22nd October 2017

In this life you have to be flexible.
   In the Apprentice on Wednesday, the contestants had to design a robot so that it could interract in today's world, and then sell it to interested parties.  As expected, the egotistical youngsters were so focused on themselves and arguing with each other that they missed the main picture.
   On Thursday Theresa May arrived at the EU summit in Brussels, following a press conference with Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker.  She was armed with precise instructions from her Cabinet and focused on one aim: what was best for Britain.  In turn Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker arrived with precise, voted-on, instructions from the council comprising all the other EU countries. In business, politics and in life flexibility is required.  In critical negotiations always give the negotiator carte blanche to make individual decisions.  At such times you cannot be robotic:  you must have the power to duck and dive, bend and move at will, not hampered by pre-instructions. In Brussels neither side had this flexibility. What would Alan Sugar have predicted? Stalemate.

8th October 2017

Did you see The Apprentice on Wednesday? What you see is what you get. This UK series is the last in a 3-year contract, Sugar's fee going to charity. When asked whether he thinks Trump, the original US host, is "up to the job", Sugar replies "Why not? I think he is up to it. Actually, if he didn't open his mouth so much and put his foot in it. He thinks he's still on The Apprentice. He chucks people out who don't agree with him."  Well, yes.  Trouble is, the show worked wonders for Trump by convincing many Americans that he was a master dealmaker.  As Sugar says "If you owe the bank $2,000, they'll shut you down and make you sell your house.  If you owe them $2bn they'll take you out to lunch!" Does Sugar see himself following in Trump's footsteps by putting himself forward as a future PM?  No, it's a thankless task, he says.  You just can't win. These days image has a lot to do with it. No good putting yourself on a stage, as May did this week, and have the letter F fall off behind you (F off?), plus images of standing in an empty market hall, contrasted with your opponent's newly-groomed image amidst cheering supporters. Nothing to do with politics then. Image is everything. Just watch the next episode of The Apprentice. As with politics, schadenfreude is all.

12th July 2009

A hundred years ago, a man called Schueller developed an innovative safe hair-dye formula in his French kitchen at home. This was despite his former boss warning him that his idea was 'very limited for the future'. But something spurred him on. He called his product 'Aureole', later becoming 'L'Oreal'. After his initial modest success, he employed the Oxford graduate Lindsay Owen-Jones who dreamed up the slogan 'Because I'm worth it'. That's all it needed. From Schueller's original 1909 notion of helping women to improve their natural hair colour, a business developed, an innovative slogan deployed which tapped into women's minds, and voila, suddenly there's a turnover of 17.5 billion euros!
Similarly, a hundred years ago this month, another 'mad' Frenchman had a strange idea. He decided to put together some ash planks and canvas, tied together with piano wire and perched the lot on a pair of cycle wheels. His name was Louis Bleriot. Despite the fact that his odd contraption actually managed to lift off the ground in Sangatte, just outside Calais, only a few locals bothered to turn out to witness the event. But, something caught the public's imagination.
All this makes me wonder how many other 'brilliant' ideas never see the light of day because either the mad inventor didn't have enough perseverence or chance didn't happen to step in. It's not just Alan Sugar you need; it's the 'chaos'/domino effect too to push the idea along. Sometimes, it's only a chance of fate that decides whether a 'strange' new idea takes off or whether it's left to languish forever unknown in someone's head.