CAS E STU D
IN THIS CASE STUDY
Restaurant chains have unique challenges when training employees.
They often have high turnover, a dispersed workforce (both full- and part-time), and employees who often lack access to computers and may have lower levels of formal education. Continual changes in menus, safety standards and procedures mean that restaurants must provide continuous learning to their employees. The restaurant chain featured in this case study is known for having extensive training for its staff and managers. Because it serves a wide assortment of menu items, the company has to train its employees thoroughly on how to prepare and present the different dishes to ensure customer satisfaction. To guarantee that, the company has invested in a rigorous training and support model to enable its workforce to learn, feel prepared and find opportunities for growth.
When the recession hit and consumers began eating out less, the organization used the down economy as an opportunity to revisit its approach to training and development. The company’s CEO wanted to leverage the latest learning, engagement and technology strategies to connect, inspire and educate its workforce. To accomplish this, the CEO championed additional investments in social media, and implemented a team to support and integrate its use for learning.
This would not be the only modality of training, of course, since there is little substitute for structured, on-the-job training for roles such as a server or cook. But structured experiences captured and shared through social media could, to a large degree, enhance or replace some of the more monotonous lecture-style activities
FOCUS:
Structured Social Learning for Today’s Workforce
How One Company Uses Interactive Videos to Train and Engage Its Workforce
—Janet Clarey, Senior Analyst | June, 2012
ENTERPRISE LEARNING
ORGANIZATION AND GOVERNANCE
LEARNING PROGRAMS CONTENT DEVELOPMENT
LEARNING MEASUREMENT
LEARNING SYSTEMS INFORMAL
LEARNING
typically dominated by PowerPoint presentations and “one-size-fits-all”
mass monologues.
In 2011, the company rolled out an interactive learning management and social engagement platform that allows its more than 25,000 staff members and managers to share videos which they create, both work-related and not.
The platform, created by a social-learning platform company, has allowed the company’s staff to glean and share best practices and cultural nuggets through storytelling across its network of restaurants – and to do so in a way that is more engaging, fun and relevant than traditional lecture-style training.
According to a vice president of the organization,
“This model and the technology platform are geared to support learning experiences and the recognition of knowledge champions, much like Sal Khan and the Khan Academy1 have achieved through YouTube for our kids.”
With this approach, the organization has been able to launch targeted learning initiatives that have improved its new-menu rollout training, culture development initiatives and customer experiences.
Its experience in creating and implementing the social, video-based program offers lessons to any company seeking to integrate what the company calls
“structured” social-learning and engagement technologies, while meeting business needs. Today’s workers are increasingly comfortable with social media technologies, such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter; the company's example shows how a company can modernize its training to conform with advances in technology and staff expectations.
In this case study, readers will learn:
• How the company conceived and rolled out the video-based, social- learning program;
• The steps it took to pave the way for the new initiative and encourage its acceptance among its workforce;
• The challenges the new system posed and the issues that the company was forced to confront;
• The benefits that the company has realized since unveiling it; and,
• How the organization is building on its experience with the initiative to move into other structured social-learning endeavors. e
1 The kahn Academy is a not-for-profit educational organization. Its website supplies, for free, a collection of thousands of video tutorials stored on YouTube.
This case study shows how the restaurant chain modernized its training to integrate advances in technology and to correspond with staff expectations.
KEY POINT
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Contents
Company Overview 5
Business Environment and Challenges 5
Talent Challenges and Strategies 5
HR Organization and Environment 6
Recognizing the Need to Change Training 7
The Changing Nature of Employee Learning 8
The Social Media Revolution 9
Launching the Video Program 10
Video Guidelines and Uses 11
Improved Training with Video 13
Changing the Culture with Video 14
Tools and Technology 14
Change Management 15
Metrics / Evaluation / Business Impact 16
Best Practices / Lessons Learned 17
Next Steps / Looking Ahead 17
Conclusion 18 Appendix I: Topics for Discussion and Learning 19
key Learnings 19
Ideas for Action 19
Questions to Consider 20
Appendix II: Table of Figures 21
About Us 22
About This Research 22
Company Overview
The national restaurant chain featured in this case study has more than 100 restaurants throughout the U.S. and abroad. The company's restaurants are casual, sit-down restaurants that place a premium on good service and freshly prepared food.
The company was founded more than 35 years ago as a "mom-and-pop shop," expanding its offerings and growing into a restaurant empire.
Business Environment and Challenges
Restaurants are a highly competitive industry, with plenty of choices for consumers. This particular organization believes that it stands out, based on its menu and overall customer experience.
As a whole, the restaurant industry’s health traditionally fluctuates with the health of the nation’s economy.2 When the economic downturn hit, restaurants suffered. In the case of this organization, sales declined, the restaurant chain slowed its opening of new restaurants and its stock
plunged. As the economy has improved, so have the company’s sales, pace of restaurant openings and share price.
Talent Challenges and Strategies
Because of the breadth and complexity of its operational model, the company focuses on hiring only the best people and then trains them extensively. Its hiring is very selective – only four percent of applicants end up being hired, according to the company.
When the company hires employees, it trains them using a blended approach of formal and informal learning. New employees receive up to two weeks
2 Source: “Economist’s Notebook,” National Restaurant Association, June 16, 2011.
Figure 1: Restaurant Company at a Glance
• Employees: More than 25,000
• Annual Revenue: Approximately $2 billion
• Founded: 1970s
Source: Bersin & Associates, 2011.
When the recent recession hit and consumers began eating out less, the organization used the down economy as an opportunity to revisit its approach to training and development.
KEY POINT
of training, including instructor-led training (ILT) and structured on-the-job activities – primarily job shadowing3. New managers spend the first two months training on all aspects of the restaurant. Servers, for instance, typically spend two weeks learning about service standards and hospitality, restaurant operations and systems, their role and the food. Throughout this process, they shadow and are coached by experienced servers, who are internally certified as designated trainers. Along the way, the trainees are constantly coached and evaluated on both knowledge and their service to customers.
• Does a certain dish have peanuts in it?
• Do they have a welcoming smile?
• Did they greet guests appropriately and take their drink orders within the time a guest would expect?
New employees are subject to a written test with hundreds of questions that requires them to study. Achieving less than 90 percent means additional learning, support from their team of designated trainers and, ultimately, pride upon certification.
The company also conducts ongoing training (such as new-menu rollouts), service and hospitality programs, and software system implementations and upgrades. Like many restaurants, it also uses secret shoppers and guest surveys to evaluate customer service and the overall restaurant experience.
As compared with other industries, the restaurant industry typically has a high turnover rate. The average restaurant turns more than 75 percent of its employees in a year, according to the National Restaurant Association.4 The company continually tries to reduce turnover by offering flexible schedules, health benefits, and a culture of fun and collaboration that entices
employees to stay and develop a career in the food services industry.
HR Organization and Environment
The organization has a small corporate support center, relative to the number of staff members in its restaurants. In practice, this means that most of the human resources functions take place in the restaurants. HR at the company’s headquarters puts programs in place that are implemented at the local level.
This holds true as it relates to training. In the restaurants, up to 25 percent of employees are certified to be designated trainers for their job functions.
3 “Job shadowing” is an activity in which an individual spends time with a professional on the job, observing actual workplace tasks in order to explore best - practice performance in the work environment.
4 Source: “Statement of the National Restaurant Association,” December 1, 2010, http://www.restaurant.org/pdfs/ceo_report/NRA_Statement_on_Mini_Meds_and_
PPACA_12-01-10.pdf.
In the restaurants, up to 25 percent of employees are certified to be designated trainers for their job functions.
KEY POINT The restaurant chain's hiring is very selective – only four percent of applicants end up being hired, according to the company.
KEY POINT
They are assisted by a dozen regional training managers who have authority over different geographical areas and by a small team of course developers at the corporate support center.
HR is composed of several divisions, which report to the senior vice president of human resources – talent, staff relations, performance development, organizational engagement and compensation / benefits. The company’s senior vice president of human resources reports to the company’s CEO.
Recognizing the Need to Change Training
The organization has long prided itself on having some of the best training and development programs in the restaurant industry. When the recession hit and people started eating more meals at home, it was not content to simply hunker down and weather the slowing economy.
The company’s CEO recognized the need to continue innovating – and not just in the kitchen. He wanted to do something to raise the bar, enable greater involvement from the staff, and offer more effective, interactive and fun ways to learn. In 2011, he expanded the corporate learning team and added an engagement function that was tasked with driving innovation in training.
“Innovation” for the company means more than enabling a khan Academy- style platform internally to the company. A company vice president stated,
“We want to find ways to integrate our culture of sharing, fun, recognition and storytelling into all our materials and each learning experience.”
Figure 2: HR Organizational Chart
Source: Bersin & Associates, 2011.
CEO
Senior VP HR
Talent Staff Relations Performance
Development Organizational
Engagement Compensation / Benefits
In 2011, the CEO expanded the corporate performance development team and added an organizational engagement function that was tasked with driving innovation in training.
KEY POINT
When the executive team members were shown some possibilities around social media, especially utilizing video, they decided to test the waters. The CEO had recently brought in a futurist to talk about emerging trends; the futurist identified the importance of storytelling in engaging people. Sharing stories and knowledge through video seemed like a natural way by which to improve training, share the culture and recognize “go-to” people in the restaurants. A big part of what the organization does is sharing, so, the CEO approved the plan with a $20,000 budget and the support to move ahead.
The Changing Nature of Employee Learning
Traditionally, training at the restaurant chain has been a combination of instructor-led training and on-the-job coaching5. That remains true.
What is changing, however, is the nature of instructor-led training (ILT).
The notion of traditional ILT conjures images of binders, whiteboards, systems training and presentations. In truth, though, technology has played an increasing role in corporate training since personal computers became popular in the early 1980s. Since then, of course, advances in technology have brought changes in training. Companies now have an easier way to reach their employees.
Today, training at most companies tends to be blended – a mix of approaches that might include instructor-led training, e-learning and on-the-job training.
That is a far cry from the corporate training of 30 years ago.6 Nowadays, online delivery of training accounts for roughly one-third of total training time.7 The company has largely kept pace with these changes, focusing on a mix of coaching, job shadowing, video training, ILT, self-study, and testing and visual assessments. The ILT has made strides. For instance, when the company
5 “Coaching” refers to a broad category of management techniques in which the manager serves as a coach to others. Coaching includes setting standards, listening, understanding employee needs, providing ongoing feedback and often providing personal support to help individuals improve their performance. In corporate HR, coaching is a technique often used for executives (using external, professional coaches), for new managers and leaders (using external consultants, training
providers or internal coaches) and for other professionals who need help overcoming performance challenges. In many organizations, coaching is a process used internally, and taught to all managers and employees.
6 For a discussion of the history of corporate training and a framework for building corporate learning programs, please read, The Enterprise Learning Framework: A Modern Approach to Corporate Training, Bersin & Associates / Josh Bersin and David Mallon, April 2009. Available to research members at www.bersin.com/library.
7 For more information, Comparing Adoption of Rapid e-Learning Development Tools by Key U.S. Industries, Bersin & Associates / David Mallon and Janet Clarey, January 2011. Available to research members at www.bersin.com.
The organization focuses on a mix of coaching, job shadowing, video training, ILT, self-study, and testing and visual assessments.
KEY POINT
made changes to its menu, it would roll down training through its leadership levels, culminating in an “all staff” PowerPoint presentation made by the restaurant’s general manager. Now, these events include watching videos filled with stories and educational messages, followed by game stations through which staff members sample new-menu items, play learning games and compete as teams to win contributions to local charities.
The Social Media Revolution
By the late 2000s, new technologies were emerging and becoming popular in society. Social media was becoming common, with 51 percent of Americans aged 12 and older saying they have a Facebook account.8 About 35 percent of American adults own smartphones.9 Digital video was everywhere, with increasing numbers of Americans creating and posting videos on the Internet, as well as streaming television shows online.
The company saw that its staff was becoming more accustomed to using this technology; it realized that this offered the chance to share knowledge in new ways. Instead of a top-down training approach, the technologies offered the chance to tap into the thoughts and ideas of a wider base of experts. Just as YouTube and Facebook give users timely information from friends and other sources, so, too, could a structured social media-driven approach give restaurant managers, cooks or servers insights into doing their jobs from colleagues across the country.
In our research, we have found that, while the number of companies using social media for learning is still small, it appears to be growing. There are a number of different technology tools that companies can use to share expertise among the members of their workforces, from interactive discussion groups and communities of practice10 to blogs and employee directories that list individuals’ areas of expertise. The average U.S. company spent more on these types of informal learning tools and services between 2010 and 2011 – a figure expected to rise in the coming years.11
8 Source: “Facebook Achieves Majority,” Edison Research, March 2011, http://www.
edisonresearch.com/home/archives/2011/03/facebook_achieves_majority.php.
9 Source: “Smartphone Adoption and Usage,” Pew Internet and American Life Project, July 11, 2011, http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Smartphones.aspx.
10 A “community of practice” (CoP) is often defined as a group of people who share an interest or concern about a common topic, and who deepen their knowledge in this area through ongoing interaction and relationship-building within their group.
In corporate training, many CoP solutions utilize online discussion rooms and other technologies that facilitate the ongoing discussion and knowledge-sharing among close communities.
11 For more information, Training Spending: Where Is Your Money Going?, Bersin
& Associates / karen O’Leonard, March 24, 2011. Available to research members at www.bersin.com.
The restaurant saw that its staff was becoming more accustomed to using this technology; the company realized that this offered the chance to share knowledge in new ways.
KEY POINT
Launching the Video Program
The organization looked at how other companies had launched various user- generated video initiatives and chose to roll out its own in three phases. The first stage focused on capturing and housing culture-themed videos through contests on a voluntary basis. This would help to identify video skills sets throughout the company, test network capacities and measure potential voluntary participation levels.
The second phase focused on generating learning content. This enhanced existing training programs through structured requests that were supported by restaurant management and the corporate video team.
The third phase focused on supporting targeted experts in the development of their own specific “channels” of video learning content. The goal here was to build the critical mass of “go-to” experts, each with his / her own “channel” of video content necessary to enable the learning model and platform to self- sustain. In essence, this would be the equivalent of having its own internal restaurant version of the khan Academy.
It was clear from the beginning that, due to a lack of predecessors, rolling out the program would be a staged experiment; there was a lot to do.
• Tailor the platform to defined business requirements.
• Ensure social media policies were out and signed by staff.
• Ensure the network could support the anticipated traffic.
• Ensure that a governance team, and process to review video and comment submissions were in place.
Figure 3: Percent of U.S. Companies Using Social Learning Tools
Source: Bersin & Associates, 2010.
13%
26%
28%
33%
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%
Social Networking Expertise Directories Blogs, Wikis, Forums Communities of Practice
• Communicate policies, roles and processes to leaders.
• Resolve system and content access concerns for nonexempt staff.
In addition to making sure the technology worked, and that the company set up rules and standards for its use, the restaurant chain had to ensure the video content was relevant and engaging. The company had to select exactly what it wanted and the videos it would use.
To ensure success, the platform was designed to be engaging through the use of several techniques:
• The ability to support a point-based reward structure / badging;
• The use of game design techniques;
• Recognition opportunities;
• Localization;
• Community development; and,
• Others.
For example, users earn points for participating, including signing in, watching videos, completing courses, posting materials, commenting, recognizing others and updating their profiles. Those with the most points can earn their images on the home page and be recognized. User groups can be created, so that peers by role or location can develop a greater sense of community extending outside of their specific restaurants. Profiles and messaging allow people to reach out, connect and support others, offering opportunities to extend their value and contributions to the success of others.
Video Guidelines and Uses
When thinking of the possibilities, the company kept the following principles in mind.
• Keep the Videos Short – Nobody likes videos that drone on and on. One of the rules is that no video shall go longer than three minutes.
• Make the Videos Engaging – Many of the videos are made by the corporate office to stir up creativity and guide messaging; some are submitted by restaurant employees. Videos shared by staff and managers range from well-edited stories with lively music, themes and humor,
The restaurant chain designed its video program with users in mind – not with top- down corporate messages.
KEY POINT
while others are simply raw video files with sound, lighting and content issues. A company vice president commented,
“As long as the content meets our legal and HR standards, we usually leave them as is, or offer suggestions to the submitter for improvements that they or we can do. Fortunately amateur videos are often considered more ‘real’ and desirable than professionally produced video that companies typically use to get the message out.”
As far as production values go, the company's goal is to avoid boring training videos, like the “please buckle your seatbelt”-type videos on airplanes and the deep monotone voiceovers of the old “National Geographic”-type documentaries.
The company strives to select topics that viewers can identify with and to encourage creativity. For instance, in one of the first contests, servers were invited to submit their best greeting of a guest. More than 80 servers entered videos, but the buzz had many, many more practicing. Executives selected the 10 most creative greetings and rolled them into a training video presented during a new-menu training session to all staff – an example of using diffuse knowledge and sharing it companywide. This is something that the corporate team could not have done, given budgets, geographic distances, time, and the very real challenge of writing real-world content and capturing acting that is believable to the viewers.
As one company executive stated,
“What we got was excellent video of people doing perfect greets. They were describing our restaurants extremely well, using their own words. It’s not canned. It’s not the same way every time. They put their own personality into it.”
• Keep Staff Involved – The video initiative can be successful as a next- generation learning management system (LMS) with the addition of user-generated content and access to subject-matter experts (SMEs).
However, it will only become a part of the cultural fabric if it also
integrates social, recognition and storytelling attributes. As one company executive said,
The company encourages user- generated videos to be authentic and entertaining, not boring.
KEY POINT
“People don’t see it as another place they have to go to take a course. It’s a fun site to connect, be inspired and help out others by watching, participating in, and posting your own story and expertise.”
Many staff and managers come back to the site simply to listen to a story about a guest’s amazing experience, to upload a video of a team-building cheer their team put together, to see how the culinary team actually created that new dish or just to say “thanks” to someone in front of thousands of virtual people.
Ultimately, the company has objectives to meet with regard to training its staff and developing its culture. So although the platform is designed to be easy to use and engaging, targeted initiatives (such as film festivals, contests and team-building exercises) are regularly structured and managed to drive participation.
The company, of course, needs to be sure that it is appropriately paying staff for time worked. To that end, all uploaded content is reviewed and tagged as “work-related” or purely for fun (not work-related). Work-related content is not viewable by nonexempt staff outside of their restaurants, whereas non-work-related content is. This ensures that staff members are compensated for work-related participation, while still allowing for them to utilize the platform to develop communities of interest.
With video-editing software becoming more standard on personal computers, the company has learned that it has many amateur movie producers among its employees – and it taps into this knowledge base.
Improved Training with Video
At the restaurants, managers involved in training say that they enjoy the possibilities which shared video opens up, especially with servers and hosts.
The company has made an explicit effort to move away from a mechanical and utilitarian approach to describing dishes, in favor of an approach that values storytelling, as well as incorporating video-aids that tell stories.
For example, if a customer asks what a certain dish is, a conventional response from a server would be to say that it is a pasta with meat sauce.
But using the video-sharing program, trainees can see examples of servers using a storytelling-based approach that the company favors. For instance, on video, servers can describe how traditionally on Sundays, Italian families would take the meals they cooked throughout the prior few days and simmer them in a pot along with a rich marinara sauce, which gives the different meats a hearty and robust flavor.
As one company executive said,
“Not only do they have a pasta, but they’re able to share that story with their friends as they speak about their dining experience.
We’ve armed the staff with those small vignettes. It means more than saying, ‘It’s a pasta with meat sauce.’”
Changing the Culture with Video
The video program is not just a training tool – but a way to collect and preserve the company’s culture, while increasing employees’ engagement with their jobs. Strengthening culture and engagement should have benefits in employee retention, which could help reduce training costs.
A manager of one of the company’s restaurants said that, apart from training, the program ”... injects a dose of fun into our staff’s jobs, as well as spread the company’s culture.” Some of his staff, for instance, enjoyed creating company-related videos that spoofed a famous commercial. The manager continued,
“If you’re going to retain people and keep them engaged, we have to make sure the [company's] culture stays in every single person. It’s got to be more than just a job.
This is a way to capture that culture as we continue to grow our company globally.”
An HR executive added,
“It’s an environment where people can go to learn, to share their knowledge, to inspire others to learn and develop and grow.
It’s as much about learning as it is about culture development and communication development … through [video sharing], we can show our exuberance for something.”
Tools and Technology
Like many companies, the restaurant chain has a number of different enterprisewide systems (as a result of selecting best-of-breed solutions) and it is working to integrate those. The company uses a basic portal solution that acts primarily as a document repository for managers to retrieve the latest revisions to policies and processes. The restaurant chain also uses an
The organization views video-sharing as a way to build culture, not just train workers.
KEY POINT
extensive network of terminals to feed recipe videos to cooks for training and quality assurance purposes.
In 2010, the company added an LMS. Among other advantages, that system allowed it to launch formal training online, integrate its quizzing platform and use online observation checklists to track the progress of individual employees as they become certified by onsite managers.
The company sees the video program as its next-generation LMS and as a hedge against the traditional LMS solution. What it would like is the feature functionality of portals, LMSs and social software integrated into one system.
Currently, the video system is the closest solution to that vision.
In the restaurants, too, the company battles technological constraints.
Typically, each restaurant has only a few computers shared by managers and staff for operational duties. Restaurants also have DVD players, projectors, screens and TVs. The company is working to get computer tablets into the restaurants, which employees could then check out to work on training and videos.
Change Management
The strength of using social media is that it taps into knowledge spread throughout the organization – into the company's kitchens, dining rooms and hostess stands. Instead of being a top-down approach, it uses information from the bottom-up and many different providers supply the content.
In a corporate setting, however, these strengths can pose challenges.
• Who determines what content is appropriate?
• How do you encourage participation in what is, at its base, a work program?
• How do you compensate employees who are spending loads of time with the video program?
The restaurant grappled with all of these tough questions before launching the program and it has refined its approach as it evolved.
1. Establish Clear Rules for Content – Shortly after the restaurant chain launched its video initiative, three cooks in one restaurant submitted a video in which they sang the company’s values iby inhaling helium from balloons. It was a funny and entertaining video. After a review, though, the company’s staff relations department asked that the video be pulled.
Staff relations worried that the video was encouraging employees to breathe helium gas while at work, a potential safety hazard.
The organization embedded clear rules and structure beneath its social learning program to adapt it to the corporate environment.
KEY POINT
The episode underscored the need for clear rules about acceptable content. The company established a review committee, which meets monthly, composed of staff relations, legal, training and operations. It has documented, written policies regarding content. For content that the company produces, it puts a small logo in the corner of the screen.
User-submitted content has no logo, so the company can identify
“rogue content.”
2. Clearly Distinguish between Work and Non-Work – Because the initiative has both work and non-work components, it is important that the company draw a bright line between the two. Employees can access it while at home, but the company’s system recognizes that they are at home and permits access only to the social, non-work side.
3. Establish a Structure That Promotes Participation – On social media sites such as YouTube, certain videos go viral with really no structure behind them – someone posts a video of cats doing funny things, word spreads organically and the next thing you know it has one million hits. In a corporate setting, however, the company has found that good ideas need a little nudge. It has set up a structure to encourage its use, using prizes and contests, usually overseen by a moderator. The corporate office told the restaurants that it expected them to use the system, which ensured that it was used. The company said people did not resist the change – most understood what the company was doing and why, and the company’s culture encourages fun and experimentation. But the company still needed to take steps to get staff and managers to start using the program.
Metrics / Evaluation / Business Impact
Clearly, the video program is only one part of a bigger, blended-training approach that combines formal and informal kinds of learning.
Still, the restaurant chain has seen measurable results against its metrics. In the first three months of its use, about one-third of staff participated, with more than 10,000 views into the system.
Because the company uses the platform for new-menu introductions, it is able to measure how well employees are performing. As a result of more engaged training strategies such as this one, the company has seen retention of learning content increase by 25 percent to 35 percent. That means
that servers are learning the new-menu items more efficiently now than previously. The restaurant chain has also seen a reduction in the percentage of meals that customers send back to the kitchen, which it believes stems from servers’ improved understanding of menu items. This increased knowledge improves productivity and results in higher guest satisfaction.
The company has set up a structure around its video platform to encourage its use, using prizes and contests, usually overseen by a moderator.
KEY POINT
As a result of more engaged training strategies, such as the video program, the company has seen retention of learning content increase by 25 percent to 35 percent.
KEY POINT
Measuring the effect of the system on the organizational culture is harder and employee surveys show similar levels of employee engagement as in the past. Anecdotally, however, the company says that the platform is succeeding – employees are enjoying it, having fun, laughing and paying attention.
Best Practices / Lessons Learned
1. The Organization Empowered Employees – The company did not take a one-size-fits-all, top-down approach. While providing a structure, it sought to harness the ideas, creativity and skills of its employees throughout its entire system – for the benefit of the company as a whole.
It did so by creating a fun, visual, engaging system designed to appeal to employees, as opposed to a system that reflected only the priorities of the corporate office.
2. The Company Adapted the Technology to Fit the Needs of the Business – Like many companies, the restaurant chain has a patchwork of different systems, platforms and software, but executives did not feel bound by existing technology. With the employee-user in mind and with the help of outside experts, the company, along with its solution provider, designed a system to meet its needs. It let the user’s experience, not the technology, determine how the video platform was to function.
3. The Company Devised Clear Rules – While social media tends to be the
“Wild West” in terms of regulations and conventions, the company realized that corporate social media required rules to function. It
convened regular meetings of stakeholders from different divisions to try to head off problems before they arose.
Next Steps / Looking Ahead
The video platform is not the last technological innovation for this restaurant chain. The company’s HR executives are examining other technologies that could improve employees’ learning, such as interactive gaming.
Drawing inspiration from mobile phone apps, the company has looked at creating games like one in which players catch hamburger ingredients in a certain order to win points. The company, of course, has hamburgers and many other sandwiches, so a game customized toward the different ingredients and toppings would be relevant.
It has also found inspiration in the other consumer apps like one which offers users a series of simple puzzles to solve. The company could integrate its recipes into challenges for its cooks to more easily understand; for instance, for salad preparation, cut the tomatoes, add dressing, toss three
times – in that order. Get it right, advance to the next level; get it wrong, go back.
The goal, the company says, is to continue to innovate and find engaging ways to keep employees interested and learning.
Conclusion
Faced with a traditional, blended approach to training, the organization sought to reinvigorate the way in which its employees learned. The company took its existing technology, and mixed it with a new system that allowed employees to create and share videos throughout the organization.
While the company established rules, it placed a premium on encouraging creativity. It navigated potential legal minefields through careful
collaboration. It sought to tap into the knowledge and skills of employees throughout its network of restaurants – and the company tried to do it all in a way that was fun and engaging.
As a result, the company has experienced some success in how its workers are retaining knowledge. The new video platform system is an important part of building a more vibrant and collaborative corporate culture as the
company expands.
The new video system is an important part of building a more vibrant and collaborative corporate culture as the organization expands.
KEY POINT
The following sections will provide you with considerations for sharing and implementing the best practices that were highlighted in this report.
Key Learnings
Below is a list of key learnings (the “gems”) from this case study.
1. Providing structure around social learning supports employees, and protects the company from unintended behaviors and actions.
2. A strong learning culture is crucial for the success of social learning.
3. When buying social software or developing a social platform, learning and development (L&D) must make sure that the user interface is easy to use and engaging.
4. When implementing social learning, incentives and contests that reward end-users can speed up adoption.
5. Identifying potential issues upfront and having governance in place to deal with those issues heads off problems that might arise down the road.
Ideas for Action
Below is a list of actions that you can take in order to apply or implement the best practices highlighted in this report. These are some of the foundational elements that we highly recommend be in place inside your company in order to execute such a plan, process or program.
1. Know Your Capabilities – You may feel as though you can do all the design and development in-house. It is often faster, more effective and overall less costly to leverage the expertise of an experienced
solution provider.
2. Build Strong Partnerships – Successful programs are the result of building strong partnerships with all stakeholders, including learners, councils, managers and internal business segments providing support.
3. Overcome Objections Early – Devise a change management strategy to overcome objections, and get everyone “onboard” and engaged.
Appendix I: Topics for Discussion and Learning
Providing structure around social learning supports employees, and protects the company from unintended behaviors and actions.
BEST PRACTICE4. Utilize Multiple Delivery Channels and Methods to Support Transfer of Learning – A “once-and-done” approach to training is ineffective and costly. Extend the classroom learning and keep key objectives in front of learners by utilizing multiple delivery channels, like user-generated video content and social media.
Questions to Consider
Below is a list of discussion questions that you can ask your team, colleagues and business leaders, which will help you to take the next steps.
1. Is your social-learning initiative based on business strategy?
2. Does management empower and support employees to share?
3. Will your social-learning initiative immediately impact on-the-job performance?
4. Is leadership engaged in the program?
5. Does your staff have the skills needed to oversee a social-learning initiative?
6. Have you identified potential objections and, if so, do you have a change management plan ready to implement?
Successful programs are the result of building strong partnerships with all stakeholders, including learners, councils, managers and internal business segments providing support.
KEY POINT
Appendix II: Table of Figures
Figure 1: Restaurant Company at a Glance 5
Figure 2: HR Organizational Chart 7
Figure 3: Percent of U.S. Companies Using Social Learning Tools 10
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About This Research
Copyright © 2012 Bersin & Associates. All rights reserved. WhatWorks® and related names such as Rapid e-Learning: WhatWorks® and The High-Impact Learning Organization® are registered trademarks of Bersin & Associates. No materials from this study can be duplicated, copied, republished or reused without written permission from Bersin & Associates. The information and forecasts contained in this report reflect the research and studied opinions of Bersin & Associates analysts.
