The Apprentice: Why Heidi Lost

In the previous week’s episode, when Omarosa lost, Donald Trump warned Heidi that he found her annoying. Now when Trump warned Omarosa about being a bitch, she didn’t pay attention and continued in her ways. Heidi, however, from what we saw may indeed have taken what he said to heart. Either that or just not having Omarosa around removed the tension that existed and thus helped Heidi out. So we can quickly rule out the “annoyance factor” as a reason Heidi was fired. But that leaves us with the question that we ask this time each week – why did Heidi lose?

The first time Heidi went to the boardroom was when Kristi took her and Omarosa. You might recall that Heidi did not react well when she figured out she would be going. While Heidi was labeled as too aggressive by Donald Trump, the team’s loss really had nothing to do with her. Kristi was fired essentially for not defending herself.

Next time, Omarosa took Heidi and Jessie. This was the occasion of the infamous negative compliment from Omarosa. Jessie lost for not standing up to Omarosa and Heidi was never really a candidate, I don’t think. But she had still been brought there as a person who the project manager felt could be blamed.

Then Kwame brought her along the next time they had to go to the boardroom. Trump & Co. knew there were a lot of problems between Omarosa and Heidi, and while Omarosa took the fall for it, there was still the implication that Heidi was part of the problem.

Finally, Troy took her this time around.

To some extent, Heidi benefited from the same thing that Omarosa did for a while – there was always somebody else who did worse or annoyed Trump more, such as Omarosa herself. Indeed, had Heidi gone up against Kwame, I think she would have had a fighting chance. But against Troy, who had shown himself to be, as Kwame called him, an “all-star,” Heidi had a tough battle. Add to this the fact that, as she said in our interview with her, she wasn’t in a mindset to fight because of her mother’s illness, and you have a recipe for being sent home.

But there is more to it than that. It seems that her being fired might have been a culmination of things, rather than one particular one. As Heidi herself had noted previously, taking her to the boardroom was a regular ritual for whoever the Project Manager was in that given task. Over the four times she was there – equating to the four times the team she was on was there – Trump had to notice that she was always deemed to be one of the worst by the Project Manager. Sometimes it’s possible to overcome these sorts of things by proving that you are worthy and those who bring you are just jealous/mad/nasty/lazy/whatever. However, when it happened time and time again, questions were certainly raised in the minds of Trump, George, and Carolyn – especially Carolyn.

Contrary to what Carolyn said, Heidi did have accomplishments in the challenges – but she did not impress Trump, George, or Carolyn as a leader. For one thing, for whatever reason, she only took on Project Manager status once, compared to Troy’s three times and Kwame’s twice. Indeed, Trump specifically noted that people have talked about Troy as a good leader, but not her. He further noted that he liked her, but she didn’t have the leadership skills necessary to win.

Different people are cut out for different jobs. For example, in my own work experience, a person might be a great engineer, but not such a good manager of other engineers. Indeed, in her final words, Heidi even said she learned that she loves sales and wants to stick to that area. But The Apprentice isn’t about Trump looking for a new salesperson. It’s about him looking for a leader. Heidi had not shown the leadership skills that Trump wanted. That is why Heidi lost.

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline and can be reached at RNO@pobox.com.

Be sure to sign up for our e-mail update so you can stay informed about new articles on the site! And take a look at the rest of the site. You can find all of our recent articles on this show at our The Apprentice page and take a look at our sections on Survivor: All-Stars and Celebrity Mole. You can even buy reality show stuff at our Reality TV Store!

For more news about The Apprentice, be sure to check out SirLinksALot!