Yeah, that tactic was nothing but showboating, and the only showboat The Donald likes is The Donald. The firing was completely deserved.
If we’re going to talk about character traits, then I think that Ivana and Stacey J. fared worse than Bradford. I think that Trump’s decision was needlessly harsh, and that the punishment did not fit the crime.
Heck, I would consider Stacey J’s disruptiveness to be much worse than Bradford’s impulsiveness. While this was a bad move on Bradford’s part, one could at least say that it reflects confidence and a readiness to stake his reputation on his well-earned laurels. I can’t think of anything positive to say about Stacey’s disruptive behavior.
I can’t help but wonder if Trump’s decision was done in part for the sake of a ratings-generating shocker early in the season… the kind of thing that would get people hooked. It would certainly be a good marketing tactic on Trump’s part. And, while I disagree with his decision, I do think that it’s somewhat defensible.
Any guesses on what Jennifer was getting ready to say when Trump told her to be quiet ? She said something like, “I have to say something”, after the vote around the table with everyone saying Stacie J. should be fired.
For a minute, I thought she was feeling guilty about the women ganging up on Stacie J., and that she wanted to unburden herself.
If that’s the case, would Trump care? George had already called Stacie an oddball and said she had to go.
Carolyn was pretty testy tonight. I don’t think she likes any of those women.
Oh, I forgot to say – I love that Raj had bowties for all the men.
Giving a portion to charity was a smart marketing move. The women offered nothing original.
I just want to say that my flavour suggestion would be Beer Ice Cream.
I found Carolyn to be unnecessarily angry in the Boardroom tonight. I’m torn between whether or not she’s been told to up the Bitch factor by Mark Burnett, whether she’s just getting really full of herself or if there’s something she observed the team doing that had her angry from the outset.
Bad move, Bradford, on the mispronouncing of her name.
My half-assed guess #2 ( 
) is that Trump fires someone who isn’t opted for the boardroom. That could be someone from the winning team or someone from the losing team that the PM decided not to bring in. Shrug, I should give up guessin’ while I’m behind.
Oh, and as for the decision tonight…I just hope Trumpy doesn’t fire Raj for hypoglycemia next week.
“Raj, a leader, the head of one of MY companies, can’t be whining about having breakfast due to hypoglycemia. You’re fired.” To Carolyn The hypoglycemia was just too much of a liability in a power-business environment.
In other words, totally random!
Was she the one walking around saying, “Buy some ice cream. It has poison in it”? Well, not those words exactly, but she acted as if she’d rather die than touch someone. The one who said the guys were selling make outs instead of ice cream? The one I disliked even more than Stacey?
Sure the other’s piled up on Stacey. She’s a space cadet. If I were on that team I’d be trying to think up ways to get rid of her too. She’s a liability.
Why do the nuts all have to be black women. I know it shouldn’t, but it makes me wince.
Oh, she’s Trump’s pinched faced dominatrix.
They are rerunning the episode on Saturday with some additional boardroom footage. Maybe that will shed some light on why she was so frustrated by the contestants.
Can you blame her? I haven’t seen much to like.
Well, it WAS a real business situation and Bradford made it based on a lousy two game performance streak and it cost him everything. Perhaps you’re more comfortable with the idea of bestowing the CEO position of one your companies to someone that thoughtless, uncalculating and glib-- but he learned a lesson he’ll never forget. Trump taught an important lesson to everyone watching this show how it’s much more likely a boneheaded move like Bradford’s would bite you in the ass than ingratiate you to anyone you’re doing business with.
I wasn’t surprised at Trump’s decision.
All last season people got fired mainly for personality flaws rather than particular business actions.
What Bradford did was throw away an advantage without even a slight chance of getting anything in return – an utterly lousy business decision, you must admit.
I’m not sure if his primary motive was arrogance (“I’m so much better than the rest I have no reason to fear firing” or vanity ("Look at me! I’m great and I know it!) but either way it was stupid, stupid, stupid.
And, btw, Trump never said Bradford was one of the best players: all he said was that he was the best of the four in the room. And given that the other three were:
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A wishy-washy leader who couldn’t keep her eye on the goal. (Really – so what if your two carts are separated? Is that any reason to take the cart at hand out of business? Apparently they wasted several hours of selling time while Ivana fretted over the location of the second cart.)
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Someone who has no idea of teamwork AND seems a bit manic, at the very least.
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Someone who hasn’t done much of anything good but is too stupid to realize she’s in the good and SHUT UP.
My guess is that Trump has all three of them on his ‘fire sooner or later’ list. If Ivana is a bad leader, she’ll be a bad leader again. Ditto for Stacie and Jen: their flaws will inevitably recur, and they can be booted then. Bradford he pretty much had to fire for this offense NOW or let it go.
I missed the first episode, but caught this one and merrily so.
I instantly disliked Bradford for his cockiness and arrogance.
The chick with the short hair ( who looks like she could do supermodel work if she gets canned) should have had a phone with her while she went walking around looking for the lost cart.
And how hard could it be to find a cart with a big red and white umbrella ?
Ivana and her team should have been selling and selling hard while the short haired chick was out looking for it and she should have radioed the other team several times to tell them to sell or something.
The girls needed a uniform of sorts. Totally unorganized.
I was hoping Ivana would get canned because anyone who does charts and graphs while using Buzzwords of Utilizing and Maximizing needs to be bitch-slapped.
I loved Raj and his bow ties and his imitation of the woman on their team selling ice cream. Could she be any less people person? I think she might be this season’s Omarosa with her, " I was in my element eat cavier" (whatever) comment. How snotty of a line is that? Cavier…some reward. Why not have a scoop of dog poo on the side. Indeed.
Speaking of Omarosa, what is she doing lately?
Ok. I am hooked. The wife and I just started watching this season and this episode clinched it for us.
I completely agreed with Donald about Bradford. He took a large risk without the possibility of ANY reward. Risks are acceptable in business, but only if the rewards are large enough to justify them.
The other three should not make any long term plans though.
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My guess on the rule change next week is that Staci (or someone) does something so overwhelmingly odd, that Trump views it as an embarrassment to his brand and fires them in the first boardroom session without paring it down.
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Part of me says he wants to keep Staci around because she adds a little flavor to the show.
I really thought someone would have come up with an idea for “low carb ice cream.” I personally hate the low carb trend, but it’s what’s selling right now.
The women’s first (and biggest) mistake of the game was scrapping their idea to market ice cream to restaurants and instead, ripping off the men’s idea to have push carts. The men had devoted much more time and strategy to that idea and pulled it off far better. Rather than compete in the same market, they should have tried to make contracts with restauranteurs to sell their ice cream. That was the original idea and they should have stuck with it.
As soon as Bradford gave away his advantage and Trump wigged out about his stupidity, I turned to my friend and said, “That’s it. Trump will not be able to resist firing him.” And I was right. I understand why he did it; arrogance of that magnitude puts me back on my heels too. Good riddance to a cocky egomaniac. He only gave away his advantage because he was soooo sure Trump knew how good he was, and he thought his noble sacrifice would endear him to his team. It was self-aggrandizing, not noble, and he paid for it. Oh well.
That said, I don’t think Bradford was the best one out of all of them, either. There are several women who seem pretty smart who have been derailed or marginalized by bad leadership. Despite what others have said in this thread, I don’t think the Jennifer who went to the boardroom was useless in the task. She seemed much more organized and motivated than Ivana, and even made an executive decision about where to move the other carts when Ivana was dicking around and looking totally confused. She is also the one who got some restauranteurs to visit the push cart and try the ice cream. I think if she’d been the PM, they’d have won, or at least had a better shot at winning.
As for Stacie, she had no idea where she was, even though she lives in Manhattan (Harlem and 7th & Broadway might as well be in different cities, though). I’m not surprised Maria couldn’t see the cart either, despite Trump and Carolyn’s shock about it. The Broadway/Times Square area is always packed with people and traffic. It’s pretty hard to see anything sometimes, especially if you’re not looking across the street or whatever.
I have to hand it to the men: hooking up with a charity was a great idea and it was classy of Kelly to donate all the proceeds to the charity at the end.
Tonight they are going to rerun the episode with additional boardroom footage.
I’m doing my best to see what business lesson can be learned from the task, and what lesson from the firing.
From the task: Ice cream is an impulse purchase, depending on traffic. Draw lots of people to your cart! (The bow ties were a nice touch.)
From the firing: If you have a strong competitive advantage, such as limited immunity, don’t give it away for nothing. Exploit your advantage for all it’s worth.
Until she just wouldn’t shut up, I really liked her (I still do like her, but she needs to learn when not to speak).
Ivana doesn’t belong anywhere near the head of a company. Her “chart” was idiotic, and she couldn’t lead, she couldn’t rein in the other women, she was just a disaster.
I’m beginning to like Raj, he’s quirky, but he can back it up. And Kelly asking to donate all the winnings to the charity was very well done.
I’m also annoyed with the ‘black woman as basket case’ casting…but not annoyed enough to stop watching.
But that’s the point–they should be acting as if they’re in real business situations. So far, everyone’s still acting like it’s a game (which it obviously is), but Bradford’s gesture was rooted in game strategy and not real-world consequences, so Trump had to teach him a lesson (which’ll serve as an object lesson for those smart enough to read it that way).
And I’m tired of the Stacie pile-on. They were using her as an obvious scapegoat. Though she may be a bit distracting (though not even 1/10th as distracting as Sam last season), Apex’s failure was in no way related to her. Her time is short (as is everyone’s who was remaining in the boardroom), but she wasn’t at fault and the group going against her felt ultra-cliquey.