Blood in the Boardroom

Right now: Gotye - 'Learnalilgivinanlovin'

'The Apprentice' is now back for its eighth series and therefore, I have decided that I am going to become a dedicated and avid follower of the show. I must confess bloggers, that I have never watched a full series of 'The Apprentice', a felony I am most ashamed of, especially due to the fact that I am a business student. I watch this programme and often ask myself why the heck I am doing this degree when I don't think I would last five minutes sitting in front of Lord Sugar. I'd probably just implode and begin spraying blood out of every orifice in fear (and with that lovely little image in my head, I shall move on...)

Get those bloodstains off the back wall of my office, NOW!

Please note the following blog contains spoilers if you have not yet managed to watch the episode yet.

So, firstly, the all important 'Who is going to be the project manager on the first task?' scenario. I'm going to be honest and I say that I would not be volunteering. Therefore, I think that if you do volunteer for the dreaded task, you should be immediately exempt from a sacking for sheer courage and bravery. As for my opinion on the project managers, I really like Gabrielle. She seems like a motivator and someone you could easily approach, a quality I quite admire. She didn't seem ruthless or embittered either. However, she was quite confident to put herself forward for the task and therefore, she should have been more aware of the fact that her leadership was being scrutinised.

As for the bloke, I can't even remember his name. That's bad. But he didn't impress me, he just seems like your average, run of the mill, young entrepreneur with a lot to prove. However, he did seem well-liked and respected by MOST of his team, the exception being Stephen, a salesman who had a lot to preach and criticise about, yet he didn't exactly volunteer for the role.

In the end, the boys won, which I was surprised and saddened about. I'm not being sexist or biased here but the girl's design at the end of the day was fresh and quirky, I probably would have bought the tote bag myself, I liked the design that much. The boy's design was SHIT. Absolutely SHIT. Yet, their target market was tourists, which in London, is a pretty good market. They also had quite solid figures as well, which is key to everything, from knowing how much raw materials to buy to coming up with a realistic selling price (although £15 for a small teddy bear? If anyone bought it at that price they deserve nothing less than to be culled for stupidity). The girl's simply focuses too much on design and if they had had more time, they could have worried about margins later but it was the first task and they didn't spend enough time getting their figures straight.

So Gabrielle, the project manager decides to take Katie, who is playing the 'if I don't talk, he won't notice me' game and Bilyana, a bolshy bulgarian whose egomaniac confidence is a sight truly to be beheld. My thoughts throughout the whole ten minutes in the Boardroom was that Gabrielle was probably going to go, even though I liked her the most, if not, Katie would get it and that Alan Sugar would keep Bilyana in, even if for pure entertainment value. However, as it seemed more and more likely that Katie was getting the proverbial 'chop', Bilyana opened her mouth and did not stop talking, panicking and using the fact she was a head girl to try and tug at the heartstrings of Alan Sugar. Then she was fired. Pure and simple.

At first I was ecstatic, Gabrielle was still in and Katie's game had paid off. But although I had found Bilyana irritating as hell, when she appeared on the spin off show, 'You're fired' with Dara O Brain, she came across really well and I kind of felt bad for her. But hey ho, onto the next episode.