The Apprentice: A Look at the Final Four

Donald Trump started his quest for a new Apprentice with 16 extremely smart, ambitious, and accomplished people. That field has now narrowed to four. In two episodes, just one will win. The Apprentice is different from, say, Survivor – candidates can’t get rid of the person they consider the biggest threat and the best player. Instead, the decision lies solely in the hands of Donald Trump. As a result, our final four candidates – Amy, Bill, Kwame, and Nick – are without a doubt a strong, solid group of contenders. Along the way, they’ve all made some extremely smart decisions… and some that were not so smart. As we head down the home stretch, let’s take a look at our final four to see who has done the best, and who has a shot at winning it all.

Amy Henry

Age: 30

Hometown: Austin, Texas

Last job: Worked in the tech sector

Wins: 11

Losses: 1

Project Manager: Twice (Madison Avenue Pitch, Casino Promo)

Trips to the Boardroom: 1 (Casino)

Amy has, by far, the best record of any of the remaining candidates, with just one loss. She also has the respect of her peers – when the teams underwent the first corporate shuffle, Amy was the first person chosen for the new Versacorp. Then, when the teams needed to choose another player to even out the sides, Amy was chosen again twice. Donald Trump has noticed that, and appears to be impressed.

Amy is also a skilled negotiator. In the Negotiation 101 challenge, she secured an extremely good price on the golf club, faring far better than her competitors did. She also negotiated some very good celebrity donations for the Donation Auction challenge (despite having the bumbling Tammy with her), and was able to move past Katrina’s flirting to secure the donation of a car for use in the Casino Promo challenge. She has a pleasant, friendly demeanor, but never loses sight of the practical aspects of a negotiation.

Amy has worked well with some very difficult team members. When she was project manager in the advertising challenge, her first order of business was to demand a cease fire in the conflict between Ereka and Omarosa. She kept the peace throughout the challenge, even if it meant keeping the two women as far away from each other as possible. In the celebrity auction challenge, she was teamed with Tammy, who did a terrible job and tended to make the celebrities uncomfortable. Not once did she lose her cool with Tammy, nor did she allow any signs of upset to show in front of the celebrities. She was also one of the few players who was, for the most part, able to get along with Omarosa.

Amy also had a very strong, grand-slam idea. In the Taking Over rickshaw challenge, she came up with the plan to sell advertising on the rickshaws. She was also able to use the strong relationships she had formed with Marquis Jet and other past clients to make that plan come to fruition. Without a doubt, Amy’s idea to sell advertising firmly cemented Versacorp’s win in that challenge.

Amy has done extremely well, but some of the other candidates – such as Katrina – believe that Amy is not all she’s cracked up to be. Indeed, Amy has had a few missteps along the way. She was a part of the all female Protégé’s consistent strategy of using sex to sell. In the negotiation challenge, for example, she prompted Kristi to show off her abs to a fishmonger in an attempt to get a good price on squid. After the women’s team followed this strategy for several challenges, Donald Trump and Carolyn told them to knock it off. Especially notable was Carolyn’s reaction, as Carolyn has the job that these candidates aspire to – a young woman in her thirties, Carolyn is president of one of Donald Trump’s companies. Carolyn told the women under no uncertain terms that trading on their sex appeal will not land you a job working for Donald Trump. Amy’s reaction showed that she missed the point. Back in the suite, she said, “If being attractive is wrong, then we did something wrong.”

Amy’s relationship with Nick has attracted a great deal of attention. Amy certainly won’t be fired for flirting with another candidate, but if she lets her relationship with Nick influence her decisions, Trump will not be impressed. Ereka, for example, was fired largely because she spared her friend Katrina from the boardroom. Amy will have to take care to separate her personal life from her professional life.

Amy has served as project manager twice, winning the advertising challenge and losing the casino challenge. It can be argued that the win in the advertising challenge wasn’t a direct result of Amy’s leadership. The winning concept of using sexy images of planes was Tammy’s idea. The men’s team lost mainly because Jason made the choice to not meet with Marquis Jet first. Amy did meet with the client, but the absence of doing something incredibly stupid doesn’t exactly make her smart. In the casino challenge, Amy lost big. Trump blamed her team’s loss on the lame car rental giveaway and demanded to know whose bad idea it was. It was Amy’s bad idea, but in the boardroom, she claimed to not remember who came up with it. So not only did she make a bad choice, but she didn’t own up to it. During that challenge, she tried repeatedly to poach the other team’s ideas – but without success. She sent one of their models to take VIPs away from Bill, but discovered that Bill had negotiated exclusive access to the high rollers. Then, when she saw Troy’s success using a microphone to draw customers, she tried to do the same thing – but in so doing, actually lured players away from the gaming area.