In a bizarre episode of “The Apprentice,” Donald Trump fired the only male member of one team because the guy had been dumb enough to give up an exemption — one that would have prevented him from being fired that week.

Bradford had been the captain when his team won the previous week, so he earned the exemption. With Ivana as the captain the next week, the team failed, and teammates strongly criticized her and Stacie J., who had alienated almost everyone.

In the boardroom, Trump criticized Bradford — saying he had made the kind of stupid, impulsive decision that could destroy a company. So he fired him — making a stupid, impulsive decision of his own.

Make no mistake: Bradford’s ego and attitude probably would have kept him from earning the apprenticeship in any case, but Trump sent the wrong message. He had one weak leader in front of him in Ivana and one weak team player in Stacie, but he chose to dump someone who had performed reasonably well. That’s bad management.

Trump should have taken a deep breath, then criticized Bradford for not playing the game as well as he should. And then moved on and dumped a weak link.

Think about what Bradford did, and its real-world implications. One of the biggest dysfunctions in any workplace is when workers feel that someone, usually a manager, is being protected unfairly. Even if he fouls up, he won’t get fired — someone else will. So it’s easy for people to feel that he doesn’t care.

What Bradford did should have been lauded. He said, basically, that if I’m the one who screwed up, dump me — and the exemption be damned.

That’s not the sort of character trait that a smart CEO would punish.