LJWorld.com / 'Apprentice' advises taking high road to find success

Archive for Thursday, October 7, 2004

Trump show winner speaks at KU for Homecoming

October 7, 2004

Last spring Bill Rancic won over Donald Trump before a national television audience and became "The Apprentice," but don't expect him to become a 20-year employee of The Donald.

"I'm an entrepreneur at the end of the day; I like to be kind of a free spirit out there," Rancic said Wednesday night during an appearance in the Kansas Union Ballroom.

Rancic, 33, survived 13 weeks of business boot camp under Trump, the New York billionaire real estate tycoon. Winning the highly watched television series contest earned him a job as Trump's understudy. He now works 16-hour days developing a 90-story high-rise and condominiums in his hometown, Chicago.

Despite the long days and hard work, "Having Donald Trump as your mentor is pretty cool," Rancic said.

Working in "The Apprentice," when he got only a couple of hours of sleep each night, was tougher, Rancic said.

"It wore you down," he said. "I lost 16 pounds."

Besides the hard work, Rancic thinks he and "Apprentice" runner-up, Kwame Jackson, got as far as they did in the TV show because they took the high road.

"If you act crazy, you are going to look crazy on television," Rancic said.

Rancic's appearance was another of several events this week in conjunction with KU's Homecoming. Students on the Homecoming committee estimated about 400 people showed up to hear Rancic. Many of them bought copies of his book, "You're Hired: How to Succeed in Business and Life," and had him sign them.

Ryan Ingle, a KU freshman from Shawnee, said he was interested in Rancic's retelling of how he made money starting his own business waxing yachts for $400 a day and later selling cigars over the Internet instead of settling for minimum-wage jobs out of high school.

"I was inspired by how much money he was making when he was 18 and 19 years old," Ingle said.