Only 2 episodes in but they all seem just utterly useless.

The male group seem like they have never held a job in their lives.

The woman group seem terrible too to be honest and the women are usually way better than the men.

Maybe because there are still so many of them makes it difficult to notice competent candidates

Too early to judge. They are all so desperate to stand out from the crowd, without actually volunteerning to be PM, that they are forced into arguing. We'll have a better idea in a couple of weeks.

I'm not sure they are all utterly useless, but it's the year that they all seem to have the mentality of never making a decision without having someone else to blame first.

Exception being Steven, who is like this years Jason but with more business sense, just clueless about how the rest will play to win.

Most of the boys are seemingly dead weight, but many of the girls look to have potential IMO.

Some of them (boys and girls) are coming across as really nasty people. I know they're trying to stand out from the crowd and are ambitious but this lot are just about trampling on each other to show off.

The teams were bad yesterday due to poor management, and today with the design constraints I don't think they could have done a huge amount better in terms of the product itself - a very limiting task.

I think next week will really clarify to us the good leaders, sellers, creative people, and all round which ones are strong candidates and which ones aren't.

Yes which is why I'm on the brink of giving up. There's not even any pretense anymore about deliberately choosing fools or people who are going to wind each other and us up. It's become so clichéd and contrived. And the shouting and bickering just gives me a headache.

I'd so like to see a bunch of bright, competent, professional business people on the show but it's not going to happen.

They all seem so gormless and fearful. The fact that the girls often need help defining simple words like decadence and tenacity says it all.

Having said that, I don't expect them to be too bright anymore. After all, this show is now known for its cringeworthy and brainless moments.

I think they are always dreadful for the first few tasks. But it never fails to amaze me that none of them ever seem to have learned from previous series. Nobody listens. Before they start anything the first thought on their minds seems to be who to blame.

The lack of even basic knowledge that some of them showed such as wanting the solar panels covered, lead me to think this bunch of girls have some very thick members in it.

There's more high flyers on this show than usual going by the CVs. . There's also been signs that we have some very smart people - a lot of the strategic points are being got right , and then lost in what follows.

They are going wrong because there's too many of them to have a proper conversation, there's some loud types who dominate with dud ideas, and many of them don't know how the show works this early on. They also have all the duds still with them, more than usual with the bigger teams, and the smart people won't PM until more of the duds have gone and can't sabotage your bid for success.

The first task saw them not understanding the technicalities - like paying for things, and getting from a to b.The girls had a hopeless PM and the boys a hopeless deputy. The second task just doesn't lend itself to a good solution - so we didn't get one.There were, though, enough people getting the analysis what was wrong right to provide good enough teams for the final stages.

Whats missing is someone who has the obvious raw business skills of a Luisa, or the clinical analysis and command of facts of a Leah. And some of the smarter people may be from backgrounds he usually ignores - like the female small traders, fitness specialists or lawyers. Lord Sugar 's got rid of the right people so far, but he may miss some of the real talent if he plays his usual hand.

It's still a bit early but no, I think the candidates from series 2 and 9 were worse than what these are.

Anything can be put on an Apprentice CV. They are never brought up on them until the Interviews stage. Though I think some researcher checks to make sure there's plenty of dirt for that part of the stage.


People with real talent aren't going to bother with this show. They are off making £££ money already.

Its the modern way for people to be given, or give themselves, hi-ferlutin' titles that are actually quite ambiguous.
So a "brand manager" - could be they look after typhoo tea, or maybe its just their dads plumbing firm!
A lot this year seem to be directors and managers - but how big are the companies/departements?
Chlles is a case in point - director of two companies. One is building materials, the other consultancy. But consultancy in what? Doesn't say on the BBC page and he was totally unforthcoming with detail on "You're Fired" too!

A good point. Many 'consultancies' are just one-man bands and may not necessarily be active - you only need to have registered yourself at Companies House. Of course, the same goes for any company - you can be a director of a company like a big plc or a part-time company operating out of your back bedroom. The job title is the same.

And, far be it for me to suggest it, but it's also ever so slightly possible that the candidates exaggerate their jobs and job titles a teensy bit. For instance, Nurun calls herself a "marketing officer and fashion retailer" according to he rprofile on the show's website. Now I don't mean to do her down here, but didn't she basically say on last night's episode that she is a market stall trader? Of course, that doesn't sound quit so glam, does it? As I say, I don't blame Nurun of any of the others for stretching the truth somewhat, but it's important to take some of the candidates' claims with a large pinch of salt ...

I'm not sure this bunch are any worse than any other in recent years. And while there are undoubtedly some candidates who have been picked for entertainment value rather than talent, in many cases perfectly competent business people are made to look like idiots, especially in the early episodes because (a) being competent doesn't make for good telly and (b) from a narrative point of view, the producers have to explain why people are brought back into the boardroom and fired, which means focussing on what people do wrong and giving us a clear split between the 'good' candidates and the 'bad' ones.

I also think it's easy to underestimate just how stressful and unrealistic these tasks are. Most of the candidates are in their mid-20s and so relatively inexperienced, and the Apprentice environment is nothing like how a real business operates. When you put a team of opinionated people in a "team" (they're anything but a team in reality) and put them in a high pressure situation which is unfamiliar and lacking basic resources such as internet access, mistakes are going to happen with even strong candidates. All it takes is one high-profile error on an early task before you've had a proper opportunity to prove yourself, and the resultant edit makes you look like an incompetent buffoon who couldn't tie their shoelaces together without assistance. Which is part of the reason why people play tactics and avoid becoming PM on early tasks like the plague.

The boys remind me of a basketful of little boy puppies - all yapping and falling over themselves to be noticed. The girls aren't much better - 'decadence' indeed!

Its the same every year in the early weeks - too many people chasing too little airtime and trying to stand out.

That said - every year I do wonder exactly how many of the candidates have actually watched previous series as they make the same mistakes every year.... not listening to the others, allowing shout -a- thons to develop in brainstorming sessions, attempting to please everyone in the team/ pushing a pet hobby horse on the others, not working with peoples strengths etc and talking over each other in the boardroom.

They are all so preoccupied with promoting themselves, that sensible ideas (like Solomon's last night) get overlooked in the shouting match going on. if only they would realise that they would get further by listening rather than saying something for the sake of getting their voice heard, and shutting the f**k up when their "unworkable" idea has been sensibly dismissed, and actually being constructive about workable ones (prime example being that numpty who wanted to cut up the lemons and had to be told no at least 3 times before sulkily giving up!

I really liked Rebecca last year when she actually shut someone up who was butting in on her pitch - and they didnt like it either on the team or on these forums.

Yes yes and yes but there is hope.
Unfortunately there is a tendency to try not to be the project manager but surely this is the time when they don't really knows each other.

I think on the girls team there are a couple of Luisa types and that's what is needed.

To be fair Luisa was a great apprentice she gave 100% .

I'm not sure why lord sugar doesn't like her but he didn't like Katie Hopkins(who does after her recent outbursts)because she voluntarily left the show.
I remember Donald Trump was angry too when one of his apprentices did the same.

They don't like their plans being upset do they?

Pure and simple, he didn't think her business idea was as worthwhile an investment as Leah's which, don't forget, was in a market that Sugar at least has some knowledge of. People tend to invest in what they know - as Sugar has admitted in the past, he's a products kind of guy who has dabbled in the beauty sector.

Plus there's the fact she's proven to be somewhat fame-hungry since the show, having basically used it to build her own celebrity.

There's basically six months between the final task and the results being decided, during which time all kinds of due diligence will have been performed on the candidates and their plans - a whole load of stuff that we as viewers aren't privy to but allows Sugar to make a far more informed choice than any of us ever could.

No it's not to do with numbers. I really do think that this lot is the most utterly unrealistic self-obsessed inarticulate bunch of numpties ever to parade before us.

Yes thanks for that I hadn't thought of the show delay and of course I couldn't see him being in partnership with her now anyway.

The only thing I can say is she did work in the tasks on the show , hopefully some apprentices will put in a bit of the same effort.
At the moment they are not impressing.

Yep, much though I didn't like her personally or her approach to her teammates in some of the tasks, Luisa showed herself to be a good worker and one of the more competent candidates during the tasks. As much as she craves attention, she definitely had a real will to win.

The formula has changed so much since the first series, I don't think they're incompetent - they're just in it for entertainment value.

That's the only reason they have included so many 'characters' notable examples being Stephen, and the tall guy who was just fired (forgotten his name already), not to mention the extra candidates. I still watch, but in no way are any of these people not looking for more than their 5 mins of fame.

after so many series, I can't believe they are not falling over themselves to be PM, even if they don't like the context of the task. Alan Sugar actually suggested one guy for the second task and he passed on it apparently because it didn't interest him. Oh dear. When most of us go to work we have to do a lot that we don't want to do but we do it to keep the job. It reminds me a bit of jury service where no-one wants to be jury chair.
I didn't see the first couple of series, but have watched the rest if only because the contestants are generally so bad it's funny. I wonder how many really good business people apply and don't even get on the show. They can't be the only applicants can they?