What You See is What You Get

by Sugar, Alan

  I didn’t have any input into the final choice of the fourteen candidates – that was all down to Peter Moore and Tanya Shaw. I think they were a bit paranoid in distancing me from this process, but I guess they didn’t know me and I can understand them having the wrong impression from what they’d read in the media, particularly the football stuff. I’m sure they thought I was a bit of an interfering, domineering autocrat who would try to take control of every single thing. Little did they know, this was a long way from the truth. I knew nothing about television production – these people were the experts. Having said that, I don’t think it would have hurt, as we neared the closing stages of applications, to have shared with me the final fifty or a hundred applicants’ CVs. Instead, they were presented to me as a fait accompli and I was shown their pictures a week before we started filming.

  This was a really exciting venture and it was something I needed. I’d done the business with Amstrad and I’d romanced the football industry without succeeding (albeit I still made a bit of money), but this was a new voyage in my life.

  When we got close to filming, I was introduced to two other senior members of the production team, Dan Adamson and Beth Dicks. Beth was going to be the lady by my side, filming the general visual shots of me they’d use in the makeup of the programme, like the opening scenes or me driving around in my car or on my boat. These shots are normally done in advance, so when they come to edit the final shows, they can slot them in at the appropriate places.

  I recall going to Stansted, standing in front of my plane and being given a script of what to say. It was at this point that I realised I hadn’t mentioned to Peter or Tanya that I was not going to be scripted in any way, shape or form, or told what to say or do!

  The script they had given me was difficult for me to rattle off in a natural way. They weren’t Alan Sugar words’ and after an hour of repeatedly trying to record it in a noisy aeroplane hangar, having to stop and start every time a plane took off, I was getting a little frustrated and so was Beth. I reckon she must have been thinking, ‘Bloody hell, we’ve picked a wrong ’un here – he can’t string a set of words together.’

  This prompted me to speak to Peter and Tanya. I said, ‘I think there’s been a bit of a misunderstanding here. When I’m talking to the candidates or my advisers, if you think I’m going to work from a script or read out the lines I’m going to say to people, then you’ve made a serious mistake. I’m sorry not to have thought of mentioning it to you earlier, but there’s no way I’d be prepared to do that. I’m not an actor and it will just come across as false. If you want to get the best out of me, you just need me to let rip and do what I want to do.’ Peter and Tanya were quite shocked that this is what I had thought.

  Peter said, ‘We actually chose you because you’re a motor-mouth. There is no way we’re going to script you – you are going to be let loose. Do what you want, say what you want. At the end of the day, if you don’t like some of the things you said, or we don’t like some of the things you said, it’s not a live programme – we’ll edit it.’

  This assurance came as a great relief to me. From that day, all the things I said out on location and in the general shots were my own words, after I’d got the gist of what the production people wanted me to put across. Luckily, Peter was very pleased with the videos coming back from the location shoots. It was a big risk taking me on and his reputation was on the line. He wouldn’t know if he’d made a mistake or not until the candidates turned up for the first time in the boardroom and we got started.

  In the meantime, at the end of an Amstrad board meeting, I took Margaret to one side and told her I was going to participate in a TV programme called The Apprentice. I gave her a video of the American version to watch and told her I’d be taking on Donald Trump’s role in the UK version. Nick Hewer had already accepted the role of one of the advisers; would she consider the other role?

  Her immediate reaction was, ‘I’ve never done anything like that before – I wouldn’t know what to do. I’ve never been on television or given an interview. As you know, Alan, I have always kept away from the press and I have always warned you to keep away from the press and keep your mouth shut. I’m not sure whether this is meant for me, but I’ll have a look at the video and let you know if I’m interested.’

  I didn’t want to put too much pressure on her, but asked her to let me know in the next couple of days. Judging by her initial reaction, I wasn’t very hopeful she’d go for it. Thinking about it more though, it looked like the dream team. Nick, a very stand-up, posh-speaking, respectable man; Margaret, an eloquent, high-profile ex-City lawyer. Two serious people – and in the middle, this kind of rough diamond, a hard-nosed businessman. What a mixture!

  Margaret called me back a day later and said she would do it, so long as it didn’t interfere with her other commitments (some non-executive directorships). She felt, as I did, that it was quite an exciting and interesting challenge. Knowing she was onboard, I told Peter and Tanya of my choice. They didn’t raise any objection – they too knew that three most unusual characters from different walks of life would be a winning formula for TV.

  I was now to meet the fourteen candidates for the first time. Nick, Margaret and I were positioned in the boardroom waiting for them. They knew they were going to meet Sir Alan Sugar, but I didn’t know who they were. And no one had any idea what I was going to say to them apart from me. Over the weeks of preparation, I’d worked out in my mind the thrust of what I wanted to say to let them know who I was and what I expected. I had it kind of stored in my memory cells, ready for the big day.

  As they sat down, I started explaining to them, calmly at first, what the process was about. I would be putting them in teams, sending them out to do various business tasks. One team will win, one team will lose, and someone in the losing team will be fired. At the end of the twelve-week process, there will be one person left who will get a six-figure salaried job with me. So far, so good.

  Then I upped the volume and broke into my famous tirade, telling them not to underestimate me – I don’t like liars, bullshitters, cheats and schmoozers. I ranted on for what felt like ages but was only a few minutes, then sent them off to a house I’d got for them to live in over the course of the next twelve weeks. I told them I’d be calling them later to set the first task.

  The candidates exited the boardroom and were whisked off to the house. Peter and Tanya were absolutely delighted. The cameramen filming the thing found it hard to keep a straight face as they saw how the candidates were in shock. I often wonder now how cameramen manage to keep their mouths shut or not burst out laughing.

  I felt pleased at that moment for Peter Moore. He had gambled on me and it was the first time he had seen me in full flow in front of the candidates. As a professional who had made lots of successful television programmes, he must have been relieved. From that moment on, I think he knew he was going to have a big hit on his hands.

  It was time to get going on the first task. We’d come up with an easy opener for the candidates – to go to a wholesale flower market to buy flowers, then sell them on the streets. I’d chosen flowers because they are perishable items and in that kind of business there’s an art to buying the right amount of stock to make sure that, at the end of a trading day, you don’t have any left, as they will decay and be unsaleable. When introducing the task, as an analogy for the flower-selling situation, I asked the candidates to turn up at the printing works of the Financial Times. I told them we were there to illustrate that a daily newspaper has to be produced and delivered overnight, put on sale and by the end of the day there should be none left, as there’s nothing more useless than yesterday’s news. Their task was to sell a commodity with a similarly short shelf-life.

  Despite my having no input in the selection of candidates, they turned out to be quite a good bunch of people, quite credible and from all walks of life. Some of them were highly qualified. A few were in the business world, while others worked for ordinary
organisations. Tim Campbell, for example, worked for London Underground.

  Surprisingly, the boys won the first task. There was a brilliant performance from Paul Torrisi, a fiery northerner with Italian blood in him, who turned out to be one of the show’s main characters in that series. It was clear from the way the show was going that, apart from the underlying business message, it was great entertainment seeing these characters performing under pressure, getting stressed and arguing with each other.

  At the end of the task, I would question the candidates. It wasn’t until I was thrown into the deep end that first time that I realised I was talking blind. How could I judge something if I hadn’t seen what was going on? Sure, anyone could judge which team had won by selling more items, but to work out which person from the losing team was culpable, I needed Nick and Margaret’s feedback. I forced a debate amongst the candidates and asked Nick and Margaret to interject. It went on for ages, as I needed to get a clear picture in my mind of what had happened. From then on, I had a serious debriefing with Nick and Margaret after every task was performed, before the candidates came into the boardroom to face me.

  To dispel any rumours, I have to say that I really don’t get to see what goes on while the candidates are out in the field or at the house. As much as I’d like to be a fly on the wall, the fact is, the footage takes weeks to process and put into a format for viewing. In most cases, I meet up with the candidates the day after the task is completed. As I don’t have any footage to view, I have to use my imagination and rely on the feedback from Nick and Margaret.

  The candidates would argue with each other in front of me and some would bend the truth for sure. When I picked them up for being less than honest, they were totally shocked at the information I had on them, which was all down to Nick and Margaret – my eyes and ears. I’d also learned a few techniques from the barristers I’d observed during my court cases. I would let the candidates ramble on with their version of events – and, in some cases, bury themselves – then I’d pounce on them with the truth. After a few weeks, they got the plot not to bullshit me.

  What became clear was how people would make the most irrational business decisions under pressure. Some of the simple basics of business were being ignored, such as paying attention to costings, working out how many items to buy so they didn’t get stuck with leftover stock and ensuring that what they were selling made a profit!

  It was also quite amazing to see the naïvety of academics who had never been involved in business or, worse, those who claimed they were experienced in business. After all, one wasn’t asking them to create a complex business model – it was all simple stuff. It came as a great shock to me that some people completely ignored simple maths and hadn’t realised their early decisions had left them dead in the water before they’d even started. Even more fascinating was seeing how, having explained the errors of their ways throughout the course of the process, the same mistakes were repeated over and over again.

  Eventually, in that first series, the very worthy winner was Tim Campbell, after a closely run final with Saira Khan. Tim came to work at Brentwood and got on very well with the staff. He was given a new project to head up, an electronic face-care system, and he worked with the engineers to develop both the product and a website to host the sales.

  I have to say that it was time-consuming and gruelling filming the show. Occasionally it involved working over weekends, which was sometimes inconvenient to family life. Little did Nick, Margaret and I know at the time how popular the programme would become. Once the filming was over, we all went our separate ways and got on with our own business. I was invited to the editing suite from time to time to see rough cuts of sections of the programmes. It wasn’t until I saw the footage of the candidates running round in the streets and in offices and shops did I actually realise what they’d been up to. I was comforted in most cases that the decisions and criticisms I’d made, somewhat blindly, were borne out by what had actually gone on.

  I was very impressed when I first saw the opening title sequence of the programme, showing the sweeping views of London and the Thames, together with the very distinctive music. It was all very exciting stuff. I was told I hadn’t seen anything yet, as none of it had been polished. They had hired helicopters to film London, as well as film crews to capture the candidates driving around in the vans and me riding along in my car.

  I was getting an understanding of how a programme is produced. In the case of The Apprentice, each one-hour programme has been edited down from over a hundred hours of filming, as the teams go off to separate locations and sometimes split into sub-teams, each with separate crews filming them. Then there’s the film of the candidates in the house and the boardroom. There can be up to four sets of crew following them around and six cameras in the boardroom. From that mountain of material, the editors have to make the programme. It was a new world I was experiencing and it was fascinating to watch these talented people cutting and pasting the raw footage to create a one-hour, feature-packed show.

  As time went on, I started to see some of the finished films and they were excellent. Peter Moore wouldn’t give me copies of them. I think he was worried I might show them to somebody and breach the contract Talkback had with the BBC. He needn’t have worried – I just wanted to keep them for myself. In fairness, I guess he’d only known me for a few months and wasn’t aware of my professionalism. On one occasion, I told Peter that Ann, whom he’d met a few times, was at home in bed ill and I wanted to show her one of the first episodes. He finally let me have a tape to take home.

  Peter had a bit of a fiery temper and we had a couple of rows. He was one of those temperamental people you’d expect to find in the media industry, the sort who would have a tantrum and walk off the set, so to speak. These artistic people are a bit funny in that way. They’re a completely different bunch of people to those I’d come across in business, very touchy and sensitive about their artistic genius.

  I wasn’t poking my nose into their business – I wouldn’t have had a clue what to do with respect to filming and editing – but I used to get very frustrated waiting for the cameras and lighting to be set up. It was all very time-consuming and I would sometimes lose my rag and come out with some verbal tirade. By the back end of the filming, being a quick learner, I was seeing stuff go on which was grossly inefficient and it was winding me up. On one occasion, I think it was while filming the penultimate show, Peter came storming into the boardroom, ranting and raving at me about my objections. I stood up and told him to fuck off, and he could take his fucking TV show and stick it up his arse. I shut the book I had in front of me on the table and walked out, saying, ‘I’m going home. That’s it. It’s over.’

  Peter might have got away with losing his rag on shows he’d done in the past, but he’d dropped a real bollock this time. His temper could have cost his company millions of pounds. If I’d walked off, they’d have had no show! At that time, they only had ten shows recorded. He’d have had to explain to his bosses what had gone wrong, and they’d have had to explain it to the BBC. I don’t think he’d expected me to react the way I did, but he’d picked a bad time to start on me, as there were some family problems playing on my mind. Also, it was a Sunday and I was supposed to be at a family event, so I was in a foul mood anyway.

  After I’d walked off, Nick told me to calm down. He said he understood how frustrated I was, but reminded me of all the work we’d put in up to now and said it would be unprofessional and uncharacteristic of me to storm off. While I was talking to Nick outside the boardroom, James, the senior cameraman, came up and asked me whether I wanted a cup of coffee and to take a break for a few moments. He had a look on his face as if to say, ‘I don’t blame you for walking off, but all our jobs are on the line here and we’d like you to stay.’ Not that he actually said anything – it was just his body language.

  Nick and Margaret calmed me down and I went back into the boardroom and finished off the show, but I went home fuming. I phon
ed Peter the following morning and told him I was a professional and that if I was committed to do something, then I would do it, but I wasn’t going to put up with any more of his bloody nonsense. I guess if you asked him for his take on that phone call, he’d say that that’s what he said to me. I think it reasonable to say we agreed to disagree.

  The BBC didn’t have a clue how popular the programme would become. There was no formal press conference, which they’d normally have before launching a new programme. It just went out, with no fanfare, for the first time in February 2005, while I was away on holiday, skiing in Courchevel.

  When the kids were younger, I’d always promised to take them skiing, but I never had and they never stopped reminding me! One day, talking to Daniel, we discussed going skiing – boys only – me, Simon, Daniel and the elder grandchildren, as well as my son-in-law Mark. By then, Daniel had had a second son, Jake, who was obviously too young to come with us. Michaela was laughing at the thought of how Daniel would cope with their son Alex, now five years old, on his own. By then, Louise and Mark had had Joe, their first child, who was also too young to come.

  Daniel found a fantastic chalet in Courchevel with all mod-cons, including satellite TV. The problem was, it didn’t have a BSkyB receiver. Luckily, we found this out before we went, so I brought one along to plug into the satellite dish. This meant we could watch the first episode of The Apprentice live. Daniel knew a few other English people there at the time, so we invited them round to watch it. I’d seen the final cut already, but it was interesting to watch my family’s and the guests’ reactions. They were glued to the TV, asking me what would happen next. The format was new, so they had no idea, having just seen me for a short time at the beginning of the show, when I would come back into play. They certainly got it when we reached the boardroom scenes.

  Ann was at home, as were Louise and Michaela. The show first aired at 9 p.m. on a Wednesday night on BBC2. As soon as it was over, my mobile started ringing. Jeremy Beadle was on the line, telling me the BBC had a massive hit on its hands and how fantastic the show was. A few minutes later, Bill Kenwright, the Everton chairman, called me saying the same thing.