MATT JOHNSON is chief executive of Mando Group

LORD SUGAR is back with a bang, as millions of viewers flocked to BBC One for the beginning of the seventh series of The Apprentice last week.

With an estimated 7.8m viewers for the first episode – over 1m more than the primary episode of season 6 – it’s safe to say that the nation’s appreciation for the boardroom backstabbing is as strong as ever.

This year’s contestants are the usual mix of brashly confident 20 and thirty-somethings with some impressive qualifications under their belts.

They include one candidate who has been trained by no less than 12 Nobel Peace Prize winners.

Previous series have seen the winning candidates granted a £100,000 executive position within one of Lord Sugar’s existing businesses.

However, the stakes are a little different for this year’s series.

Taking cues from the Dragons’ Den, the successful contender of the new series stands to gain a £250,000 investment into the start-up business of their choice.

Such a generous cash injection is likely to stand the right person in very good stead for the future.

Creating a new business requires a very different set of skills than stepping into an executive role, and with such high stakes for the man himself it will be interesting to see the different characteristics Lord Sugar will be looking for in a future business partner than he was for a potential employee.

So far, we’ve seen teams Logic and Venture battle it out over fresh produce and mobile applications, with bumbling boys’ project manager Edward the first to go and Alex Britez Cabal hot on his heels.

With an already interesting array of tasks under their belts just two episodes in, it will be fascinating to see what future challenges the winning candidate will need to overcome to claim their prize.

And even more interesting to see which of the hopefuls will make it all the way to: “You’re hired.”

For the record, my money is on Susan Ma or fast-talking Jim Eastwood.

But with the current score standing at 2-0 to the girls, and 10 boardroom encounters yet to go, it’s still anyone’s game.