13A – Reading Reflection No. 1

Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc

1.

• The thing that surprised me the most was the determination of Kroc to achieve something big.
• I admire the persistence of Kroc, he clearly states over and over that that's the only thing that helped him create the brand we know as McDonald's.
• Even though he created something that big, he had to sacrifice a lot of his personal life. That's clearly a workaholic-like trait that I didn't like.
• He faced failure and adversity a lot of times, even though he says he was great at selling stuff, he never got a break until he was in his 50's. The only thing he did and therefore comes with the title of the book... he kept "grinding it out".

2.  He exhibits ambition and persistence.

3. There is a part that didn't exactly confuse me, but he argued that he didn't want to be only a vendor to his company. He ended up being a vendor and a partner to the company. He wanted to maximize his sales profits to his customer and as a partner the highest quality for franchisees to maximize their profit and therefore his. This surprised me, it was smart.
4. I know persistence is part important of your book's lesson but did that persistence came through the moment the McDonalds brothers showed you their system, or you were showing it with every business on the way?
Would you do everything as you did it? taking into account what you've lost in your personal life and what you gained monetarily?
5. I think he would say that hard work is different in the different areas, and what matters is not the knowledge you have, but the persistence you show to have what you want. I agree that it is an important factor, but I don't think is the only one when accomplishing goals. Maybe in business but not in all.