Mgt400 Leader Profiling
Mgt400 Leader Profiling
Mgt400 Leader Profiling
LEADER PROFILING
PREPARED BY:
(2021870664)
IM2462ST1
PREPARED FOR :
DATE OF SUBMISSION:
24 MAY 2022
INTRODUCTION
I choose this leader Colonel Harland David Sanders who is founder of Kentucky Fried
Chicken. Colonel Harland David Sanders (September 9, 1890 – December 16, 1980) was an
American businessman, best known for founding fast food chicken restaurant chain Kentucky
Fried Chicken (also known as KFC) and later acting as the company's brand ambassador and
symbol. His name and image are still symbols of the company. The title "colonel" is an
honorific title, the highest awarded by the Commonwealth of Kentucky, the Kentucky Colonel,
and is not a military rank. The Governor of Kentucky bestows the honor of a colonel's
commission, by issuance of letters patent.
The company's rapid expansion across the United States and overseas became
overwhelming for Sanders. In 1964, then 73 years old, he sold the company to a group of
investors led by John Y. Brown Jr. and Jack C. Massey for $2 million ($17.5 million today).
However, he retained control of operations in Canada, and he became a salaried brand
ambassador for Kentucky Fried Chicken. In his later years, he became highly critical of the
food served by KFC restaurants, as he believed they had cut costs and allowed quality to
deteriorate.
EARLY LIFE
Harland David Sanders was born on September 9, 1890, in a four-room house located
3 miles (5 km) east of Henryville, Indiana. He was the oldest of three children born to Wilbur
David and Margaret Ann (née Dunlevy) Sanders. His mother was of Irish and Dutch descent.
The family attended the Advent Christian Church. His father was a mild and affectionate man
who worked his 80-acre farm, until he broke his leg in a fall. He then worked as a butcher in
Henryville for two years. Sanders' mother was a devout Christian and strict parent,
continuously warning her children of "the evils of alcohol, tobacco, gambling, and whistling
on Sundays."
Sanders' father died in 1895. His mother got work in a tomato cannery, and the young
Harland was left to look after and cook for his siblings. By the age of seven, he was reportedly
skilled with bread and vegetables, and improving with meat; the children foraged for food while
their mother was away at work for days at a time. In 1899, his mother remarried to Edward
Park, and according to the 1900 census, his mother was widowed. When he was 10, Sanders
began to work as a farmhand.
In 1902, Sanders' mother remarried to William Broaddus, and the family moved to
Greenwood, Indiana. Sanders had a tumultuous relationship with his stepfather. In 1903 (age
12), he dropped out of seventh grade (later stating that "algebra's what drove me off"), and
went to live and work on a nearby farm. At age 13, he left home and took a job painting horse
carriages in Indianapolis. When he was 14, he moved to southern Indiana to work as a
farmhand.
After running a successful café in Corbier, Kentucky, for 27 years, at the age of 66,
Sanders started what would become the franchise business, Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Capitalizing on the popularity of the simple fried chicken that had been a staple of his café,
Sanders grew his chain from just 5 stores in 1958 to over 600 in 1963. The success of the
franchise provided much wealth to the honorary Colonel, and even after he sold the company
in 1964, he remained the staple of the company’s brand image, as did his special, secret-recipe
chicken.
EDUCATION
Sanders was raised according to the strict teachings of conservatism and religious
fundamentalism. From an early age he learned self-reliance and developed a love of work, a
suspicion of welfare, and an intense dislike of vice. "Mom didn't spare the rod if we disobeyed
her," he recalled in the New Yorker.
When Sanders was 12, his mother remarried. Because her new husband disliked the
children, they were all sent away to live elsewhere. Young Harland went to work as a farmhand
in Indiana, earning about $15 a month. He quit several years later and then held a series of
menial, low-paying jobs. His formal education ended in the seventh grade, but later in life he
obtained two degrees from correspondence schools.
CAREER
At age 40, Sanders was running a service station in Kentucky, where he would also feed
hungry travelers. Sanders eventually moved his operation to a restaurant across the street and
featured a fried chicken so notable that he was named a Kentucky colonel in 1935 by Governor
Ruby Laffoon.
In 1952, Sanders began franchising his chicken business. His first franchise sale went
to Pete Harman, who ran a restaurant in Salt Lake City where “Kentucky Fried Chicken” had
the allure of a Southern regional specialty. When a new interstate reduced traffic at Sanders'
own restaurant in North Carolina, he sold the location in 1955. He then started traveling across
the country, cooking batches of chicken from restaurant to restaurant, striking deals that paid
him a nickel for every chicken the restaurant sold. In 1964, with more than 600 franchised
outlets, he sold his interest in the company for $2 million to a group of investors.
Kentucky Fried Chicken went public in 1966 and was listed on the New York Stock
Exchange in 1969. More than 3,500 franchised and company-owned restaurants were in
worldwide operation when Heublein Inc. acquired KFC Corporation in 1971 for $285 million.
KFC became a subsidiary of R.J. Reynolds Industries, Inc. (now RJR Nabisco, Inc.), when
Heublein Inc. was acquired by Reynolds in 1982. KFC was acquired in October 1986 from
RJR Nabisco, Inc. by PepsiCo, Inc., for approximately $840 million.
Sanders continued to visit the KFC restaurants around the world as an ambassador
spokesman in his later years. He died on December 16, 1980, at the age of 90, in Louisville,
Kentucky.
PERSONAL LIFE
Harland Sanders was born in 1890 and grew up on a farm in Indiana. When he was 6
years old, Sanders' father died, leaving him to take care of his younger brother and sister while
his mom spent long days working. One of these responsibilities was feeding his siblings, and
by age 7 he was already a decent cook, according to the New Yorker. His mom remarried when
he was 12. Because his new stepfather didn't like the boys around, Sanders' brother was sent to
live with an aunt while he was sent to work on a farm about 80 miles away. Sanders soon
realized he would rather work all day than go to school, so he dropped out in the seventh grade.
Sanders held a number of jobs in his early life, such as steam engine stoker, insurance
salesman, and filling station operator. He began selling fried chicken from his roadside
restaurant in North Corbin, Kentucky, during the Great Depression. During that time, Sanders
developed his "secret recipe" and his patented method of cooking chicken in a pressure fryer.
Sanders recognized the potential of the restaurant franchising concept, and the first KFC
franchise opened in South Salt Lake, Utah, in 1952. When his original restaurant closed, he
devoted himself full-time to franchising his fried chicken throughout the country.
❖ By the time of Sanders' death, there were an estimated 6,000 KFC outlets in 48 countries
worldwide, with $2 billion ($6.6 billion today) of sales annually.
❖ Colonel Sanders was the recipient of the Horatio Alger Award in 1965. In 1976, the
Colonel was named world’s second most recognizable celebrity.
❖ At the age of 90, the Colonel was stricken with leukemia. Until his death in 1980, he
traveled 250,000 miles a year, visiting the KFC empire that he had founded.
❖ In 1986, the March of Dimes sponsored the first award for lifetime achievement in
research and education in the genetic sciences. The award is presented during
the March of Dimes portion of the Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting.
REFERENCES
Conrad N. Hilton College Hilton University of Houston 4450 University Dr., Room 227
Houston.
https://uh.edu/hilton-college/About/Hospitality-Industry-Hall-of-Honor/Inductees/Colonel-
Harland-Sanders
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonel_Sanders
Colonel Harland Sanders Biography (1890–1980) APR 27, 2017 A&E Television Network.
https://www.biography.com/business-figure/colonel-harland-sanders
https://www.hbs.edu/leadership/20th-century
leaders/Pages/details.aspx?profile=harland_sanders