As of this week, a new column about The Apprentice will be penned by Aleksandra King, who gives us her opinion of the episode from the BBC1 hit show from that week.

King is a former ‘BBC Apprentice’ candidate and business consultant from Buckinghamshire. She regularly features on BBC radio and other local TV and radio stations as a commentator and panellist. Aleksandra is also a lecturer and ambassador at Istituto Marangoni, a world leading university for fashion, with establishments in London, Milan, Paris and Firenze. She writes:

As episode one of The Apprentice 2017 kicks off, Lord Sugar makes it very clear that only he decides who leaves the process with his opening statement “We have Brexit but be under no illusion, I am the one who decides who is going to leave”. In other words “please don’t leave like Aleksandra did because that takes my power away and does not make me look good”.  

That sets the tone of the first task of manufacturing burgers and selling them to trade and public. The teams are split into girls and boys, project managers are selected and it’s off to the kitchen. 

As per the usual apprentice scenario things get heated in the kitchen. As the pressure builds up off the back of mistakes candidates lock in on potential targets to pin the blame on in the boardroom. The boys attempt to sell in a now hauntingly quiet location in Brixton as they’ve missed lunchtime traffic. The girls trade team get a ‘tad’ over enthusiastic whilst selling to a shop owner and then proceed to point fingers at who ‘shouted the loudest’ and ruined the sale. 

This all sets the perfect tone for the boardroom where the boys team make a loss of £144 and three of them face firing. A good win by a calm and collected project manager, Sarah, on the girls’ team.

For the unlucky ones left in the boardroom, Lord Sugar looks down upon them as his prey whilst they desperately fight each other to remain in the process. In the end, the boys team project manager, Danny is faced with the cull. 

He made a classic Apprentice error by bringing someone who is ‘better at arguing’ than him into the boardroom. In this case, it’s a shrewd and articulate lawyer, Elliott, who planted just the right seeds in Lord Sugar's head. 

How good it feels to be watching all this ‘culling’ from home.