Originally Posted by Jepson:
“Liz had the very basic 'howler' of not spotting the bagginator's absurd tour pricing and not realising the importance of getting the agency deal.”
I'd say her mistake was leaving it up to her PM. Which I'm not going to judge her too harshly for because really it was the PM's role. Stuart likes to pluck figures out the air, derides people for taking notes, etc. If he wants to run the team like that, while he's in charge, he can. So with no advance discussion, he comes out with his strategy in the actual meeting with the agent. That's the first time Liz hears it and I'm not surprised if she chooses not to attempt to override him in the middle of a negotiation, in front of the agent. I doubt any of the other final 7 would have done any better than Liz there.
Quote:
“Actually, she doesn't have a good record of leading teams. She won once as PM and lost once. When she lost, she lost because she misunderstood the task and concentrated on getting all the items rather than on the cost of the items.”
She lost because Stella and Laura agreed a stupidly high price for truffles. If it hadn't been for that, they'd have won. Liz
had understood the importance of price, and had told them to phone her before making the deal, but they didn't.
Apart from that, she led well, was better organised than I've seen any other team be on that task, and her own negotiations were acceptable (not as impressive as Stuart and Christopher, but a lot of us are uncomfortable with how those two got their deals).
Quote:
“And when she won she won because of squealing girlily over sequinned dresses, while the other team chose silly recycled clothes.”
It wasn't a great win, but she was a better PM than Paloma. Securing the better products was a part of that. As was negotiating a large last-minute discount from the designers - she was pro-active.