I love some reality television. Some, of course, is rubbish – maybe all of it is – but I find some of it entertaining. Most television is an escape from reality, a way to divert our minds from the realities of everyday life.

Reality television is no different. It bears little resemblance to reality, and so it, too, is merely a diversion.

But The Apprentice, the 16 week job interview for an executive position with Donald Trump highlights one of the worst, and in my mind, one of the most stupid, aspects of business.
I am talking of competition.

Competition is good. It is good for business because it keeps us all striving to do better. It is good for our customers because it prevents collusion and keeps prices down.
But the problem with the Apprentice is that regardless of how well both teams do at a particular task one is considered to have failed. If the difference between the two is narrow they are still asked by Donald Trump ‘What went wrong?’ The short answer may well be nothing went wrong but that is not an acceptable answer. The other team beat you so you did badly.

This all reminded me of the Prisoner’s Dilemma which I first read about many years ago in an article in Scientific American by Douglas Hofstadter, and later exanded upon in his book Metamagical Themas. I won’t go into the details of the Prisoners Dilemma except to say that it is a non-zero sum game. The idea is that you can beat your opponent, but in doing so you may be worse off than if you didn’t.

It isn’t exactly what happens in The Apprentice but soemthing about the television show reminded of it. The problem, of course, is that it doesn’t matter how badly a team does, so long as they beat the other team. Similarly, it doesn’t matter how well you do, if you are beaten you are considered a loser. Now some people may say that that is how business operates. But I would much rather make $1,000 and you make $2,000 and be considered a loser, than make $100 while you only made $50, and be considered a winner.

The Prisoner’s Dilemma has applications in many other places, business being only one of them. Perhaps the most serious is international affairs, and particularly the arms race during the cold war, and the seeming emergence of something similar these days.

A little co-operation can go a long way, regardless of whether we win or lose.