What You See Is What You Get – My Autobiography' by Alan Sugar
This book is another gift, this time from a member of my family.
What a surprise this book has been for me. I expected the usual ghost-written hagiography, but the style of writing is very much as you would expect it to be if Lord Sugar wrote it: punchy, gritty, to-the-point, straightforward and 'in-yer-face' and sometimes quite humorous. There’s quite a lot of swearing; not so much as to frighten the horses, but enough to make it congruent with the way he communicates.
The book tells the story of his life from the very earliest time in Clapton in East London, where he was born into a Jewish family in 1947 to low-income working class parents. The story of his school days is interesting in that we learn what an entrepreneur Alan Sugar was from a very early age.
There are plenty of anecdotes and examples of his commercial acumen, even as a young boy and then as a teenager; some of the scams he got up to are quite amusing and he demonstrates his ability to spot an opportunity that others did not see. This ability he carried through into his adult business life, and Sugar is a great example of luck being where opportunity and preparedness meet.
There are discrete sections in the book devoted to different years and stages of his life, both family and business, from the very earliest up his elevation to a baronetcy, although he was to be known as Lord Sugar.
The author is sometimes painfully honest about himself and his failings, but he is also painfully frank about his opinion of those with whom he had dealings over the years, from his business suppliers and customers, to the people with whom he dealt during the very difficult time – for him – he spent at Tottenham Hotspur, the football club in which he was involved for ten years, initially as Chairman and finally as a shareholder; Terry Venables comes in for some fairly heavy flak!
Contrary to what I believe to be the public perception of Alan Sugar, he seems to be quite a shy man, who is most comfortable in the company of close friends and his family, with whom he has a very close relationship and about whom he writes with great affection.
It’s fascinating to read what goes on behind the scenes, as well as in front of the camera in the making of The Apprentice, if you’re a fan – closet or otherwise, you will find the book worth buying for this reason alone. We also learn how Nick and Margaret came to be involved, something of which I was ignorant.
I enjoyed the book immensely, so much more than I anticipated. And if you have any interest in business, hifi, computers, politics, human nature, witty insults, innovative thinking, family relationships, football, The Apprentice, trains, boats and planes, then you will too – I found it 'unputdownable'.
Richard Jackson, co-founder of Mancroft