In the last week I have read about three European G-countries, Germany, Greece and Great Britain and thought how would they do f they were teams on the Apprentice. These are three very different countries within the European Union having three very different experiences with the current economic opportunities. So lets have a bit of fun during this blog, and it’s just that.

So picture this: The third teams are lined up and told they have taken over a small business and this business needs to start growing by increasing their sales and revenue. The target is €7bn.

The teams then go off, brain storm, SWOT analysis and then run around phoning each other,..etc etc until they have to pitch.

The first to pitch to the customer is Great Britain, they first take the client sight seeing and act out some poetry by one of the worlds most famous authors. They show the customer around the birthplace of the author and create one of the best relationships with the client. Then it pitch time with the Project Manger takes centre stage, who then went on to tell the client how to do business, about business ethics and what is wrong with the client’s shop. The client provided €1.6bn in sales. These sales are good, but will not help the project manager develop the growth required in the business in the short term.

The second to pitch along the European high street is Germany and again did a little sight seeing but lower key. The pitch from the project manager is very powerful and business like, this time after some exchange of ideas and a common approach to long term development did €10.3bn in sales. This has placed this team on one of the best growth paths of any business and a sure winner. You would expect no one in this team to be going home this week.

The third country Greece is currently closed for business did not receive the customer. The project manager had a team meeting to agree to receive €270bn in investment without providing any equity. They also reduced the wages of everyone in the team, agreed to sell some assets and decided to make the other teams pay part of their earnings to them over the next 30 years. The customer is current looking at this team as an equity investment opportunity, when the team is ready to do business.

Then we move back into the boardroom to receive the feedback from the customer. Germany will be a long-term partner, customer and investment opportunity. Greece has developed an innovated yet unorthodox approach to business, however the customer believes there are long term opportunities. Then we come to Great Britain, the customer did not like their approach to business and thus the low sales, the pitch was heavy handed and the customer did not see a long term business future. Someone in this team will be out this week, the Project Manager has to decide who will be coming in with them to answer why this task went wrong.

In the words of Lord Alan “And then one of you will be going home.”