The double standard with Paloma was shocking!
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So..
Paloma: Attitude and a mouth.
Stuart: Attitude and a mouth. (2 Boardrooms)
Lord Sugar has let Stuart off with the exact same problem twice now, and yet fired Paloma straight away. And Stuarts "outburts" have been alot worse imo. Where was her chance to adjust and to change her ways?! She is clearly a stronger candidate then he is, Sandeesh and Alex. Stuart does absolutely nothing, and yet wont shut up about how brilliant he is! :mad: He's yet to step up to the plate as either PM or in any kind of contribution to the tasks! Its suprising he hasnt been found out tbh, Lord Sugar usually has a good record when identifying those that hang in the background. All Stuart has managed to achieve thus far is offend the public and his team mates. It should be interesting to see his shot at being PM.
Then there's:
Paloma: Biggest crime was behaving professionally in the product meeting to eventually lose out.
Stuart: Actually insults the baby glow rep, so loses the "best" product for his team.
Im sorry but she didnt deserve to go last night. Alex did. His error, he should have gone. It wasnt just the pitching mistake, the entire day he stood dictating rubbish to her and the others. His "expert on all things retail/trafford centre" comments were just not helpful to the team, it was embarrassing too!
Paloma: Attitude and a mouth.
Stuart: Attitude and a mouth. (2 Boardrooms)
Lord Sugar has let Stuart off with the exact same problem twice now, and yet fired Paloma straight away. And Stuarts "outburts" have been alot worse imo. Where was her chance to adjust and to change her ways?! She is clearly a stronger candidate then he is, Sandeesh and Alex. Stuart does absolutely nothing, and yet wont shut up about how brilliant he is! :mad: He's yet to step up to the plate as either PM or in any kind of contribution to the tasks! Its suprising he hasnt been found out tbh, Lord Sugar usually has a good record when identifying those that hang in the background. All Stuart has managed to achieve thus far is offend the public and his team mates. It should be interesting to see his shot at being PM.
Then there's:
Paloma: Biggest crime was behaving professionally in the product meeting to eventually lose out.
Stuart: Actually insults the baby glow rep, so loses the "best" product for his team.
Im sorry but she didnt deserve to go last night. Alex did. His error, he should have gone. It wasnt just the pitching mistake, the entire day he stood dictating rubbish to her and the others. His "expert on all things retail/trafford centre" comments were just not helpful to the team, it was embarrassing too!
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If she had said you need to save me because I am so good and why rather than you need to save me because they are so crap it probably would have helped her case.
At the beginning of a previous series Lord Sugar said he didn't want 'steady Eddies'. And in this one, he says that he's looking for exceptional individuals.
Alex is certainly the boring steady Eddy, and Paloma is certainly exceptional.
I think that what made Lord Sugar uncomfortable about Paloma was that she has an ego too much like his own. He doesn't like individuals who can think for themselves, and are not easily controlled.
Paloma is like a wild horse, a Palomino.
And Lord Sugar (something of a gutless wimp IMO) is no Roy Rogers.
This stuff about wanting 'exceptional individuals' is the 'Del Boy' in Alan Sugar speaking. It sounds good, but he doesn't mean it. When a real one turns up, he wets his pants and runs away.
Paloma was just too strong as a woman.
I have to disagree with you on this. As to whether what he was saying is rubbish and I'm not so sure it was. Because people are mostly right-handed they do tend to go to the right unless they see something to make them go in another direction.
Most of all he is right. The shop did look empty so why would people go in? If they saw a selection of clothes they are more likely to think that's nice and walk in and have a look at it. Neither shop had anything in display in the window to catch people's eye (excluding a blonde looking like a hooker) so both were failing to maximise the opportunity of enticing customers in.
For Alex's faults, which he has many, he was at least trying to do something. He recognised that people weren't coming in and was suggesting things to do to alter that. What was Paloma doing? Did she come up with any ideas? Did she call everyone together and ask if anyone else had an idea?
I doubt she would even do the second one as that would make her look weak and she won't allow that.
It would have been harsh to send Alex home because he obviously put the effort in.
IMO Paloma showed her true colours when she brought Sandeesh into the boardroom and openly admitted that it's because of her contribution on other weeks. That was an blatant survival tactic. If I just bring in Alex I have an 50/50 chance of survival. If I bring anyone else in then the odds go up in my favour. She knows what Alex is like and how he will fight his corner and be vocal. She used Sandeesh as the sacrificial lamb offering.
Lord Sugar clocked that straight away. If I were him I would have taken her out of the equation straight away and decided it was going o be Alex or Paloma regardless.
All of his other suggestions were constructive (and nearly all right!) Paloma just didn't rate him herself and considered everything he said was rubbish when she would have done better actually listening to him rather than dismissing him out of hand. Her choice of the ghastly and overpriced re-cycled clothing range did more to scupper the team than anything Alex did - the cartoon couture T shirts would have probably gone down better than that!
She's a great White Shark in a business suit and she is the sort of business woman who gives all the others a bad name. It will be interesting to see the group dynamics now that she has gone as her presence in the tasks was quite domineering. Without her maybe some of the quieter ones like Sandeesh and Alex will get a chance to shine
But Paloma couldn't even do the smarmy bit. She was just openly vile. She'd alienate everyone in your working environment. She didn't even have the intelligence to be enthused by the sparkly frocks! No manners, no way with her at all. Thoroughly unpleasant.
Plus the expensive recycled fashion for Trafford Centre was a guaranteed failure. Chris's sale came to more than a tenth of their total for the day. And he was just lucky the right loonie (sorry, lady) walked in.
The only reason that Paloma brought Sandeesh back in to the boardroom, is because she knew that Sandeesh was already in trouble and thought that that would take the preasure off of her. So after praising her up and saying how well she did, she brought her back into the board room, to take some of the flack.
Lord alun is no idiot and spotted this a mile off.
Paloma is a nasty unscrupulous self serving back stabber and I wouldn't want her in any company of mine either!
I'd agree with this. Paloma also lied twice. She lied yesterday about Alex when she claimed Laura got the filmed ad in the shopping centre and she lied when in the boardroom with Shibby.
I don't recall Alex lying outright.
Also she lied so easily despite knowing she is surrounded by cameras, imagine the whoppers she could tell with no cameras around:eek: A snappy wardrobe and good grooming do not make a professional. She was given the opportunity to showcase her strengths and instead used it to reiterate the other 2's weaknesses, time after time we see them getting fired for this, its not unique to AS but managers who make waves so easily for no good reason other than self-preservation are bad for business.
AS saw what was going on with Alex before the results were even given and comforted him with the "A man who never made a mistake never made anything" spiel. If Paloma had an ounce of sense she would have backed off from attacking Alex so dismissively, she was a terrible manager imo
He is a rough rookie with a big cocky mouth but he always states the obvious and cannot keep his opinions to himself. Sometimes I do so agree with him.
He was shocked at the price of the recycled clothing garbage and he was absolutely right imo.
But no one listened to him probably because he was quieter than usual.
Paloma had no intention of trusting any of ther team anyway and she got fired for sinking to insulting them.
Shame really because she was the one candidate who could have proved to be a ruthless money making machine for Sugar.
I agree 100 percent. I reckon Sugar felt a bit intimidated by a woman that's very confident in her skin and isn't afraid to speak her mind. In this respect, Ruth Badger, from series two wasn't that different from Paloma. Sugar saw potential in Badger, she was runner up but Paloma strikes me as the sort of woman that won't take the proverbial crap from anyone - notice how easy it is for her to go into attack mode in the boadroom - and I sense Sugar knew that and wasn't prepared to risk her winning the show so he fired her. Ruth Badger knew when to be quiet in the boardroom but Paloma is a bit more of an alpha female (if you pardon the cheesy term) and irritated or intimidated Sugar too much.
If you think of the show as a bit of a power struggle - candidate vs Sugar - there's no real incentive for Sugar to hire someone that isn't a tad deferential to him. Paloma isn't the sort of woman to say "you're so wonderful, Lord Sugar." She'd speak her mind.
Her behaviour was deemed unacceptable, so she went. Nothing to do with her being a woman.
Sugar made a comment about Paloma trying to consult him and he didn't like that. He didn't like the fact Paloma picked Sandeesh based on the previous tasks. He didn't like her because she spoke out in a way he thought to be unacceptable.
As had been mentioned many times, you can be fired for not speaking out, for being a lame duck candidate, but you can be fired for speaking out, for being confident and assertive. It's such a fine line to tread. If you consider the point of the show - candidates trying their best to win a job - Paloma's behaviour was not that unacceptable. She was trying to stay alive in the boardroom, fighting for the job. She may be cunning but her behaviour was not that out of the ordinary. Sugar could have looked at it like that and said to himself "this girl really wants the job, that's why she's attacking Alex and Sandeesh."
Unfortunately some people seem to have the gender/race/sexuality card set as their default option for defence or reasoning.
I once worked in an office and a girl was pulled up about her shouting and speaking in an overly loud voice so was asked if she could talk quieter. Straight away it was "you're only picking on me because I'm black" Erm... no it's because you are the only one making a noise. Everyone else gets up and goes to the person and speaks to them. You shout across the office.
I have noticed that the gender card does get used a lot on reality shows though. I think it's because it's an safer option than trying on the sexaulity and race card. There has and rather pathetically always will be the male vs female competition.
Paloma was two faced, picked on her team and was overrall an unpleasant candidate. She rubbed everyone the wrong way and didn't gel with her team at all. It had to be her way or the high way. She was negative and nit picked the whole time. The way she got Sandeesh into a position like that then totally turned on her. I could never trust her.
They are either desperate to win at any cost or are so used to conducting business in that way that they can't actually see anything wrong in what they are doing.
Totally agree with you.
I am female. I cringed watching her in the boardroom last night. In my mind, the right person went.
1. The sparkly dresses were obviously the big win. Their pitch to the designer was woeful. They summoned no enthusiasm whatsoever for the product and had I been the designer, I would have gone with the other team. Paloma in particular, looked really ill at ease and uncomfortable with the designer and the product. A few well chosen words and some enthusiam about the dresses could have swung that pitch round.
2. Yes, the promotional stand was in the wrong place. He put his hands up and admitted that. He also scored the commercial, which in part, does make up for part of his error. He was also correct about the layout of the shop.
3. Paloma would accept no criticism for her part in the task. Her attitude was to blame the others.
4. She made the mistake of bringing Sandeesh in, because in her mind she hadn't performed in earlier tasks. Its not down to Paloma to decide that, its Lord Sugar's job. Paloma herself said that Sandeesh had performed well in that particular task, so it looked like she was throwing her under the bus so to speak, by bringing in a weaker target to cover her own ass.
5. Her personal attacks on the two she brought in was disgusting. I wouldn't want someone like that on my team. Her arrogance was immence. That is not someone who would intergrate easily in to a team.
6. She has been caught out in two lies. I'm not liking that at all.
I thought at the start that she had great potential, but she was arrogant, rude and made assumptions and decisions that were not hers to make.
I'm no fan of Stuart's, or Alex and Sandeesh. I haven't seen any of them particularly shine yet. But Paloma's behaviour in that boardroom falls far short of what I would consider as acceptable behaviour. IMHO, I haven't seen Stuart behave like that yet.
ETA: I'm not saying that Lord Sugar is not ever intimitated by strong women, I've thought that he has been in the past. But on this particular occasion, I really don't think it was down to gender.
Other candidates (including in this series) have been miles worse than Paloma in the boardroom. Strange how a short, ugly, cocky 21-year-old male gets let off the hook for his bad attitude but a tall, good-looking, articulate female has her "arrogance" singled out much more firmly and is given none of Siralan's infamous second chances.
I also think the part where she attacked the business records of the other two came across as very set-up for TV.
The rest of the team certainly weren't much better and were also ready to pass the buck when things went wrong.
I was rather annoyed she may have messed it up for herself and gone over what Lord Sugar considers to be fairly useless candidates in Alex and Sandeesh who are just series filler if truth be told.
Although clearly Paloma likes running her own business and would have struggled working for someone else. She marches to the beat of her own drum and is probably better off that she didn't win.
For me, it was more her non verbal communication, such as her imperious expressions, that made me prickle, and the little gestures such as mouthing 'wow' sarcastically at one point. I do appreciate that the show is edited, but personalities do come out. In contrast, Liz has only ever left a positive impression with me.
It's not just the tasks - it's a case of: do I want to be around this person. Paloma- an overwhelming no. Others, in particular Liz, would be a yes. Paloma certainly showed some business acumen but had a high unlikeability quotient. I think if anything, being fired relatively early in the series may have done her more good than harm - if she has the capability of learning from mistakes, better to realise that being cold and calculating makes her less employable than some she considers inferior.
I did, however, get the feeling from her demeanor in the aftershow that she's already made her excuses for her behaviour and will just carry on as before. I don't see any double standards in how she was treated, just that someone who has some good qualitiies but also some overwhelming negative ones was given a reality kick that she thoroughly needed.