2008 Final

The 2008 You're Hired! final started at 6.30 a.m. with the contestants arriving at the Plymouth Guildhall. There, they were put into six teams of five by Jan and Nicky from Tamar Education Business Partnership.

Last year there were five schools taking part - Lipson Community College, Estover Community College, St Boniface's Roman Catholic Boys' School, Plymouth High School for Girls and Devonport High School for Girls - so each team was made up of five pupils from five different schools. Being able to establish a working team with people they have never met before was very much part of the challenge for the contestants. Each team was then packed off in a taxi to a mystery destination...

... which was the Plymstock branch of The Range. There, they were introduced to the first of the two challenges by Plymouth's own version of Sir Alan Sugar, Chris Dawson. This retail challenge started with buying stock from The Range (at a discount) which they then had to sell to the general public from stalls in and just outside Plymouth's Pannier Market.

 
As a retail tycoon who started out as a market trader, could we have had a better person to set this challenge than Chris Dawson?

After Chris's pep talk, the contestants were whisked straight back to the Guildhall and the introduction to the second challenge. This was set by Mike Fisher, an architect at Bailey Partnership, one of our sponsoring employers. The task was to design a landmark building for the Millbay regeneration area. How the teams divided themselves between the two tasks was left entirely up to them. Those taking part in the retail challenge would have gone from the Guildhall to the Pannier Market, where they found their stock already delivered courtesy of vans provided by Mitie and Cowlin Construction.



The market traders finished trading at 3.00 p.m., then packed up their stalls and made their way back to the Guildhall. Back at the Guildhall, the contestants doing the building design presented their building designs and concepts to the judges from 3.00pm.

Then the serious debating began among the judges. There was an overall winner ("Plymouth's Best Future Employee 2008") and a runner-up, and each sponsoring employer gave their own awards. 

As well as the title, some really good CV points and a trophy, the overall winner received a prize of two months of paid work experience with the sponsoring employer of their choice.


To find out who won, click here.