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Having missed the first episode of the show, I was excited to see how the new candidates were this time. There was a brief recap of last week’s show which did not give much idea of course. But it make me feel the stereotyping and I realized how candidates accepted that very well. Being tagged as the underdog, and with their “net worth”, the street-smarts seemed really fired up to me.

OK, on to the task…There is some much to cover since it was an intense show. The task is to renovate a crappy hotel in Jersey shores, and teams were given $20,000 to their disposal. Hotels were equally terrible and time was equally limited and customer satisfaction was the goal.

I’ll start my analysis with NetWorth Corp. Brian was chosen as the project manager, as I predicted in the fantasy game. I knew already that his team did not have respect for him, and thought he would want to step up to prove his worth and his sheer quality in negotiation(!). So, the team comes to the hotel, they look at the rooms and get very disgusted. Well, we could literally feel the smell! A crucial moment for the team, and Brian came moments later. Audrey suggested that the first thing they needed was a big (giant) trash can and said that she had learned that they could buy one for $700. Kristen, wisely, jumped in to tell Brian that what they needed first was an itemized budget. Brian made his first critical mistake (oh, so many to choose from), and thought he could gain respect of everyone by being a deterministic leader and ordered Audrey to order for $700 by not listening to Kristen and closed the discussion promptly. OK, Kristen does not have the best attitude but what is with not making a budget when you have limited funds? After that, Brian pretty much played the “lonely leader” and jumped on everything by himself. He ripped off all the toilets, ordered to replace them, negotiated contractors himself, and even said that everyone in his team should have watched him as a lesson to learn how to negotiate! He so does not accept his mistakes that he had the guts to go in front of the team and tell them that they did not have enough money for carpet cleaning. Kristen went mad and she got into a loud fight with Brian. She definitely has an attitude problem. Oh, by the way, what is with that language? It is the most “beeping” Apprentice so far. Excuse me, but, some of these people must not only be street-smarts but from the streets as well. They have to learn some manners before it is too late. So, they somehow managed the bare minimums and the hotel started to accept customers. They were so tired that they completely forgot about the customer satisfaction, as far as I could see, and they kept on arguing loudly in the premises. All in all, it is hard to say who stood out after this task since Brian played a non-delegating, self involved leader. The only person I thought did a good job was Tana since she at least remembered about some customer service and prepared a nice breakfast and thought about complimentary newspaper.

Now on to the Magna Corp. Michael became the project manager. Magna seemed to have things more in order. Verna pointed out early on that the customer satisfaction was the key. Well, clearly. I think she was given the role of customer satisfaction manager. There was not any fighting going on but this team had their own problem, Verna. Although it seems like a very stressful environment, I have no idea how she managed to collect that much stress and burned herself out. She did not seem to have a very physically hard job but somehow she made it so big in her head that stress took control of her. So, she decided to quit the game and said that she wasn’t playing anymore when Bren came to ask about breakfast that she was supposed to take care of. After a while, she leaves the premises and starts walking aimlessly until Caroline drives to pick her up and shows some support. Then, magically she is back. I never thought she would be back after that. Everyone seemed very supportive even though they didn’t sound so when they were commenting on the situation in her absence. When I was trying to understand why she might have felt the way she did, she mentioned that “not being in absolute control of things and the team” made her stressful. Well, obviously she is a control freak. But, IMHO, it is not acceptable in that level to run away when there is too much stress. I don’t know it was the editing of this episode of the nature of this episode it was hard to see who performed very well and who performed really bad. I think Michael did a good job as the PM. Also, Danny did an awesome job to turn the evening into a party pool. I think that is what brought them the victory since their morning service sucked.

Finally, Magna won with a nice margin in customer satisfaction survey and possibly the most hilarious boarding room section started. Before the loosing team was announced Verna got some “trumplement” for her come back. But I am sure this behavior will get back to her when things go wrong in the upcoming weeks and she will be accused of not doing well under stressful conditions and will be deemed quitter.

Now it is just the looser team in the board room. As usual, Trump asked the PM what happened and if he was responsible for the loss. Shockingly, Brian admitted that he was responsible for the loss and said “YES” when Trump asked him if he had to be fired! Man, have you never ever watched a board room action before? The number one rule of that board room is to fight even though you sucked! Oh wait, it is not over. After than unfortunate(!) statement, Brian started to defend himself. Yeah, George was dead on with his “delusional” statement. Oh, to me it got funnier when Chris got mad out of the blue and suddenly got Angie’s vote to be fired. Fortunately, Brian made it easier for Trump  and he was fired without question. Apart from everything he did wrong, was he really expecting to be hired after cursing in the board room? He kept looking clueless and delusional in the taxi cab. One thing that stands out after this episode is this: it may be the fight of book-smarts and street-smarts on the surface but it is really smarts vs. non-smarts as we have seen one non-smart leaving in a taxi cab in full arrogance.

My observation after watching the show first time this season is that I have not seen anyone who can be a clear favorite. I haven’t seen a Troy in the street-smarts group. I haven’t seen a Bill or Kwame in the book-smarts. But you never know, I mean who could have imagined Jen would go that far last season. I know it is too early but let’s hope there will be some smart people to be left. No, I don’t want this for Trump’s sake, I want this I can take more when I watch the show.

Question of the Week: How many MBA’s does it take to think about removing the plastic wrap of a new mattress before laying down the sheets?