Introduction
Every organization or business has a leader that most people have come to admire and respect, may it be the way they started that organization or how they came to be known and respected for they what they have done. One such person is Colonel Harland Sanders, the founder member of the famous Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC). This is an aspiring story having been born in 1890 Sanders, and his siblings were raised up on a farm in Indiana. At only six years old he lost his father leaving him with the responsibility of taking care of his siblings while his mother most of her time working. One of the many responsibilities he had was giving food to his brothers and sisters and was a pretty decent cook at seven years of age. (Feloni, 2015)
When his mother remarried his stepfather did not like him, and he was forced to go work a farm where he realized he would instead work than study, so he decided to leave school. Sanders lost four jobs, married and divorced his wife taking his daughter, became a conductor at a railroad, he did odd jobs for a period and at one point joined the army. In 1930 in Corbin Sanders bought a service station where he sold food to travelers and later realized that he was selling more food than gas, so he decided to close the station and stick to full-time cooking.
In 1939 His restaurant gained popularity, and he attributed this to his fried chicken that was made in spices and 11 herbs in a pressure cooker. This leads the governor of Kentucky to name Sanders colonel in 1950, and he started dressing the part. Everything was going well for Sanders, and he even made a deal with his friend Pete Harman where he would sell his chicken as Kentucky Fried Chicken and pay him 4 cents for every piece sold. Due to the competition, he sold his restaurant at a loss and his only source of income was the one hundred and five dollars he got from social security. He later convinced his wife to come back and decided to try something new, he packed spice blends, flour, and a few pressure cookers and would enter a restaurant and request the owner to allow him to cook his chicken and only pay him if they liked the taste and it sold. By 1963 he was getting requests without having to go out there to look for restaurants to allow him to cook and that was how he got into a deal to sell his franchise rights to John Y. Brown, Junior a lawyer and Jack C. Massey a venture capitalist at the price of two million dollars and in March 1965 the deal was finalized. He also got a seat on the board, majority shares of the Canadian franchises and a lifetime salary of forty thousand dollars that later rose to seventy-five thousand dollars.
Although Sanders did not want to let go, he decided that at 75 years of age it was the best thing to do as that would see his company grow. His main pursuit was to be known for selling good and quality food and not to be rich, and that is why he always complained that the new KFC made the more they made, the less quality of gravy. One KFC executive once said that Sanders preferred a franchisee who made the perfect sauce and made little money for the company to a franchise making more money and making poor quality gravy. (Feloni, KFC founder Colonel Sanders didn't achieve his remarkable rise to success until his 60s, 2015). Sanders may not have been the billionaire that he could have been because all he wanted was to serve good and quality food, but he lived comfortably for the remainder of his life. (Plante, 2016)
Although his father died when he was still young and taking care of his siblings after that, losing a lot of jobs and even his wife and daughter Sanders always picked himself up and managed to do what he had always wanted to do in life. This shows that every one of us can achieve what we set our minds to. Mr. Sander's story makes him stand out because he had all the reasons to give up and he almost did, but he got up and went after what he wanted and did a great job at it giving the world the best chicken known to man.
Although I have come to respect and admire Mr. Sanders for what he did, I still think that he should not have sold his rights but would have instead pasted his knowledge and recipe to his daughter. That way I believe his legacy would have been more significant and am sure his daughter would have always done what her dad taught her and that would have been the best way to still the great work of her dad.
References
Feloni, R. (2015, JUNE 25). Retrieved from KFC founder Colonel Sanders didn't achieve his remarkable rise to success until his 60s: https://www.businessinsider.com/how-kfc-founder-colonel-sanders-achieved-success-in-his-60s-2015-6?IR=T
Feloni, R. (2015, June 25). KFC founder Colonel Sanders didn't achieve his remarkable rise to success until his 60s. Retrieved from https://www.businessinsider.com/how-kfc-founder-colonel-sanders-achieved-success-in-his-60s-2015-6?IR=T
Plante, C. (2016, JULY 5). Retrieved from The real story of Colonel Sanders is far crazier than this bland inspirational meme: https://www.theverge.com/2016/7/5/12096466/colonel-sanders-kfc-meme-life-story
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Essay Sample on Respect and Admiration in Business. (2022, Jun 30). Retrieved from https://proessays.net/essays/essay-sample-on-respect-and-admiration-in-business
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