We could say this about most of the candidates, but I suspect Mark's behaviour in the real world would be modified relative to what we see here. He's playing a game, yes - and the edit is focussing so closely on this that it's all we see of him - but then TA *is* a game. It's just that Mark is playing it a bit more openly than everyone else.

I've worked with people like Mark in the past and got on with them just fine (on a professional level. at least). You have to set them firm boundaries and goals - this type of person is VERY driven by achieving targets and hitting milestones that allow them to progress - and adopt a fairly direct management style. To be honest, in large corporates (which is where I've spent most of my career), most of the good salespeople I've ever encountered have a similarly relentless drive and focus. Some are more pleasant than others socially, but I can imagine many of them coming across the way Mark has been portrayed in the same situation.

And Mark *does* deliver. He put himself in a stressful position last night - if he had failed and Tenacity had lost, he would have been in big trouble.

@Slouchingthatch, thanks I had my 1 hot tub and 10 hot tub figures in my head.

'S okay - I know what you meant and your point remains valid!

Whatever the name of the woman that was selling hottubs was. Shows how non-descript she was as I cant even remember her name.

Felipe was an idiot, he was outsmarted by Mark, who got himself onto the hottub team. When challenged by daniel, he could give no reason why he transferred Mark onto the hottub team. The fact that sugar pointed out that he wasnt happy with Felipe taking Daniel of the hot tub team, proves me right. Sugar also didnt have a go at Daniel for whining either, as he understood Daniels point of view. If they would have lost that task, my money would have been on Felipe being fired.

As Daniel taking sales from Mark, that is pure guess work and based on nothing. Daniel whined because he was taken of the hot tub team. He would not have whined if he remained on the hot tub team. The two competing against each other would have been good to see, and pushed them both to do their best.

Yep, I've wondered about how much the competitiveness of the contest changes their normal style. I mean, they're not a team in anything but the shortest-term sense...they share a short-term goal to win a task yes, but the longer-term individual goal is more dog eat dog and solo than the average company where rewards can be shared and you won't generally be fired for not being the best (unless it's Enron ).

I'd be less generous than you in my description of some of the sales people I've worked with. I can count on three fingers the ones I liked and truly trusted, who had integrity and traded on this. Most were good for a laugh but often disingenuous sometimes to the point of bitchy, and would be quite mercenary to close a deal.

*That* is pure guesswork and based on nothing too. It's equally possible - some might say probable - that the two of them would have spent so much time fighting over customers that they would have driven people away and damaged the team. What was apparent was that Mark and Katie were able to work together amicably, creating a professional sales environment that was singularly lacking over on Daniel and Felipe's side.

What Sugar says in the boardroom is often - but not always - right, so what he says doesn't prove anything. That's not a criticism of him, but the fact is he's not present at the tasks. In fact, we see more of the task than he does, as he has to rely on Nick and Karren's reports and doesn't have the benefit of a nicely edited summary to watch.

What we don't know is whether Felipe would have made the decision to swap Mark and Daniel on his own. It's what I would have done. Move the proven poor salesman out from the critical product and replace him with the proven good salesman. Take the emotion out and it's an obvious decision, really.

As for Daniel having the right to sell the hot tubs just because he'd successfully won over the vendor? Sorry, no. As I've said elsewhere, procurement and selling are different jobs with different skills. Any decent-sized business will have separate procurement/buying/sourcing departments and salesforces. Just because you do one job does not give you the right to do the other.

It looked to me like Felipe didn't give a reason at first because he didnt want to say what he did in fact admit later, that Mark was better at selling. He was avoiding conflict. When conflict found him, he soon piped up.

And that nondescript woman you can't remember (Katie) was singled out by the vendor while actually talking to Daniel as the reason he chose their team. Which is tantamount to saying "it definitely wasn't cos of you, mate". Ouch. So Daniel had no right to sell the hot tubs given that he wasn't instrumental in securing those deals. This wasn't mentioned to Lord Sugar in the boardroom.

If Daniel's embarrassing pitch to vendors was any indication of his selling style (which we already know is poor from previous tasks), there's no question Felipe made the right call.

Oh, I've known plenty of salespeople like that too! But working for a very large corporate like I do, we tend to have salespeople who are less cut-throat and more - how do I say this? - conscious of adhering to ethics and corporate values.

As for the differences in behaviours on and off the show, I think there are two factors. Firstly, the artificial and competitive nature of the show brings out the ruthlessness and game-playing aspects of some people. And secondly, the way the show is edited to present us with distinct characters means that there are always good guys and bad guys, winners and losers, pantomime villains and underdogs - caricatures of real people that focus on specific aspects of their personalities. You can't create something that isn't there, but you can certainly emphasise it to the point where it's all you see of that person.

Daniel is being portrayed as something of a plucky underdog at the moment, but in reality he has failed to demonstrate competence throughout the past 8 weeks. Conversely, Mark might as well be wearing a black hat, mask and cape because he has been cast as "the ruthless one". That's undoubtedly true to an extent, but it seems to mean that many people are blinded to the fact that he's actually pretty good at what he does (i.e. selling).

I think Mark played the right card, and did what was best for himself and the team. That Felipe agreed, doesn't so much show me that Mark got into his head, but there is a general distrust of Daniel as well, he could easily have moved Katie to the stall and had a pleasant day, and let the other two sink or swim with the tubs, then been golden if they ended up back in the boardroom.

Mark's game was a bit sneaky but at the same time he was the obvious choice for selling the hot tubs as he has a far better sells record than Daniel. As for the Daniel being there instead of Katie argument is in my mind nonsense as Daniel would have ended up sabotaging Mark's sells by trying to get in on them and ultimately losing sells - bottom line is that I don't think Mark would have got the 7 tubs sold if he had Daniel with him end of. Really from what I saw the team could have thrashed the James' team if he had let bygones be bygones and just sold the bags and bike trailer instead of arguing with Felipe about his decision the could easily have made an additional grand or so from the bike trailers and bags they could easily have made 2 grand at least frankly but Daniel sabotaged that by arguing all the time instead and driving customers away.

Thing is how close would it of been had Mark not had the fluke 7, a lot closer, they sold 3 tubs and James's team sold 2 mowers, had they sold 3 mowers or 2 tubs it would of been very close, and come down to sub team sales.

It was hardly a fluke - sure the customer went in prepared to make a big order but Mark was able to seal the deal and that takes more than just a fluke. You might not like his strategy much and his PM/leadership skills may well be questionable but he is worthy of his place due to his skills overall have been getting the team through which at the end of the day is what is going to make a good business partner. Also unlike Daniel everyone seems to genuinely like Mark where people (including Katie) tolerate Daniel. I don't like all of Mark's games but I have warmed to him because he has shown himself to be quite good at what he does and the backstabbing in the boardroom aside he seems a nice enough guy as we consistently see pretty much everyone consistently side with Mark over Daniel in the house which tells us a lot about Daniel really. Personally I think the "bullying" aspect is being made intensified by the way the edit is put together and a longer edit might show the situation in a different light. But I'm sure we'll get the truth eventually.

It would have been closer - but not close.

Summit: £4,757.50, of which mowers £3,598 - 1 for James, 1 for Roisin.

Tenacity: £30,615.25, of which hot tubs £30,115.25, 9 for Mark, 1 for Katie.

Before the buyer at the end revealed he wanted seven, he and Mark had negotiated a price of just under £3,000. (I believe it was £2,995 but I didn't write down the exact number in my review notes.) It's probably safe to assume Mark threw in a little extra discount to sweeten the bulk deal, but for sake of argument let's use round numbers and say he sold 7 at the previously agreed price of £3,000 - i.e. £21,000 total sales.

Take that away, and the results would have been Tenacity £9,615 versus Summit £4,758 - still just over double. In fact, Mark's two previous sales alone would have won the task even if the rest of the team had taken the entire day off. I bet they wish they'd known that before they started ...

I suspect we won't ever know the full truth, but I do agree with you otherwise. The fact that Mark seems to be well liked is telling. Daniel aside, people do seem to get on well with him - even James seemed to have no problem with him. When you have a habit of delivering on your promises, that often helps - and, conversely, that's why Daniel is so mistrusted.

Thank you, I do think we'll get the truth of the matter though - one of the housemates is surely going to end up speaking up and say what was really going on behind the scenes in the house. My money would be on Katie if I was a betting man, especially if she doesn't win it (which I suspect will be the case) as I do see her as a bit of a Luisa Zissman/Katie Hopkins type character who would go on the type of chat show that would bring this sort of thing up in an interview.

Maybe we will but in the past candidates haven't been overly forthcoming about airing dirty laundry in public, have they? Why would they? Coming out with anything that might be seen as telling tales or undermining the credibility of the process is only going to make the individual involved look bad. (Yeah, I know, Katie Hopkins - but has she ever really said that much about what went on behind closed doors on the show? I genuinely don't know if she has , but I've never noticed anything.)

Frankly my dear () that's the best summing-up I've read so far.

I wish people would stop giving credit where it's not due though. Firstly, Felipe doesn't deserve credit for switching Mark and Daniel. Mark got into Felipe's head and then, most tellingly later, Daniel got inside as well and almost got Felipe to agree to switch Daniel and Katie, on the basis of no logic whatsoever. Felipe was about as decisive as James was dimplomatic.

Secondly, I don't think Mark deserves that much credit for his stragtegy. It was purely self-serving and any decent businessman would be chomping at the bit to sell such a high-end item and be a boardroom saleshero.

True, but I did say had the hot tub team only sold 2 so around 6K and the mowers sold 3 so around 4.5k it would of been closer and may of come down to sub teams.

Well not a fluke, but an Apprentice first. It was very strange, the guy wanted to buy hot tubs in bulk, so thinks to himself "I know I'll pop along to an agricultural show, they're bound to have some there". Not I'll google hot tub manufacturers and get a trade price. So if we now accept that maybe he knew they'd be there, ie someone told him, he'd been the day before etc., why wouldn't he have gone to see the owner of the business or an actual salesman, not some apprentice person with a camera crew hanging about. Did he rock up to the stand and was shepherded towards Mark by the production crew? I bet the other salesmen on the stand were happy!!

I didn't really change my view of Daniel or Mark this week. Daniel is a child, but he's his own worst enemy. Mark is a very good salesman and I can see why he's initially impressive, but I don't trust his judgement on product selection or much else other than selling. (Neither of them is as bad as James, but that's not saying much.)

The one who really fell in my estimation was Felipe. How the heck did he let himself get stuck in that sad little tent with Daniel and those awful handbags? He knew that individual sales were important. I'd have loved to see Katie's reaction if Felipe had said that he and Mark were selling the hot tubs. That would have been interesting. The point to me was not that Mark was selling them rather than Daniel, it's that Felipe didn't make sure he was selling them. (I think that man would have bought 7 from whoever had been there, so in this unusual case just being there was the most important thing, imo. Mark did well to sell the other two, but the 7 were pure luck - and you only get lucky if you've put yourself in the right place to be lucky, which he did.)

At least Daniel had the sense to know that the winning or losing was all about the hot tubs and want to be there, even if he was pathetic about it. He nearly did get himself there in the afternoon by wearing Felipe down and might have sold one hot tub and saved himself. I'll accept that maybe they could have sold the bike thing if they'd had a better attitude, I don't know, but those handbags were 100% wrong for a country show, a fake town idea of country and not practical either. I think Daniel made himself look stupid with his attitude, don't get me wrong, but it could have possibly worked for him. Felipe I don't understand at all.

It's all a farce really, because in the real world, you'd have put 3 on the expensive items, leaving 1 with the crap. As others have said, the site for the subteams wasn't exactly a major pathway, so it wasn't as if one person couldn't of dealt with it. You could of then, swapped the 3 around to let everyone have a bash.

We're setting a pretty low bar for "sneaky" if it includes "asking your Project Manager to let you sell something and him agreeing because you're the best salesman on the team by a country mile". Sure, Mark said it himself but it was probably because he was trying to make himself out to be a player and doing things at a more sophisticated level than actually occured. If he'd seen his edit he'd probably know that he didn't have to...

^^ Think the problem is he didn't ask like that, he sort of put the idea in Felipe's head when they were in the car, a bit like Jedi Jim...lol

Katie is quite bright, and has a lot of common sense. I think in that hypothetical situation, she would not have been happy about it and probably done a camera interview saying as much, but nevertheless got stuck into selling the handbags without creating a scene and sold as many as she could. Then in the boardroom as soon as Felipe's decision was brought up she'd have eaten him for it.

^^ and thats exactly what Daniel should of done, realised until final figures are known, it is a straight selling task, sell lots your safe, not about the money as such.