From Extreme Adversity, Flor Palacios Has Built a Remarkable, Wonderful Life

Having once lived in oppressive poverty and a bad marriage in her native Honduras, Flor Palacios is today the picture of grace and gratitude for the great success she has been able to achieve since she came to America.
Palacios, of Stevenson Ranch, is humble about discussing her accomplishments but proud to acknowledge that she has worked very hard for them – and happy to explain why.
“The harder I work, the better things get,” says Palacios, 46, a joyous woman with an uplifting spirit and a smile in her voice.
On top of routinely working 50-hour weeks in her job as a district manager for the Carl’s Jr. restaurant chain and also managing a home, marriage and children, for the past two years, Palacios has added a full college course load.
In June, she graduated with honors from College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, earning an AA in accounting. She is enrolled for the fall at CSU Northridge, where she plans to earn dual bachelor’s degrees in business administration and either business law or communication. She hopes one day to become a lawyer.
Palacios credits her employer for its ongoing support as she pursues an advanced education. Carl’s Jr.’s parent company, Carpinteria-based CKE Restaurants, Inc., is not only accommodating her school schedule, but its CKE Educational Reimbursement Plan is paying her up to $1,500 each school year, based on her grades. “This has been key,” Palacios says.
Palacios acknowledges the occasional strain of overwork, but she does not complain. She is forever aware of how far she has come from the extreme poverty and bad marriage she fled in 1986, seeking a better life for herself and her then-infant son, Dennis Trochez.  With three-month-old Dennis in tow, with zero English skills but with a ton of will, she fled to the U.S., settling first in Los Angeles.
As a single mother, she was able to get a room in the Wilmington projects. She eventually landed a job as a salad bar hostess at a Carl’s Jr. in Torrance, riding the bus to work and to the ESL and office skills classes she started taking immediately, to help prepare herself and her son for their new life here.
With her indomitable energy, work ethic and leadership skills, Palacios rose through the ranks at Carl’s Jr., to her present position, overseeing the general managers of nine Carl’s Jr. restaurants and more than 200 employees in the Antelope Valley.
At home, Palacios enjoys her life with her “wonderful husband” of 15 years, Salvador, also a Carl’s Jr. district manager, and children, Dennis, now 24, and 9-year-old Amanda. Next up for the family: a new backyard swimming pool.
“I have been blessed a lot,” Palacios says.
Among her secrets for success is her ability to make every life experience a life lesson. “You learn from everybody,” she says. “I learn a lot from my employees.”
There also is her drive to make the world around her a better place.
“I have a philosophy,” she says. “I believe that what we have is today. And every day, I want to leave it better than it was the day before.”