cutting skills to good use, but other than that I can’t really see what else he brought to the table. Having said that ‘AMSandwich’ as a business does have a nice ring to it…..

More next week!