Assignment 13A

Assignment 13A- Reading Reflection No.1 

I read Grinding It Out by Ray Kroc and I enjoyed the book and admired what he was able to do to get McDonald's to be a successful company. What surprised me the most about this book was his ability to do a sales pitch to anyone and get them as engaged as they all were. He was able to sell anything that he put his mind to and did not shy away from voicing his opinion. He told the customer exactly what they would be getting and he cared about optimizing their profits while also being able to sell his products. I admired his hard work and determination, no matter what hardships came his way he was always able to face them head on. He always worked for everything that he had and nothing was given to him. Everything that he put his mind to he was able to achieve and no one could stop him. What I least admired about Ray Kroc was that although he was opportunistic he was always very overly confident. He was never able to take no as an answer and he almost always let his ego get in the way of things he did. Ray Kroc encountered a lot of hardships while he was starting out with McDonald's. The McDonald brothers were writing out contracts for him that had a lot of "wrinkles" in them. They didn' state officially that he would be able to open up all the stores that he was opening and he thought at any moment they could've been taken away. However, he continued working hard and opening the stores and kept giving the brothers that they had agreed upon for the franchise. I noticed that he was very opportunistic and a hard worker. He never  took no as an answer, and he always seemed to hire the right people. He had a knack of hiring the right people to do the job and he always made sure his team was very complete and had a different skills that he himself might've not had. One part of the book that was confused on was the deal that the brothers had with Ray. I was confused because Ray seemed to have offered them a good thing and the brothers should've written a contract stating everything. It seemed like the contract was confusing in many ways and it would've been better for the business deal if they had had clear boundaries. If I were to ask my entrepreneur any question it would be why he placed his job above his family. It seemed like he wanted to put no effort into keeping his marriage with Ethel and I would like to know why. I would also want to ask him what exactly he saw in the McDonald's restaurant, why did he know that it would be such a successful franchise. I think that my entrepreneurs idea of hard work is being opportunistic. He always saw a business opportunity in anything that he put his mind into. I share that opinion but not as much as he does. He is was willing to do anything it took to get the business going and I'm not sure I would be able to have that mentality.