Author View (Paul C. Quintal)

Some months back, U.S. Army Sergeant Dusty Englehart asked Trump University to help him and his fellow soldiers plan a successful return to civilian life. We were proud to help. Here’s the text of a recent conversation between Dusty and Paul Quintal, Vice President of Trump University. As we post today’s blog, Dusty and his fellow soldiers are still deployed in Iraq. We know that all the members of the Trump University community will join us in thanking Dusty and his comrades at arms - and in praying for their safe return home. Quintal: Tell me about yourself. Englehart: I am a sergeant more...

It was a great Apprentice season. I kept learning important lessons, right up to the finale last night from The Hollywood Bowl. In my post this morning, I’d like to analyze the videos that Stefani and James screened last night for Mr. Trump - the ones that were supposed to prove they were the strongest contenders to become his next Apprentice. James produced a pretty strong video to argue his case to win. It pointed up the fact that he came to America as an immigrant from South Korea and that he was living the American dream of success. His video also more...

  Now that this season’s final Apprentice task has been completed, everybody seems to be asking who the strongest candidate is. But I would like to ask a slightly different question: Which candidate grew the most during the season? To me, that’s a more interesting question. And I think that the answer is pretty clear. Actually, there are two answers, because Frank and James showed the greatest growth this season. I don’t think it is a coincidence that they also are now part of the final four. If you think back to the early episodes this season, you will remember that James brought amazing more...

In the final moments of last night’s episode, we all saw Heidi come apart at the seams. It was hard to believe that we were watching the same woman who was such a consistent winner in the early episodes this season. That, for me, showcased the fact that it only takes one little lie to start the downfall of a career. Just one small fib took Heidi through this wrenching sequence: Denial. When Mr. Trump attacked her team’s brochure for being ugly and over-packed with text, Heidi impulsively tried to blame her teammate Frank for it. A complete absurdity, since the brochure was more...

This week on The Apprentice, Kinetic project manager Kristine escaped unscathed in the boardroom by the skin of her teeth. The teams had to film short Internet soap operas - called “webisodes” for a new foaming cleanser. Originally, Kristine wanted Muna to produce or direct or take some other backstage role. But Muna insisted she was much more comfortable in front of the camera. So Kristine caved and let Muna be one of the actresses. Then, as the filming started, Kristine disappeared for the first few takes to tend to some other less important task! Here’s the rub. Muna was absolutely impossible to more...

I learned a lot about leadership from Surya last night. But they were lessons about negative leadership. Let’s be truthful. Every time Surya led his team this season, he did a pretty bad job. He had no connection to the members of his team. He filled whole whiteboards with strange notes while everybody on his team made faces behind his back. He rambled when he talked. He actually disappeared on a few occasions, forcing the people who reported to him to improvise. But last night we all learned that Surya saw himself as an fine leader who was responsible for his team’s more...

I was astonished when Derek referred to himself as “white trash” in the boardroom last night - but I certainly wasn’t astonished when Mr. Trump fired him on the spot. Why would Mr. Trump want to give billion-dollar responsibilities to someone with a weak self-image? What prompted Derek to commit professional suicide that way? But when you consider last night’s episode, I think you will agree that it was really a parade of self-destructive behavior: Before the task was even assigned, both teams already had secret agendas to destroy their leaders.   When Angela missed the deadline to submit the more...

Welcome to EntrepreneurshipWeek USA, a week-long celebration of entrepreneurial vitality in America. When you want to encourage the entrepreneurs of tomorrow, the place to start is with kids. That’s why on the morning of Friday, March 2nd, members of the Trump University staff and faculty will join me to present a special program about entrepreneurship for elementary-school students at Brooklyn College’s Community Partnership Campus in Bushwick, Brooklyn. The students will get some first-hand advice about how to start their own companies. There will be presents and prizes for every kid in the audience - and even the possibility that a celebrity or two more...

People engaged in some truly bizarre behavior on The Apprentice this week. Both teams toured the malls where they would stage their Priceline.com promotions. Both teams noticed that many of the consumers in those malls were Spanish-speaking. But not one person on either team took the obvious step of saying, “Look, we need Spanish-speaking presenters here. Let’s hire some!” Everybody saw the challenge, but nobody spoke up - not one person. That is incredible to me. And by the time Aimee’s team got to the boardroom firing, team behavior had become even more bizarre. Aimee said that she noticed that many of more...

  Have the guts to take on the toughest assignments  Ultimately, the reason that Marisa got fired last night was that she had annoying habits, like interrupting people, resisting authority and not listening to her teammates. It is sobering to think that just a handful of personal traits like those - probably invisible to her - were enough to end her Apprentice career.  But for me, the most significant lesson came when Surya left Kinetic, the winning team, and voluntarily went to work for Arrow. Arrow, you remember, had already lost the first three tasks this season. They were losers. They were sleeping more...

Talking to your customers is the real secret of career success  The contestants had a pretty simple task last night. They only had to organize sightseeing tours of Hollywood on double-decker buses. I could execute that task by myself in an hour or two, and I bet you could too.  So why did the contestants engage in such bizarre behavior? Michelle was trying to dodge blame again this week by refusing to make a decision of any kind. And Tim, once his team’s bus tour got underway, picked up a microphone and told a busload of nice-looking school kids exactly how John Belushi more...

Last night's episode taught important lessons about risks, responsibility and teams. But the most important lesson I took away was this: To get to the top, you have to make decisions Plenty of decisions were made on last night's show. Some were good, but many were bad. Let's take a closer look. First, Michelle made a non-decision. Early in the episode, she refused to make a decision about how to price her team's swimwear line. She obviously had ideas about what those prices should have been, but she clammed up and waited for other people to make the decision for her. She apparently more...

Only minutes into the season's first episode last night, Donald J. Trump stunned the contestants by asking them to build a tent in the backyard of his LA mansion. He hardly knew the contestants - they had only given him their names and professional credentials. He hadn't even divided them into teams. They were probably expecting a task like those that the teams tackled last year, like launching a new video game in a WalMart or planning a charity fundraiser. Instead, they faced a cardboard box packed with a canvas tent and tent poles. They looked as stunned and confused as steers more...

Jim Blasingame Interviews Paul Quintal of Trump University Who created Trump University? What's the philosophy behind it? Paul Quintal, Trump University's Vice President, answers those questions, and more, in this recent radio interview with Jim Blasingame on Small Business Advocate Radio. Jim Blasingame: What exactly is Trump University? Paul Quintal: Trump University is a lifelong learning company that focuses on business and personal development. We offer quality learning experiences on topics that are of interest to entrepreneurs, real estate investors and business owners. We are an international university. It might interest you to know that nearly 35 percent of our students come from more...