Having been brought up on the banks of the Tolka River as one of 14 siblings, Bill Cullen has come a long way from the days of selling fruit on the sides of streets in Dublin's inner city.

Now almost sixty years later the high flying business mogul is the chairman and commander in chief of Renault Ireland which, at its height, turned over p350 million each and every year. Currently he is one of the most high profile businessmen in the country and thanks to his successful stint at the helm of the TV3 show The Apprentice, he has now become a celebrity as well. He was in Longford as the guest of Co Longford Enterprise Board on Thursday and a packed house in the Longford Arms awaited his words of wisdom.

Speaking to the Leader before the seminar entitled "How to survive in tough times", Cullen summed his success up in two words – hard work.

"You take the word work, what does that mean to you? I don't work. Everything I do I enjoy, Everything I do, I want to do. That's the secret of life," he said with a hint of noncahalnce whilst lounging back on a sofa inside the lobby of the hotel.

"I was expelled from school at the age of 13 and I got my first job in 1956," he bluntly confided. "I was expelled for playing soccer, a traitor to my country and to my school. I wrote about 700 applications to the Evening Herald for vacancies they had. I never even got a reply from 700 ads because of our address which was a no go area-Sean McDermott Street in Dublin."

That frustration and lack of progress would have broken a more reticent character. But Cullen's perseverance and gritty persona won out and by the mid '50s he had secured a job at Walden's in 1956. A decade later, the young and somewhat over eager Cullen had risen to become the company's director general.

"I just outworked everybody else," he flippantly remarked. "I get up at 4am every morning, that's not very early. My ma never went to bed at all. I'd be in bed at about 11:30pm. That's why I can do more than anybody else. I have 20 hours a day. How many have you?" Cullen suddenly asked.

His frankness is as surprising as it is refreshing. And as he prepared to address business owners and entrepreneurs in association with Longford County Enterprise Board's seminar, the star of TV3's 'The Apprentice' was quite open about his own feelings on the economy.

"When times get tough the tough get going. You've got to get up off your arse and work twice as hard as you used to."

Even his newest recruit and the winner of the most recent series of 'The Apprentice' Steve Raynor was taught a harsh lesson in that department on his very first day.

"Steve showed up on January 4 at 6:30am bright and early and I just heard him arrive outside and say to Christine (Cullen's personal assistant) 'which is my office?' I said: Come here you, you have no office.