While ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ may give its contestants a one week grace period before booting anyone off, things are very different on ‘The Apprentice’ and Wednesday’s (4 October) series 12 premiere saw one candidate leave.
So, you should know the drill by now, but just in case: The following interview is going to include a lot of spoilers as the aforementioned ex-candidate discusses their brief time on the show.
Don’t scroll down if you haven’t tuned in yet. Right…
Danny Grant made an unceremonious exit from ‘The Apprentice’ on Wednesday and speaking to HuffPost UK, he admitted that he does have some regrets about his time on the show - but being Project Manager isn’t one of them.
Despite the fact the job is often a poison chalice, Danny told us that he’s “not the sort of person” who regrets things, explaining: “I’ve learnt quite a lot from that experience. The personnel that you choose makes a massive, massive difference. I wish I’d chosen Harrison [Jones] to be sub-team leader.”
However, agreeing to lead the team was something he’d planned to avoid at first, as Danny added: “Look, I had two rules going in. One of them was that if a task looks like it fits what you do, you need to stand up and be counted for it and not try and go into hiding.
“And the second rule was not to be project manager on the first task… But when it came up that it was a manufacturing task, and I’d done some manufacturing before but it was the first task, I kind of froze.
“You really don’t have a lot of time to make decisions. They’re snap decisions and they have to be right or they will cost you.”
When it came to the boardroom, Danny’s indecisiveness saw him initially name Harrison as one of the two candidates he wanted to bring back alongside Charles Burns, before swapping him out for Elliot Van Emden, but it seems there’s someone else he wishes he’d called in…
“I’d have brought Jeff back,” Danny said without hesitation. “He would have gone. But I think I made the right decision in not bringing Harrison back, I’d have felt really guilty if he’d gone. I wouldn’t do that in real life.”
So what’s next? A number of former ‘Apprentice’ stars have gone on to give reality television a go - with varying degrees of success… - so could we see Danny in the jungle or the ‘Celebrity Big Brother’ house anytime soon?
“Depends how much they pay me to be honest!” he said. “I’ve not really thought about it to be honest… I’m open to anything but it depends if it’s the right time and the right thing to do.”
Catch up on ‘The Apprentice’ on BBC iPlayer. The series continues next Wednesday on BBC1 at 9pm.
