NorthAmericanMcDarrells! | My One-Shift McDonald’s Career at 14

WELCOME BACK TO NORTHAMERICAN McDARRELLs!

How this crazy adventure started!

Fourteen years old. Three dollars and thirty cents an hour. The promise of a free lunch.

And a career at McDonald’s that lasted exactly ONE SHIFT!

Now, you’d think a kid who loved Big Macs would be a natural at making them.

You would be wrong.

But before the Golden Arches came my very first adventure in the workforce: delivering newspapers back home in Canada in the freezing cold temperature.

This was probably the first sign, I didn’t belong in the cold!

Pretty simple job, right? Pick up the papers, follow your route, drop them at the correct houses, and collect your pay.

There was just one little problem.

I couldn’t remember which houses were supposed to get a newspaper!

Some paying customers received their paper. Some people who hadn’t ordered one received a free copy. And some actual subscribers were probably looking out their front windows wondering where the heck their newspaper was.

CONGRATULATIONS! YOU’VE WON A COMPLIMENTARY SUBSCRIPTION!

I had accidentally created a business model where I gave away the merchandise and forgot the paying customers.

Even at that age, I was apparently pioneering terrible customer service.

You might think that experience would have taught me something about paying attention to instructions.

Well, the next employer was about to find out how much I’d learned.

McDONALD’S!

I was fourteen years old, and I was excited. Really excited.

There was never a Big Mac I didn’t love as a kid. And now I was going to work in the very place that made them!

Plus, the wages sounded fantastic to me.

THREE DOLLARS AND THIRTY CENTS AN HOUR!

My own money! A real job!

Although, looking back, I have to wonder whether I was actually more excited about the free lunch they advertised.

YOU MEAN I’LL GET PAID TO BE AROUND BIG MACS AND THERE’S LUNCH? WHERE DO I SIGN?

It was a brilliant plan.

Right up until my first shift, when I discovered one rather important detail.

They expected me to remember the process.

Somebody could explain what to do, and I’d think, okay, got it.

Then things started moving. Orders, people, pressure.

The faster everything happened, the less I could remember.

It’s one thing to love a Big Mac. It’s another thing entirely to make one when everybody’s waiting and your brain has left the building.

So I reached for the one bit of McDonald’s training I already knew by heart.

The commercial!

That famous Big Mac jingle.

I kept singing it, hoping the words would tell my hands what to do.

Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame seed bun.

I knew every word!

But no matter how many times I ran through that song, I still couldn’t remember the process under pressure.

I COULD SING THE BURGER, BUT I COULDN’T BUILD THE DAMN THING!

The marketing department had done an outstanding job.

My ability to follow the kitchen routine? Not so outstanding.

And here’s the part that makes me laugh now.

I’ve traveled around the world and eaten Big Macs in country after country.

I’ve ordered them from menus in languages I couldn’t even read.

Different countries, different signs, different languages, same familiar burger.

And every time, the person making it seemed to know exactly what to do.

APPARENTLY EVERYBODY ON THE PLANET LEARNED HOW TO MAKE A BIG MAC.

Except fourteen-year-old McDarrell.

I could find a Big Mac halfway around the world without speaking the language.

But put me in the kitchen, with instructions in English, and suddenly I was completely lost!

I COULD EAT THEM AROUND THE WORLD.

I JUST COULDN’T MAKE ONE!

Now, you’d think the burger confusion would have been enough drama for a first day.

Not quite.

Somebody asked me to clean the bathroom.

No.

That was my answer.

Just… no.

Apparently, I was fourteen years old and already negotiating the terms of my employment!

I had walked in dreaming about three dollars and thirty cents an hour and a free lunch.

Instead I was struggling to remember the procedures and being asked to clean a bathroom.

I wasn’t exactly a model employee.

And that was it for my glorious career under the Golden Arches.

ONE SHIFT!

Not a summer. Not a week. One shift.

No long career. No chance to work my way up to management.

Just one unforgettable shift!

Think about my early résumé.

Newspaper delivery: some of the customers didn’t get their papers, while the neighbors got freebies.

McDonald’s: could remember the jingle, couldn’t remember the steps, and wouldn’t clean the bathroom.

THE FUTURE OF CANADIAN INDUSTRY WAS LOOKING BRIGHT!

Of course, life went in a different direction.

I eventually graduated in telecommunications, worked eighteen years in that field, and then spent another seven in banking and financial services.

But here’s what I like about telling this story now.

In Episode 54, I talked about why I keep creating and sharing these stories.

Well, this is one of the answers.

Not everything worth remembering is a grand adventure on the other side of the world.

Sometimes it’s being a kid, excited about a few dollars an hour, and discovering you’re spectacularly unsuited to your dream fast-food job.

And if you heard Episode 45, you’ll know work and earning money didn’t stop presenting surprises later in life, either.

At least my adult Airbnb problems didn’t require me to memorize a burger recipe!

I still love Big Macs.

I still know that jingle.

And whenever I see those Golden Arches in another country, I think about the millions of people who managed to do the job I couldn’t handle at fourteen.

If McDonald’s ever offers me another shift, I might have to negotiate.

Three dollars and thirty cents an hour?

Not going to cut it anymore.

Free lunch?

Now you’ve got my attention.

Cleaning the bathroom?

STILL NO!

That’s NORTHAMERICAN McDARRELLs!

A LEGEND IN MY OWN MIND, AND DEFINITELY NOT EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH!

Thanks for listening to another true story from the NorthAmericanDarrell Podcast.

Find the stories, videos, and everything else at NorthAmericanDarrell.com.

READ! WATCH! LISTEN!

And I’ll catch you on the next adventure!