The Apprentice fired candidate Shahin Hassan interview: ‘I should’ve been project manager because I like being in control’

‘Thomas’s sales style is a bit aggressive, which doesn’t work in all situations’

Shahin Hassan may have the boxy chin of a superhero, but even that wasn’t enough to save his skin in the first episode of The Apprentice series 16.

The 36-year-old chartered engineer struggled as part of the sales team, and was finally dismissed by Lord Sugar, albeit “with regret”, at the end of the episode.

Despite his disappointment, Hassan sat down with The Independent to talk about his time on the show, where he thinks it all went wrong, and whether he really loves business more than sharks love blood.

Is this just the worst possible outcome, to go out in week one?

Absolutely. I was well gutted, I was disappointed. I wasn’t expecting to be fired in week one. I thought I was a strong character and a strong candidate, to be honest with you. But unfortunately it was just the task itself and the selling bit which let me down.

You always get big characters straight off the bat and then ones that slightly sit back – did you have a strategy going into the first task?

I’d watched previous episodes and I know people say not to be the project manager to start with, but I think, in this situation, I wish that I was the project manager because I like being in control. I think I should have been a bit more assertive in terms of what I wanted to do, and in terms of whether it was the selling side or the tour side. So that was my downfall.

At least you got a trip to South Africa out of it, I suppose.

Yeah, that was a nice surprise. I’d never been to South Africa, so absolutely.

Your big scene in the episode was when you were trying to get those last-minute sales in the bar and you seemed to freeze a bit – what happened there?

I think it was just a long day, to be honest with you. At that point it just didn’t work out for me. And it was probably because I’m just not a natural salesperson, which is why it came out like that.

Was it frustrating that Thomas leapt in and tried to take over the sale?

He probably did the right thing. But I don’t like disappointing people, so it was just a situation which I couldn’t control at that point in time.

Thomas is definitely one of the show’s biggest characters so far. Did you get along with him?

Thomas is a great guy, and he’s a market trader and he does that for a living. Maybe his sales style is a bit aggressive? Which doesn’t work in all situations. But you kind of adapt to the situations, and although we worked together, it’s probably not my selling style that I normally would do.

Were you sad not to see much of Lord Sugar?

Yeah. I don’t think he was able to see my potential because my skill set is around product development and [things that would be better in] some of the technology tasks – creating and designing and pitching to corporate environments. So I think he definitely missed out on those opportunities to see my skill set, so that was a shame.

He at least said that “it is with regret” that he had to fire you, which must have been a slight silver lining at least?

I highly respect Lord Sugar and I think it was a difficult one for him. Clearly it’s a selling task and he had to be objective. And at the start of the series, he probably doesn’t know anybody, so he had to [choose] based on the objective data.

Would you have done things differently in the first task if you could?

I think I would have requested to be on the tour side and probably been more assertive and made sure that I was on that side. When I was put on the selling task, I think I accepted it because you need to adapt and demonstrate that you can sell as well. I think that was the only thing that I would probably change.

You said in your official biography “I love business more than sharks love blood” – did you come up with that yourself?

You can use all sorts of phrases, but I thought this one was one that demonstrated that I do like business, and I thought it kind of rolled off your tongue. I sort of blended some words together and thought that made sense.

So what’s next for you?

Let’s see what opportunities the future brings me. But as long as I’m out there helping people in terms of connecting products and services to the cloud to make a difference to their lives, that’s what I want to focus on. That’s the way forward.

The Apprentice airs every Wednesday on BBC One at 9pm​