The firm employs approximately 67,000 staff and spends £30 million on training each year. But the fact it has such large resources, said the judges, should not detract from the scale of its learning and development achievements. Not only does McDonald's benefit through improved productivity, but so does the wider economy. The fast-food giant trains often under-educated people, knowing they are likely to move on to other jobs soon after gaining new skills.
McDonald's, which gained awarding body status last year from the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, has an L&D strategy for each employee group: 'crew members'; restaurant management teams and franchisees; and office staff and middle managers.
Training of crew members happens on the shop floor and in other settings. Proof of its success is the fact that 94% of McDonald's business managers began their careers flipping burgers.
For restaurant management teams and franchisees, the recent focus has been on flexible and field-based training. Other initiatives include a service leadership programme and an extended hours workshop. The former, designed to improve staff confidence, raised McDonald's mystery diner score by 2.5%. The latter was developed to help managers prepare for a change to trading hours in certain restaurants.
For office staff and middle managers the emphasis has been on providing more opportunities for personal and team development. At the beginning of 2008 there was a 100% increase in the number of internal courses.
Judges' comments
The judges liked how L&D was linked to the business plan. "McDonald's business performance owes much to the success of this strategy," they said.
HIGHLY COMMENDED - Howden Group
The need to recruit 350 graduate-level engineers over the next five years was the driving force behind Howden Group's decision to invest £3.5 million in a partnership with Glasgow Caledonian University to create the Howden Academy. The on-the-job training previously provided by the engineering company was no longer sufficient to cope with the number of new recruits, who were required to hit the ground running.
A three-week residential training programme that would help new engineers become effective quickly was identified as the solution. It was the efficiency with which the company identified the problem and came up with a clear idea of what it wanted to achieve that most impressed the awards judges.
