Marble-Mouthed Message

I haven’t told many people this, but I tried out for this season’s Apprentice. I thought my “audition” went pretty well, but apparently they didn’t want what they saw from me. That’s fine. It was a great experience and I learned a lot about myself.

It is a bit frustrating though to see the caliber of candidates they selected instead. Some were obviously chosen because of the drama their personalities would create for the show. I believe Marcus is one of those choices. In last night’s episode, he basically provided no benefit to his team’s project (which has been his M.O. since the beginning). As the team brainstormed ideas, Marcus tried to vocalize some ideas but instead spit out incoherent phrases laced with industry buzz words. Later, in the boardroom, Marcus could not communicate why his team lost or what he contributed. As Trump stated, he had a mouth full of marbles.

Ernie set me up well with his latest entry about Antonio Lucio’s recent white paper.

My big question for all of us: If you can’t say it simply internally, will you ever be able to say it simply – at all?

Marcus couldn’t. He may well be a genius. I don’t know. All I know is no matter how brilliant his ideas might be, he cannot communicate them clearly or effectively. And an idea is a terrible thing to waste.

You, your company, and/or your product may have a great story. There’s a lot of experts telling us that a great story speaks volumes. True. Yet if you can’t clearly and effectively communicate that story through your business model, your work environment, and your promotions… you’re wasting it.

But that’s just the opinion of a disgruntled Apprentice reject.