The Apprentice: Why the business community wants to see it fired

Lord Sugar's vehcile makes for brilliant television but it's the last thing business needs in the wake of the BHS and Sports Direct scandals

Lord Alan Sugar meets his latest batch of entrepreneurial hopefuls on The Apprentice (BBC)

Pity the poor business lobby. No really. After Thursday’s news agenda was dominated by Sir Philip “unacceptable face of capitalism” Green its members could have been forgiven for wanting to curl up in front of the TV with a glass of something cold when they got home. Where they would have found themselves confronted by The Apprentice.

After the injury done to the reputation of business by another public airing of the BHS scandal as the House of Commons debated whether Sir Philip, its former owner, should lose his Sir, there was the BBC’s long running reality show to add the insult.

The Apprentice, as a format, has an awful lot to answer for. At the head of a long list of high crimes and misdemeanours is the Presidential bid of Donald Trump that the American iteration of the show paved the way for. It will leave the US with an ugly legacy to contend with even if (as expected) he is trounced. In this country it provided a platform for the odious Katie Hopkins to launch a career as a professional troll.

Its UK star, Lord Sugar, has talked about his hope that the show will stimulate the entrepreneurial skill and enterprise of Britain’s young people, that it will encourage them to look at careers in business rather than wasting their time and money at university.

It is likely to do the reverse. Every year we are presented with an unattractive bunch of wannabes, seemingly picked as much for their capacity to make good tele as they are for their ability to create good businesses. Some, like la Hopkins, are clearly there to capitalise on that. Their aim is not to get ahead in business. It is to create a splash in the meeja.

Every year I apply what I describe as the pub test to the candidates. I ask whether I’d want to spend an evening in a hostelry with any of them. The answer is invariably no, with the odd exception.

If the youth of Britain takes the same view, if they think Apprentice candidates are the sort of the people they’ll meet if they go into business for themselves, their likely response is to start filling their UCAS forms in early.

The Apprentice is a turn off if its aim is to encourage young people to consider careers in business. It is also a turn off as regards improving the standing of business with the British public. Given the antics of the contestants during their tasks, and they way they comport themselves, how could it be otherwise?

And yet it cannot be denied that as a television show The Apprentice is a thing of evil genius. As a serious business commentator I hate myself for watching it. But I still watch it.

Sometimes it’s painful. That’s what it felt like watching the hapless Ollie - this year’s Tim nice but Dim - fall flat on his face.

But more often there is a potent feeling of schadenfreude as the more obnoxious contestants crash and burn after their vainglorious boasting about their business prowess.

Not everyone in business is like that and a good thing too. There wouldn’t be many businesses around if they carried on like Apprentice contestants when handed tasks.

I’ve even met the odd CEO who passes the pub test, although with the sort of money they make it’d be conditional on their picking up the tab.

I remain a critic of business. Its leaders have multiple issues, beyond quarterly sales figures and earnings forecasts, that they need to address.

Some of them recognise that. They are not all like Sir Philip, or Sports Direct's Mike Ashley, or the worst of the Apprentice's motley bunch of contestants. Most of them don’t seek to defend them.

They need to pull their fingers out, however. The actions of that lot are obscuring any good things they do from public view.

Lord Sugar likes to highlight the businesses spun off from the show since the format was re-vamped with the prize of a £250,000 investment from the grumpy one replacing the offer of a job. He claims they provide evidence of the success of his “process”.

Those businesses include a specialist recruitment consultancy, a chain of plastic surgery clinics, a digital marketing outfit and a plumber. The show is hardly a hotbed of innovation.

Will the business types wondering how best to counteract the damage done by Sir Philip Green, Mike Ashley and the rest see them as adequate compensation for the unsavoury side of the show? I rather doubt it.

They’ll probably be delighted when it’s finally fired.