The Apprentice 2014

The Apprentice 2014 starts tomorrow on BBC1 at 9pm after being delayed because of the World Cup. To get us going we have two back to back shows, one tonight and another tomorrow night. Hopefully that is enough to wet our appetite and get us into the series and its spin off show with the wonderful and funny Dora O'Brian. 

The start of the show has be heralded by a great and funny trailer on the BBC website that uses the Bond Gold Finger theme, which depicts Sir Alan Sugars finger as the gold finger of doom. It a clever and assuming way of introducing a show, that often shows us what is wrong with business in the UK and what is good, and we can see that in the meet the candidates video also available on the BBC Website, which is a another amusing look at the show. Of course a more serious introduction can also be found on the BBC Website, after all business is not all fun, you just have to ask the former bankrupt Sir Alan Sugar about that.

The show is now in its tenth series and most of them have made fascinating viewing from start to finish. This year we start out with 20 candidates for the prize of £250,000 to be invested in a business idea of there choice and to work in partnership with Sir Alan Sugar. Along the way 18 of them will fall fowl of the pointing finger and the words "Your Fired". By the last show in the series only 2 will remain to fight it out for the ultimate prize. Some of the candidates always seem like buffoons who would be better employed as road sweepers than high fliers in the business world, but that is all part of watching the show. 

I'm looking forward to the start of the new series especially after having to wait for the whole of the summer. I just hope it is all worth the wait, which I'm sure it will be, once it gets underway tomorrow.

The Apprentice 2014

If you were wondering what has happened to this years The Apprentice it has been moved to the Autumn to avoid the World Cup. It was felt it would be detrimental to the show to have it compete with such a major sporting event and I can imagine that the summer was ruled out because of the commonwealth games. 

The good news is that it is returning and filming started this week for the new series and pictures are circulating on the Internet of the filming of the show. It will be a closely guarded secret if the filming has really started but if it is I can't wait to see the show, which will be completed long before it hits the screens.

The Apprentice - The Final 2013

Congratulations to Leah Totton on winning tonight's final of The Apprentice after another enjoyable series of the long running show on the BBC television after beating Luisa Zissman, which might prove to be lucky escape for Sir Alan Sugar.

She had to fight her way past the buffoons that thought they are the future champions, but in the end showed there egos were bigger than the business intellects. There is drive and ambition and there is being big headed and thinking you know everything and that other don't know better than you, and those that fail tend to fall into that  group of idiots that show all that is wrong with British management. Thankfully Alan Sugar and his team aren't that stupid and they see through the lies and the half truths to see the contestants for what they really are. How do that do that team work, Sir Alan listens to his advisor's and takes what they have said on board before he acts. It is the one thing nearly all the contestants could do with learning and the same thing goes for business in the United Kingdom in general.

Finally one thing I have noticed that since the show is now about securing investment  rather than getting a job with Sir Sugar it has lost it's way a little compared to the original in terms of the people that it attracts. Don't get me wrong I still like the show, but the people that apply don't seem to be of the stuff that the original shows contestants were made of. They don't have the same business skills sets and tend to be just idea's people rather than future business leaders, and that is something that would never have done in the original concept of the show.

The Apprentice Returns Again

Well it is that time of the year again, when hopeless business big heads want a slice of Lord Sugar’s money. The new series of The Apprentice is set to appear on our small screens again showing why the country is in the mess it is in with people like those shown in the show running companies and coming up with ideas to make money.

 

Gone has getting a job in Lord Sugar’s empire and now the hapless business men and women get a cool quarter of a million pounds to invest in their idea. Now this has to be a good thing, after all it saves on all the hassle for Lord Sugar of having to get rid of them if they live up to their TV performances. The thing is they had better spend it fast before the pound isn’t worth a penny due to the Governments quantitative easing programme which has effectively devalued the currency to levels it is at today.

The plus side to the programme which as such buffoons running around trying to make money for Lord Sugar and messing it up, is that it makes good viewing. So join me and watch them getting sacked as your wonder how they can royally mess up something that is so simple, after all the best business men and women just need one thing, common sense and that is one quality they all seemed have to lacked in recent series.

The Apprentice 2012 - The Final

After twelve weeks of television and thousands of tweets by people watching the show tonight it all came to an end in the Final. Which in the end lived up to the promise of the rest of the show this year and was finished off a special you are hired show that at times was incredibly funny.

The show this year has been as good as any of the past and it has made good television and quiet a contrast to the main programming on BBC One. The format might be getting a bit predictable but there is a certain comfort in that. I know it is one of the few shows on the channel I still watch and that has to say something about the show on a channel that has gone down market in recent years.

This years winner was Ricky Martin a 27 year old recruitment manager who compared himself to the Norse God Thor in his personal statement before saying that he could teach and old dog, Sir Alan Sugar, new tricks. Thankfully his business plan was better than his personal statement and he even managed to impress the unimpermissible Claude Littner with his business plan. He won with a rather boring and safe recruitment agency business but given the economic climate Sir Alan Sugar went for the safe option, and who came blame him.

The only question is did Sir Alan Sugar make the right choice in the end, and I think he did. Ricky Martin business skills were good and who came blame him for playing it safe. Time well tell what return he gets on his investment, but I;m sure he will make a profit. 

So that is it until next year when hopefully we will have another bunch of hopefuls trying to Sir Alans Sugars money out of his pocket and into a new business. 

The Apprentice Mess

I wouldn't normally write about a particular episode of The Apprentice but after years of watching the show, last night I was shocked by the lack of business sense in the how the winning team were picked, based on alone sales rather than profit. The whole premiss of the programme was flawed, that the best team wins and the losers are sent to the greasy spoon to await their fate.

The two teams were given the task of coming up with a fitness idea that could be sold as franchise to gyms and fitness centres. Once they came up with their idea and made a DVD of the concept they pitched the idea to three big players in the market. Basically what happened is the winning team in this weeks show gave away free gym equipment in the form of Space hoppers, hula hoops and skipping ropes without the cost of the equipment being taken off the sales figures to get actual the profit they would have made. This disadvantaged the other team who would have made a higher profit if these costs had have been included in the calculations.

The winning team made a basic business mistake about costs. After their first pitch where they were asked about equipment costs they at first made up the figures. Realising they didn't have a clue they then decided they would include the equipment for free in future pitches. They didn't even think of how this would affect the cost or their profit. Their whole business model was flawed and they should have been punished for it. They won on their third pitch that when Virgin Active said they would buy into their idea bring implement it in one hundred and twenty two clubs. The fact is the equipment costs would have really cut badly into their profits at the price they were offered.

When it came to the boardroom, Lord Sugar pointed out their mistake but he failed impose a penalty on the money they made through sales to allow for it. By letting the team win he rewarded them for their incompetence and he sent the wrong message to the business world that he campions in the show.  Surely he doesn't want people that can't work out basic cost to work for him or be in business with him.

When I posted about the start of the series five weeks ago I said "You can just see it the show being aired on prime time Chinese State Television as an example of how not to do business" what I didn't realise was that it really could be the case after tonights show. The thing is, they won't just be laughing at the contestants. What was Lord Sugar thinking of when he let this one go.

The Apprentice 2012

It is that time of the year that see the return of the BBC long running business show the Apprentice returns to our screens to search for business talent from a what is normally bunch of high qualified individuals with egos the sizes of planets. 

The programme involves putting the egos into teams which are given tasks to do in order to make money for the boss, Sir Alan Sugar. Those on the losing team are then ridiculed in the boardroom in front of an audience of millions of television viewers before they pick the final three of their own kind to face the final humiliation in the board room where one of them is put out of their missy for good and sent home. 

All good television and with some of the skills displayed in the tasks it helps you understand why British Business is in such a mess. You can just see it the show being aired on prime time Chinese State Television as an example of how not to do business and the audience laughing at the buffoonery or the egos as the mess up the simplest tasks.

The new series starts tonight, at nine o'clock in the evening on BBC1 with next part being shown at the same time and on the same station the following week. I will be watching as always will you?

The Apprentice

Tonight see the start of the next series of "The Apprentice" on BBC One at nine o'clock. If you are a avid view of the programme you won't want to miss out on the wonderful show. It is the best of it's type on television.

The programme sets contestants grueling business tasks with the winner of the show getting a job working with Alan Sugar. Each week the contestants are put into to two teams, and a team leader is appointed. The two teams carry out a identical tasks and after the tasks are finished the teams go to the boardroom where the winning team is announced. The losing team then have to workout who is to blame for the losing the task and the team leader picks two people to return to the board room with them and face the music. Once in the boardroom they have to say why they should stay in the competition and why they shouldn't be fired. Finally Alan Sugar decides who is ultimately to blame and they are fired and they leave the programme.

It is a fascinating programme that is now in it's sixth series and one that I have been watching for quite a few years now and that I really enjoy. It is something that I have been looking forward to all year and this year I didn't have so long to wait for the new series. It is one of the television highlights of the year for me since I started watching it about four or five years ago and always will be.

The Apprentice

Tonight see the start of the Apprentice on BBC One. The programme sets contestants grueling business tasks with the winner of the show getting a job working with Alan Sugar. Each week the contestants are put into to two teams, and a team leader is appointed. The two teams carry out a identical tasks and after the tasks are finished the teams go to the boardroom where the winning team is announced. The losing team then have to workout who is to blame for the losing the task and the team leader picks two people to return to the board room with them and face the music. Once in the boardroom they have to say why they should stay in the competition and why they shouldn't be fired. Finally Alan Sugar decides who is ultimately to blame and they are fired and they leave the programme.

It is a fascinating programme that is now in it's sixth series and one that I have been watching for quite a few years now and that I really enjoy. It is something that I have been looking forward to all year. Normally the show is on earlier in the year but with Alan Sugars connections with the Labour Party in recent years and the General Election in May the BBC decided to postpone the show until now. I can see the logic but I did miss it in the spring but I'm glad they didn't miss a year which I always thought might have been a possibility. It is one of the television  highlights of the year for me since I started watching it and always will be as long as the series continues.