Crisps and Cretins

God I'm hungry (and it's not quite lunchtime), which reminds me I haven't blogged yet about this week's Apprentice. The crisps task, eh? Or How To Succeed Where No Other British Crisp Manufacturer Has. Easy peasy for the boys and girls of The Apprentice, given their top-level business acumen, fantastic client management skills and all-round fabulosity (hey! A Melissa word...). Hmm. Lord Sugar has whittled the contestants down to the final eight, and if this task hasn't put them off, nothing will. So, the brief: design some new flavours of crisps, get them made, take them to Hamburg and flog them to the Germans. Okay, sounds simple enough. Unless you don't know the first thing about making crisps, which we can safely assume they didn't. Stella's team went straight in for the "Classic British" theme, coming up with roast dinner flavour and the more dodgy sounding stilton and paprika. Stilton and PAPRIKA? WHY? At least it's different, I suppose. Chris's team decided to work on traditional German flavours.... again, WHY? Surely in Germany they already HAVE German style crisps, and don't need a bunch of Brits coming over to sell them some more. Just when you thought it couldn't get worse, Christopher and Jamie fell in love with a sausage and curry fast food snack, and off they went to make the crisps to match. Yuck.

Highlights of the episode included: Christopher's revelation that he hates Germany and Germans, with no reason given (or if there was it was deemed unbroadcastable), Laura's sulking and stropping (especially when told she spoke waaaay too fast) and Baggsy's sheer brilliance at being able to count to 20 in German. Something my 13 year old son can do, and HE doesn't act like he has the genius of Stephen Hawking. My son was watching with me as it happens, and he wasn't impressed. But then, he is never impressed by anyone on the show, to be honest. It was painfully obvious, really, that Stella's team was going to win. Not only were their flavours, well, edible, but they made some good pitches and got in there first. Chris's team made a MASSIVE mistake when they were offered a 9am appointment at The Marriott but Christopher and Jamie changed it to 1pm and guess what? - Stella and Joanna have already been there and walked away with a sizeable order. Didn't see THAT one coming... As Jamie would say, "the early bird catches the birm", or something like that.

Chris, panicking now he was set for the boardroom for the umpteenth time, dragged Christopher and Jamie along for the ride. I must admit, I don't like that Christopher much (the slimeball), but did feel a bit sorry for him when he was fired. Chris and Jamie managed to wriggle their respective ways out of an elbowing, whilst poor Christopher couldn't sweet talk Lord Sugar over, being told that although he was a hard grafter, he just wasn't "entrepreneurial enough". Hmm. One suspects that what Lord Sugar meant was, doesn't talk rubbish enough. It seems to be the way forward, don't you think? Although Lord S has often decried the verbose, he seems to like them, really. Maybe there's a moral in this tale, you know. Or even two. One - don't sell German crisps to Germans... they already HAVE them. Two - Hard work is all very well, but if you can't talk the talk, walking the walk ain't going to get you far. And there's a third - Counting to 20 in German does NOT make you a brainiac.

The Great Escape... and a Royal Wedding!

Quel surprise, I watched The Apprentice this week. Well, watched isn't truly accurate - I was scoffing chocolate and (lots of) wine whilst it happened to be on in the background - so forgive my fuzziness...

So, Sandeesh finally got the chance to be PM, as did our perennial favourite prat, Baggsy. Would this be Sandeesh's chance to finally show Lord Sugar what she's capable of. Sadly, no. Would this be Stuart's chance to finally show us that he's not just a mouthy arrogant plonker? Sadly, no.. but for the entertainment factor, he just can't be beaten. The teams were sent to Pinewood Studios ("What? The furniture store?" asks Sandeesh....) to choose a backdrop for their next task - enticing children to fake race fake cars against said backdrop to produce dvds for their proud parents to spend a tenner on. Off to Westfield Shopping Centre next, to set up for the task and get going with the moneymaking. Long story short - Baggs irritated the hell out of everyone on his team (as well as some of the doting parents who bought the dvd, when asked to pay £12 rather than the £10 previously quoted), Sandeesh seemed to DO something this week rather than just moaning, and all the kids had a great time! I couldn't for the life of me ascertain if Mr Baggs actually did anything in the task, or just left the others to crack on with it while he ponced around flapping his big mouth - by this time I was merrily opening another bottle. Anyway, crunch time came and - to my shock - the Baggs Brand had won the profit wars by a very small margin. So, into the boardroom again for poor old Sandeesh. And this time, after wheedling her way past The Sugar twice before, she was finally sent home, the only time she did ANYTHING! Chris and Liz tore all her arguments apart, and Lord Sugar did what he seemed to be putting off all series - got rid of the huge-eyed madam. Back in the house, the victory of Sturat's team didn't seem to be resonating with happiness... nobody seemed to think he had deserved the win. Especially not Stella, his team-mate, who told him point blank that the other team should have won. Ouch. Can't wait for next week... who needs competition from the other team when your own don't even like you? Oh Baggsy, your brand isn't working for me...

Moving on, whilst Lord Sugar has been firing recruits this week, the Royal Family are hiring. Prince William and Kate Middleton have (finally) announced their engagement and a wedding is planned for spring/summer next year. How exciting! Opinions seem to be split on this - people are either 100% behind what promises to be an all-out meringue fest, or resentful that "our" tax money will be spent on the outdated principle of monarchy. Jeez, can't everyone just be happy for them? Yes, we will end up paying out for the wedding, but what a treat it will be for all the family (especially if we get the day off work/school)! I remember Charles and Di's wedding as one of the most exciting days I had when I was 5. We all sat together and watched the visual display (on the telly, obviously, we weren't invited for real) and I had my first ever taste of babycham... setting the stage for an addiction to sparkly drinks. I blame my parents. And, importantly for the economy, the royal wedding will bring additional ££££££££££££ into the country (in excess of £1billion, with £750m from tourism alone). Sales of wine and champagne are set to soar, with people celebrating in their own homes and having parties - I might have a little one of my own. Or I could just keep the champers for myself. And what better for the country in these uncertain times than something to look forward to celebrating, the marriage of our future king. Whilst it's all very exciting (at least to me!), I wouldn't fancy being that Kate Middleton. In-laws are bad enough at the best of times, but marrying into the Royal Family must be a challenge of nightmarish proportions. Look at poor old Di, she was famously unhappy with the whole bally lot of 'em. Being recruited into the Windsor clan must be almost as bad as being hired by Lord Sugar.

Maybe being fired is a great escape after all...

Hold the recycled clothes and hold your tongues...

God I love The Apprentice. It makes me feel better about myself - I look like a paragon of competence next to some of these muppets. The contestants muddle their way through from task to task, messing up, moaning and bitching their way along the path to the boardroom. Mistakes pile up by the dozen, and this week was no exception.

Now, I love fashion (like most of us girls out there), so was interested to see what would happen when the teams were tasked with setting up a one day boutique in Manchester's Trafford centre. I am by no means a fashionista, but I like to think I know what makes a good outfit... unlike some of our erstwhile contenders. And I absolutely loved the sparkly, blinging party dresses that Synergy managed to blag - not surprisingly, given their enthusiasm for the clothes in comparison with Apollo's po-faced silence when confronted with the rail of beauties. So we had some WAG-ready LBDs and sequined frocks, brilliant, and brilliantly pitched for by Liz. Paloma managed to secure some "recycled" garments... clothes made out of old suits and ties, sold at extortionate prices for something that looked like a tramp had robbed a charity shop and taken a pair of scissors to fashion himself an outfit or two. Yuck.

Anyway, the shops were opened the next day, ready for some sales - proper sales, not like last week's Baby Glows and showerhead sales which all turned out to be fake, oops sorry, hypothetical. Alex (you know, the one resembling a goblin), self-proclaimed expert on the Trafford Centre geography, messed up by choosing a promotional pitch too far away from the shop, but redeemed himself by securing a short advert which was played on the big screen in the centre every fifteen minutes. The WAG dresses were flying off the shelves, Paloma and Alex were rowing about the placement of clothes rails, nobody wanted to buy the hooded waistcoats made out of old M&S suits, and Stella was sat in her boutique's window clad in a green sparkly dress, prompting Nick to compare her to an Amsterdam prozzie. Nice.

It was slightly predictable that Synergy would win the task, but impressively Apollo were only £500 behind. If only Chris had been able to sell another couple of the hideous tie dresses. And wasn't the final showdown a humdinger? Not surprisingly, Paloma dragged Alex (who she had already hinted at being to blame for the failure of the task) into the boardroom... but also Sandeesh, claiming she was overall a "weaker candidate". Interesting tactics. But ones that seemed they might work, despite Lord Sugar's initial disapporoval. It was all going so well, with Alex and Paloma snapping at each other like grouchy poodles, Paloma driving the point home that Alex failed at the pitch location task, and Alex reiterating that his advertising brainwave had more than made up for it. Paloma even told Alex that everyone else on the team found him irritating - really? Can't imagine why... now I think about it, maybe he's more like a bulldog than a goblin. Anyhoo, things were really kicking off about now, but with Paloma holding her own so well, and Lord Sugar starting to consider his point about Sandeesh being a useless waste of space, it seemed that she would live to fight (and I mean literally fight, that girl is scary) another day. And then she started laying into all and sundry, giving Alex and Sandeesh an real ear battering, and Alan just lost the plot at that point.

Paloma was fired, and it couldn't have happened to a nastier person. She made Melissa look like Mother Theresa, for God's sake. She may have had all the business savvy in the world, all the commercial experience and team leading skills, whatever ... but she hadn't learnt the most important rule of the boardroom - when to keep quiet. As Lord Sugar pointed out, she'd talked herself out of staying on. Nobody wants to work with an aggressive cow like that, after all. Poor little Alex looked like he'd faint with relief when told he was staying on, and Sandeesh had dodged the bullet again. I think it's all too easy to keep on talking when the moment has passed, and talk ourselves out of something we want, especially when we let personal opinions (Paloma's seeming hatred for Alex for example) get in the way of our ambition, intent and focus. She deserved to go, that's for sure. And the lesson learned from this? Shut up and put up, at least for the short term, if it helps you get what you want. I just wish I could get this across to my kids. I could always set an example for them, I suppose, but short of a tongue amputation, I can't see that working...

The Apprentice - Bragging, Burning Bridges and Bad Behaviour....

It was a good one this week, with the gobby Melissa Cohen finally getting her comeuppance and hearing those famous dreaded words... "You're Fired!" Frankly, I thought she was so utterly horrible in last week's episode that I was hoping her team would fail so that I would have the pleasure of seeing her fired, but - somehow - she managed to grab victory and so my plans were thwarted for another seven days. Her performance this week, for a self-acclaimed pitching master, was dismal, finally leading to her departure from the show. So what did we learn about Melissa? That she liked to boast, and claim her prowess in an area that she obviously couldn't - and didn't - deliver on? Melissa learnt the hard way that she should have been able to back up her claims with action, rather than letting herself, and her team, down when it came to the crunch. One of the things to take away from this is the importance of setting expectations. If you say you can do something, whether you can or not, people will expect you to do it. If the expectation to achieve is unrealistic, you won't be meet your targets, and will disappoint those to whom you made the promise. If you set yourself, and your employer/ colleagues, realistic expectations, then you will always be able to deliver, and if you manage to exceed those targets, all the better! The thing about Melissa was that she bigged up her sales abilities so much, and had so much to prove, that when she fell flat on her face we all felt a little glow of happiness at her misfortune. Her braggishness wasn't helped any by her personality flaws, unfortunately. Volunteering to be the project manager - well, forcing her way into the position - once was enough for all of us, but she then tries to bulldoze her way into it for a second week. That girl certainly wanted to prove something, to herself as well as Lord Sugar. I would have thought that scraping through by the skin of her teeth in the bakery task would have allowed her to sit back and relax knowing she didn't have to stand in the firing line as PM again, but who knew she'd be such a glutton for punishment? Perhaps it was to gain more attention from Lord Sugar, perhaps to win back the respect of her team mates. Who knows? One thing's for sure, Melissa won't be missed by anyone in the Apprentice house, from what we've seen.

Nobody could fail to be surprised, and amused, by Melissa's parting shot in the boardroom, accusing Jamie and Stuart of ganging up on her. As she stormed out, both men followed her to say their goodbyes, only to be met with a refusal to shake hands and told that she had nothing to say to them. Sulky? Moi? It made her look BAD - childish, stroppy and petulant. If you were a potential employer, what on earth would you think after seeing THAT performance? I expect better from my 6-year old, let alone a grown "professional". Always beware of parting gestures, lest you burn your bridges, because you never know who might be watching. The same goes in other situations - watch what you say and never take it for granted that you haven't been observed. For example, people who turn up for an interview and are rude or short with the receptionist, only to discover later that they were dealing with the partner of the hiring manager, or have been watched whilst in the waiting area (I know of companies who routinely do this to observe behaviour). There are those who have made crass or inappropriate comments about a former boss or colleague, only to find that they are an acquaintance or family member of an interviewer. The list goes on. Loose lips and all that...

Finally, who couldn't help but cringe at Stuart "The Brand" Baggs' unintentional rudeness to the Baby Glow lady? The tactless, agressively questioning whippersnapper lost Synergy the chance to sell the innovative product, which eventually resulted in a huge win for Apollo, who won the bid and grossed £995,000k of orders for Liz, who pitched impeccably throughout. Baggsy didn't MEAN to be be insulting, but his unintentional ill behaviour contributed massively to the team's failure. We should all keep in mind that treating people badly without thinking of the consequences is a dangerous thing to do - who wants to be the one with foot in mouth disease all the time?!

I think that's all I have to "conversate" with you for now... I'm off to watch a re-run of "The Apprentice: You're Fired" and have another laugh at Ms Cohen's expense. I never thought gloating could be this much fun...

The Apprentice and The Importance of Background Checking

The Apprentice is well underway with two episodes having come and gone, and Alan Sugar (now Lord Sugar rather than Suralan) has the uneviable task of trying to control the latest batch of self-proclaimed business geniuses.

Even before the sixteen erstwhile candidates hit our TV screens, reports of skullduggery and scandal had hit the press. It has been revealed that five of the competitors for the apprenticeship to Britain's most belligerant boss have been hiding a dark past. First up is Christopher Farrell, ex-marine turned mortgage broker turned... criminal. Not only has he been sacked for fraud, he has also been convicted of possessing offensive weapons - and is now hiding out in Spain. According to the makers of the show, Talkback Thames, a CRB check was done on Christopher, but before he attended court last year. Next up is the charming Joanna Riley, who was convicted of racially abusing 3 taxi drivers after a drunken night out. Mouthy Melissa Cohen has also fallen on the wrong side of the law, namely for a credit card fraud carried out when she was 19. Shibby Robati, surgeon, has in the past been issued with a formal warning for unprofessional conduct, which doesn't bode well for any would-be patients. Finaly, it was revealed after last Wednesday's show that Stella English, the successful project manager for the boy's team, has a past as a "gangster's moll", according to The Mirror.

Back in 2008, there was outrage when Lee McQueen, the eventual winner, was discovered to have lied on his CV about his educational achievements, and was only caught out in the final episodes during the gruelling interview round. Some people felt he should have been ejected at that point, but Sugar decided to hire rather than fire. So how did it go from educational overstatement on a CV to full-on criminal past - without being discovered during the background checks? If Talkback Thames didn't manage to pick up any of these people's pasts before the dirt was dished to the press, then what hope is there for the rest of us? It brings up the whole issue of screening, and who we should look to to provide background information on candidates. In any recruitment process, background checks are very important, to find out more about the candidate's personal and professional life. Even more crucial are criminal checks for those working or potentially working with children or vulnerable adults. There are companies who charge for the service of carrying out checks, and getting references etc, but how can the rest of us ensure that we dig deep into the pasts of our candidates to make sure no nasty surprises come to light further down the line? We can only ask as many questions as we can during the telephone screening, and then the face to face interviews, and try to wheedle out anything that might set alarm bells ringing. But how can we ensure that skeletons don't start throwing themselves out of cupboards after the interview process? And can we?

I tell you what, if all this is happening at this stage, I am very excited about what we could find out by the end! It could be anything... Roll on Episode 3, and roll on all the juicily gossip-filled articles of The Mirror, The Mail et al.

Recruitment Roundup and Hard Labour....

There's been a few interesting snippets of recruitment news recently, so I thought I'd do a little round up this week, to make a change.

Bad news - the jobs market saw a slow down in September, with permanent placements rising at the weakest rate for a year, according to a report by REC and KPMG. Permanent salary growth dropped to a 10-month low and temporary pay dropped slightly for the first time in 9 months, leading to worries about the threat of rising unemployment. In contrast, demand for IT staff has risen in the last quarter, with permanent placements up 8% and contracts up 11%. The available applicants has decreased as the ratio between demand and supply has changed, with 1.2 applicants per job. IT advertisment for roles has risen over the past 4 quarters and now stands at the highest level since Q4 2008.

Better news - the 2011 Census is going to create 35,000 jobs across England and Wales. The one-day special will see people in a variety of roles, both full and part time, visiting people in their local areas to provide help and support to make sure that everyone can complete and return the Census questionnaire.

And one of the most talked about pieces of recruitment news from the past week - should prisoners be made to work 40-hour weeks? The Justice secretay, Ken Clarke, says that they should. He believes that, rather than live a life of "enforced... idleness", they should be working in order to pay some compensation to victims. He told the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham las week that prisoners shoule be working 9-5 jobs in order to learn and trade or new skills, alongside putting one pound in every five in a fund for victims. Clarke wants private firms to create jobs, allowing money to be earned to cover prison costs, pay benefits to prisoners' families, and possibly kept in trust for release. He said that prisons should be turned into places of "purposeful hard work" and make sure victims have some restitution. Raising the earnings (averaging £8 per week) for prisoners would provide incentives for those who work, whilst also going some way towards svaing the £2 billion that the Ministry of Justice is looking to slash from their budget.

So will it work? I think so, if the right companies can be found to employ prisoners in such large numbers. Whilst there's no doubt that working will enhance a prisoner's future prospects as well as improve their self esteem and give them the opportunity to contribute to society, whether or not they will actually want to work is another issue. The new planes will not be enforced, rather down to choice as is already the case with prison workers. Whether you believe in bringing back the days of the chain-gangs, or have a more liberal stance on the matter, this could be a good idea - as long as it can be put into place with enough private employers prepared to, or able to, provide jobs for those behind bars. In fact, in the USA, there are already over 100 private companies working with prisoners as part of the Prison Industry Employment Certification Program. Whilst they have to pay them the minimum wage, they save a fortune on taxes, health care and vacation time. The number of prisoners taking part has doubled over the past decade, so it seems that we may be about to follow suit in what could be a very successful enterprise. And some of US grumble about being shackled to the desk....

Back to school and work - oh, the horror...

It's that time again - the beginning of autumn, the start of a new school year and the return to some semblance of a routine after the heady days of summer and holidays. Some greet this with relief, especially after six weeks stuck at home with bickering, bored children, whilst others feel depressed at going back to work after a fabulous week or two spent by the pool.

For working mums, the return to the office is a mixed blessing. Some are sad to say goodbye to the precious time spent with their children during annual leave and cope with the before school hissy fits and the after school hyperactivity, others are just pleased to get back to normality and the school run/ commute routine. Considering that most employers offer 20-25 days holiday leave a year (on top of Bank Holidays), most of us will have had to use some other form of childcare during the summer as well as taking time off. I am extremely lucky to have parents who force me to hand over the little darlings for two weeks at a time and whisk them off to their Welsh seaside retreat. Quality. For others, holiday clubs or out-of-school childcare is the only option - but with this costing between £75 and £105 per child per week, the summer holidays can be a large additional expense for working parents. And with thousands of children starting school today, for many mums it is the first chance they have to get back to work after starting a family... offering a whole new issue of seeking flexible or part-time work. Whilst plenty of mums are happy to work full time, there are plenty more who aren't quite ready to relinquish the hold of the school run and the teatime tantrums, and they now have to enter the fierce competition to gain a part-time job as well as deal with the equally fierce competition at the school gates.

At present, part-time workers are at an all-time high, fuelled by the economy and the current unemployment crisis, with people previously in full-time work now forced to work less hours just to remain in work. Since the start of the credit crunch in August 2007, almost 100,000 mothers have been pushed back to work to make ends meet, and many of these will be part-time workers. With the cost of before and after school care and childminders so high in many areas, part-time work can be equally financially viable as full-time work once you factor these costs in. Many find jobs in shops or cafes, others as part-time administrators, secretaries or receptionists. There are always part-time jobs to be found working for local government - whether in an office or as a teaching assistant or secretary of a school. Councils offer flexibility and school jobs offer a great opportunity for part-time work which also fits in around the school holidays, thus eliminating the need for any additional childcare and the associated cost. However, the competition is huge as these jobs are highly sought after - not surprisingly - and councils now expect applicants to fill out long and sometimes difficult application forms, although some schools will accept applications direct. If you already work, don't forget that anyone with children under six is entitled to request flexible working. An increasing number of mums are turning to self employment, using existing professional expertise to go freelance, or starting up a small business.

Fitting work around children is no easy task. Ideal hours are between 9.30 and 2.30, to allow time to drop the kids off and then pick them up from school, and if you're lucky enough to land one of these jobs (as I have been), then it's plain sailing from here on in. Disregarding, of course, problems with little unanticipated matters such as inset days, sick children, family emergencies...

My kids haven't gone back to school yet. I have that pleasure yet to come, next week. Neither, as you can imagine, are desperate to return. The six year old has been ecstatic to spend all summer roaming the streets with his mates, cycling and skateboarding. He is brown from the sun as well as the dirt. The thirteen year old has been equally ecstatic to be able to lie in bed until midday and then loaf around the house playing computer games and watching documentaries. Tough luck to them, I say. If I have to go back to work whilst the Other Half gloats because he still has a few days off... Although, having said that, I'm sitting here in my comfortable office, blogging, whilst he's stuck at home refereeing between two fighting beasts, so who's having the last laugh?

(For a good range of council and school jobs, check out www.jobsgopublic.com for opportunities in your area.

For more information about working rights and entitlements, go to www.direct.gov.uk

For help and advice on working for yourself, see www.businesslink.gov.uk)