The Apprentice 4 Episode 7 – Back to School

Sorry everybody. I missed last week’s episode. Unfortunately, I was actually doing business instead of blogging about “reality business”. I was flying back from California to Ohio

Here’s The Apprentice 4 Episode 6 – Wikipedia update. It pretty much sums it up.

And here is a good review from PJ: No Deep Thoughts: The Apprentice 4 Episode 6

I’ve got the episode on Tivo. I had hoped to get to it. But I haven’t had any time this week. I’ll see if I can get to it.

But on to this week.

9 candidates are left after last weeks massacre and team reshuffle.

Excel lost these four people: Josh, Jennifer M., James, Mark. We didn’t really get to know anyone other than Jen M., really. Too bad for them.

As the others are waiting for people to return, they are wondering where everyone is. At midnight they realize that everyone must have been fired. That really is shocking… even if just from a programming standpoint.

Adam is coming to the forefront of the show… he may be the PM.

Trump tells Excel that their team was decimated. They are down to 3. Randal is taken back to Excel to make a team of 4.

The teams are creating a Learning Annex class.

Capital Edge is covered first. Adam is project manager. Alla wants people to brainstorm 5 topics for the class. Markus doesn’t want to do that. He has one topic. He’s not a “list maker”. It’s an unclear idea.

Adam pulls Markus aside.

They come up with a sex at work idea. Adam is very uncomfortable with this topic. He can’t even really say the word sex.

On to Excel. Randal is the PM. Their initial thoughts are pretty boring and not creative. The topic is “how to stand out”.

Capital Edge: they are talking about all of the topics that might be of interest. Markus is not making sense. Adam pulls Markus aside and says Markus has the least research. Markus is sounding insane. Adam says Markus hasn’t produced any results. Markus is looking quite bad and it looks pretty genuine. I feel, from an idea standpoint, Capital Edge has better angle. But we’ve all been surprised by seemingly bad ideas that turn out great. Randal is very smart and he might be just the guy to come up with a great surprise idea.

Today’s lesson is: “Get to the point”. Trump doesn’t waste time in meetings. There are only so many hours in the day. I feel that sentiment more than ever in my own life. Time is all of our most valuable asset.

Excel at The Learning Annex: Marshawn is banking on luck on this. Randal opens up the class. He is an excellent speaker. George thinks the topic in kind of weak. But Randal is presenting it really well. So much of anything is the presentation… is the marketing. The class broke into smaller groups to practice bold and assertive communication. Randal says that when people are passionate about something they standout. It’s a great idea. Randal says that he wanted to present something well that he was confident about rather than risking a topic he wasn’t familiar with.

Now see, Randal has done some amazing work here. I’m really impressed. The “Sex at Work” class is going to have a hard time competing. Randal is a natural speaker. My guess is that Capital Edge doesn’t have a person like that.

Capital Edge starts right out saying, “Sex at work.”

Carolyn says that she doesn’t know what they are teaching. She doesn’t know what they are teaching… whether this is pro or con. Then Clay starts getting off topic with some bizarre comments. He is so outwardly gay. “Clay is the king of awkward moments,” says Felisha.

Clay says Adam is the “shy tight Jewish boy.” Adam is really taken back by this comment. He feels Clay is calling him cheap. I think he misread Clay. Tight to Clay probably means something completely different than it does to Adam.

This was an unstructured class. Adam is worried that the ratings are going to be poor because of what Clay said. The ratings are going to be poor because the class was poor.

Sure enough, Markus comes off with a really solid class.

Clay says that he was just playing off of Adam’s conservative talk. I happen to agree with Clay here. Adam is very sensitive about a topic and seems to feel that Clay hit on that topic… I don’t really think he did.

On to the boardroom. Carolyn is all dressed up in an evening gown. She has a dinner to go to.

Markus says that Adam was a mediocre project manager. Clay said that he was impressed with Adam. Everyone says that Randal was a great PM.

The comments for Capital Edge’s “Sex in the workplace” are really bad. The average score is a 6.98.

Excel got a lot of really good comments with a 7.07 average score.

Those numbers aren’t very different. That probably says more about how people rank things and what you can really take from surveys. 6.98 came from people who didn’t really seem to like them. And 7.07 from people who were quite pleased. People don’t like to rank things too high or too low. Interesting.

Randal is exempt from next week.

Excel is going to be taught to dress for success.

Capital Edge is in the boardroom… that includes Markus who could be in real trouble.

Excel goes to get some cloths from Michael Kors.

Randal is a two time winning project manager. He looks really strong.

Capital Edge: They are getting ready for the boardroom. Alla and Adam are making a case against Clay. They feel that Clay ruined the presentation. I think the presentation was ruined from it’s core. Markus has isolated himself which is a major reality show blunder. I think he is going to get killed. Although, he might be kept around because he’s so weak.

Adam think the course was great but that Clay made for a poor presentation. Adam is obsessed. He feels that much of the audience was offended because Clay called him a tight ass Jew. Wrong, wrong wrong! He said “shy tight Jewish boy.” That’s a big difference. And Adam is overly obsessed by this. It makes me wonder if he really is a tight ass. Clay restates it more accurately. Clay says he did make a Jewish comment. But it seems to me that he probably doesn’t even know what Adam is upset about. Alla and Adam are grouped up on Clay.

Markus is asked why the team failed. He doesn’t seem to be able to do it right away.

Trump is surprised that Clay is gay. I think it might make him a bit uncomfortable. He says that’s why there are menus in restaurants. He likes stake and others like spaghetti.

Markus doesn’t feel that a cross section of New Yorkers would get something out of this class. Markus, I think smartly, is moving away from this class idea altogether. He really wasn’t for it. This is probably as good a move as he can do. I think he’s going to start to get grilled here in a second. Markus says he wanted to talk about time management. But the team agrees that his ideas were not clear.

Trump says that Markus is not speaking really well. He seems to be really scattered.

Adam brings back Clay and Markus. Those are good calls.

It’s a hard call as to who should go. Clay and Markus are really poor and Adam is lack-luster. They will all go eventually. Couldn’t we really get this show down to just a few episodes?

George is most unhappy with Clay. He says that a key to a good executive is sensitivity. That’s smart. Trump thinks Adam is solid. I agree. But he’s boring… and that’s a bad executive characteristic.

Trump gets them back in and he asks Adam if he has ever had sex before. Very interesting question. I don’t think Trump would normally ask such a question, but I think I know where he is going with this. Adam declines to answer. Trump asks him if it was a good idea to lead something that he wasn’t very familiar with. Trump asks him why he’s so uncomfortable with the topic of sex.

Trump asks Clay is Adam is weak. Clay says yes. Clay says Markus is weak too, when asked. Carolyn asks Markus what he did during this task. Carolyn says he believes in the Cover Your Ass Theory. She says that he’s very negative and when they lose he has a way out. Trump says that Markus didn’t do much. Adam really wants to get Clay out. Adam does not believe Clay is Anit-Semitic. That pretty much gives Clay an easy out.

Trump tells Adam that in 10 years he will be more comfortable with sex. Trump says that it has cost him a lot of money and gotten him into a lot of trouble. He says that Adam will probably be there and actually wishes that he will be there because there is nothing like it. Strong people have a tremendous amount of sexual energy. Trump is proof of that.

Trump starts to focus on Markus. He talks too much and talks in riddles. Markus thinks he did an outstanding job. Markus starts rambling and Trump says that he uses too many words. Trump is relieved that Adam doesn’t think Clay is Anti-Semitic. Trump knows that he has had his own discrimination. But he goes on to say that Clay did a horrible job. Then Trump says that Adam is soft, young and inexperienced. Markus ends up getting fired because he uses too many words. And he doesn’t stop talking.

Trump wishes Markus good luck. Markus says, “if you mean it. I don’t think you do.” He goes on to say that “this has been a railroad from the beginning.” Trump says he talks too long, too much and says the wrong things. This is an excellent case of that. Markus disagrees. He just does not shut up.

Trump says he doesn’t have enough time to listen to Markus.

Clay storms into the apartment. He is furious.

Markus is rambling in the cab. He still can’t make any sense. It’s almost like he’s on something.