The final six candidates were put thought their paces on the buses this week as the teams sold bus tours to London tourists. Joanna Riley led team Apollo (with Chris Bates and Jamie Lester) to victory as their “Ghouls & Ghosts” tour outsold the “Cockney Tour” offered by team Synergy led by Stuart Baggs (with Stella English and Liz Locke).
Sales training requirements were visibly to the fore as the negotiation skills of Stuart Baggs badly let him down when trying to secure help from the London Tourist Centre to sell the tours. He lost out to Chris Bates who won the Centre’s support with a somewhat strange offer to share 20% of Synergy’s overall takings irrespective of whether the centre or the team sold the tickets. Had Stuart Baggs offered the centre their customary cut of 35% he may well have won their support and the task.
The main talking point of the episode has to be the boardroom. Stuart Baggs came up with one of the biggest loads of twaddle ever heard on the Apprentice. My favourite was “I’m not just a one trick pony Lord Sugar…in fact I have a whole field of ponies”. More amazing than the rubbish spouted by Mr Baggs was that Lord Sugar warmed to this type of talk and decided that he deserved to survive. Lord Sugar picked out Liz Lloyd to fire, despite her selling nearly double the value of tour tickets achieved by Stuart Baggs.
I think it was a very poor decision from Lord Sugar. Liz Lloyd had better people skills, selling skills and used her brain more effectively. Stuart’s one saving grace, in Lord Sugar’s eyes alone, was his supreme overconfidence which allowed him to frequently over promise and under deliver. My main criticism of Liz was that she could have been far more assertive in the boardroom and when things were going wrong in some of the more recent tasks. Also Liz only offered 100% effort rather than Stuart’s 24 hours a day 7 days a week commitment.
My one remaining tip, Stella English, made it through to the final five and the interview stage. Next week we will learn who lied the most on their CV as the candidates get put through a rigorous selection board.
By Jon Davies | Righttrack’s Interim International Business Development and Marketing Manager