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Apprentice contestant Chris Whiteside -
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The women in team Athena proved too difficult to handle for Chris Whiteside, who was fired by "The Boss" Terry Serepisos on Tuesday on The Apprentice New Zealand.
This week, teams Athena and Number 8 were given the challenge of developing a viral marketing campaign for a free Microsoft security product, and Whiteside volunteered to be project manager, confident in his team's combined skills to win the task.
However he was in for a shock when Serepisos announced the project managers would be swapping teams, making him the leader of Athena instead. Whiteside was unhappy about the swap, muttering he had been given a "hospital pass".
While the men in Number 8 were a picture of cohesion with Nicky Clarke at the helm, problems abounded from the outset for Athena, as Whiteside struggled to work with the team.
Whiteside set the tone of his leadership from the beginning, trying to erase the team name Athena. He reasoned, "I think the name Athena... doesn't quite fit with my mantra, however I'll get on with things and hopefully 'man-up' the team a little."
His allegiance to Number 8 was further clarified later into the challenge, when he casually showed them Athena's creative, explaining the ideas behind the campaign.
Held back in the boardroom, as project manager of the losing team, Whiteside was vague about details when asked by advisor Nathan Greenham about the sharing of campaign information.
Whiteside explained: "What happened is there was one cutting room... we all came there at the same time, I had the information in my hand, so we saw theirs as we were going in, and they saw ours as they were going out."
But when pressed by Serepisos, Whiteside admitted he had shown the opposition Athena's creative. Serepisos fired Whiteside, saying he had sabotaged his team and lied to him in the boardroom.
For more information, eliminated contestants' thoughts on their firing and Terry Serepisos' behind the scenes blog, head to the official TVNZ The Apprentice New Zealand site.
