Report on McDonald's Global Culture and Exploitation Practices

This report examines the cultural challenges faced by McDonald's, particularly in Australia, focusing on allegations of exploiting young workers through 'learn and churn' practices. The report, prepared for BUS707 Managing Across Global Cultures, analyzes the exploitation of employees, particularly those under 18, highlighting the impact of junior rates and the phasing out of older employees to reduce costs. It explores employee testimonies, the exploitative nature of the system, and the company's response. The report also provides recommendations for McDonald's, including a balanced hiring approach and equal pay for all employees, emphasizing the importance of ethical practices and the retention of older, loyal employees.

Managing across global culture

Managing across global culture 1
Contents
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
Purpose..............................................................................................................................................2
Authorization.....................................................................................................................................2
Scope.................................................................................................................................................2
Limitation..........................................................................................................................................2
Article synopsis.....................................................................................................................................3
Concerns contributing........................................................................................................................3
Revelations made by the employees..................................................................................................3
McDonald’s system exploitative........................................................................................................4
Recommendations.................................................................................................................................5
References.............................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
The global culture is all about sharing experiences, customs, signs, and thoughts which bond
people together at the universal level. The culture takes place at the domestic, regional,
global, city, neighbourhood, subgroup or super culture levels. When it comes to business,
then global culture is all about sharing business habits, conventions, symbols, and
expectations. It comprises several basic concepts like company, meeting, team or innovation.
Nowadays more and more business is entering into the global market. It makes essential for
the business to comprehend that cultural differences can influence the way they are
performing in the local markets and targeting. There are four different levels for conducting
business like the nation, business, industry and the organization. All of these levels of the
cultural links with and assists to develop others.
The culture influences the consumer behavior greatly along with their spending pattern, the
main choice of buying and expense nature. The significant difference between the cultures
affects the suitability and appeal of products in the several regions of the world are still
remaining (Robertson and Buhari-Gulmez, 2017). The culture has a similar impact on the
attraction and permissibility of various sorts of commercials in the different regions. The
outcome of the global businesses has to offer vigilant considerations to the culture in order to
designing, marketing and promoting product or service which is being offered. In order to
manage culture, an organization has to take care of the differences in a culture like the
implication given to time, the obligation of regulations in the job associations and extent of
the capacity against the experience (Pieterse, 2015). Add on, the culture also has a great
influence on the stance to the job of workers, aspects of inspiration, commitment to the
company, individual ingenuity and group reliability. The top management of global
organizations undertakes various methods to tackle cultural differences.
This report defines the exploitation of young workers with the ‘learn and churn practices’ by
the McDonald. It has been also described the consequences senior employees faced due to
these practices (Schmid and Gombert, 2018).
Purpose
The purpose of this report is to improve the condition of the workers at McDonald by
managing global culture at the international level.
Authorization
The authorization has been granted by Dr. Saskia de Klerk, the course coordinator of
BUS707 Managing across global culture.
Scope
The scope of this report is restricted to managing across global culture. The scope of the
report is to discuss the issue faced in McDonald along with some recommendations.

Managing across global culture 3
Limitation
The report is limited on the basis of the word count assigned and the limited information
available on the subject and time.
Article synopsis
This report focuses on the cultural differences confronted by McDonald for accusing of
misusing young workers with the ‘learn and churn practices’. The article by Paul Farrell and
Alex McDonald can be found on the abc news
https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-09/learn-and-churn-mcdonalds-accused-of-
exploiting-young-workers/10342934?pfmredir=sm
McDonald Australia is suspect of analytically churning its staff and dropping shifts for the
workers as their capacity reduces due to the age factor. In order to cut costs the company
believes in hiring new and younger staff. It has been considered that the fast-food chain is
several employers in Australia with over 100,000 employees in the stores across the country.
The franchises of the stores greatly provide employment to the individuals in Australia.
McDonald and its franchisees have come under the inspection for pleasing in and conducting
churn practices as the staff grow holder and hires new and younger staff at the cheap prices
(Thomas, et al. 2018).
Concerns contributing
The chief executive officer of Australia’s McDonald, Andrew Gregor confronted that there is
no widespread practice across the stores. The company takes extremely to do the appropriate
things and sustain employment standards and norms. Andrew even accepted that half of the
workers in the restaurant are more than the age of 18. He also said that it is not standard
practice for the company to not employ those who are more than the age of 18. McDonald
needs major employees to run and operate the business (Lee and Lambert, 2017).
Revelations made by the employees
Nelio Da Silva was an employee who started working at McDonalds when he was 16. But as
he got mature in the organization, he observed that his roster was varying. After a while, he
even started to get less along with the fewer shifts. The fewer shifts as he got older led to
more expensive. The restaurant was interested in giving shifts that they could give to the
younger people. Other employees in the organization also started to drop off and ultimately
rest of the employees started to leave (Krueger, 2019).
The other employees in the stores also raised the same concern. Max Beech started working
at McDonald's store in Queensland when he was just sixteen and stimulated to Brisbane store
when he was eighteen. According to Max, getting purge of the old workers was an silent rule
between the managers. The managers took sufficient time to get rid of specific people for the
same reason. The major reason contributing to getting rid of the old people was to hire young
employees at the low prices which actually helped the company in reducing its costs (Davis,
2018). Employees turning 18 or 19 would led the company to phase them out as they were
getting old and the company would have to pay them too much. It was a communal practice

Managing across global culture 4
at the company. The individual in their 18s gets ready to work for the late afternoon/ evening
shifts, weekends, public holidays and school holidays. As most of are at school and ready to
work even for the lower salary. The number of people working in the McDonald restaurant
can be found more than the senior employees, nobody can beat them for the night or overtime
shifts (Crane, Kawashima, and Kawasaki, 2016).
A former employee Mr. Beech at McDonald revealed that he worked for the night shifts in
the fast-paced store in the Brisbane’s entertainment centre. He institute the workplace ‘soul-
crushing’ at times. The employees were not treated as employees (McDonald, Thorpe and
Irvine, 2018). There was immense pressure on the young workforce. Mr. Beech even recalled
an occurrence where a customer was looking for a cup of the water and Mr. Beech was not
permitted to offer and endeavoured to attack him. He even gave his explanation but still, he
was assaulted and tried to take a swing at him. Although the workforce working there were
my friends and new that they will be back me up if anything ever happens. But it was the
scariest thing I Ever faced at the workplace. Although Andrew said that he had robust
systems in the workplace to confirm stores across the globe were enabled with safe working
environments (Davis, 2018).
McDonald’s system exploitative
The secretary of the retail and fast food workers union, Josh Cullinan accepted that the
system of the McDonald was exploitative. McDonald used casual employment and junior
rates to essentially cycle workers off beneath the uneasiness that those employees were going
to get additional hours as they get more assistances at the office (Ceil, 2017).
It is legal in Australia to pay junior rates. The employers under various awards pay children
who are below fourteen just 50% of the hourly wage. These rates enhanced gradually by 10%
on every birthday until employees reached the age of 21. As per the agreement set by
McDonald in 2013 and 2016, the workforce in NSW aged fourteen could be remunerated as
little as $8.43 an hour (Kaine, 2016). As per the views of Mr. Cullinan, these junior rates
formed an enticement for the company to employ fresher and inexpensive staff. It
progressively phases out the older casual employees as a part of the regular practice which is
identified as “learn and churn”. This expression describes the procedure of the workforce
either learning by becoming managers or being tossed as they get mature. He even accepted
that the system practiced at McDonald is exploitative and it should be stopped on an
immediate basis (Moore, 2018). These employees worked as fodder in the business model the
company and inappropriately such employees were not aware that their advantage is being
taken. Their families also suffered (Bartley, 2018).
As per the data of McDonald, the company and its franchisees employed 103,136 individual
in Australia as of February 2018. Out of which, 67,332 of the labours were aged between 14-
28 years old. McDonald even approved in the fair work commission case in 2018 that it is
aware of the “learn and churn” exercise conducted (Nadolny and Ryan, 2015). He even
confronted that he relied on rostering young employees as they were cheap. As the younger
employees get older, the company roster on the young workers. Although, Mr. Gregory did
not accept that the company practiced “learn and churn”. He even asked to the franchisees to

Managing across global culture 5
give the evidence at the Fair work commission. Gregory was pleased of the role frolicked by
the McDonald in assisting young Australians into their initial jobs (Davis, 2018). Gregory
even welcomed and talking to the staff who stroked that they had been let down or ever
attained less shifts in the organization (Nicholson, Pekarek and Gahan, 2017).
McDonald has annual revenue worth of $5 billion and took up role always as the largest
employer in Australia. Last year, McDonald even rolled out a filter for the picture at
Snapchat which allowed applicants to submit their video job applications. A woman even
claimed in a statement or the systematic process of phasing out older workers was ‘simply
untrue’. The company confronted that it needs employees of all the ages in order to meet the
staffing needs and claimed that half of its employees are over 18 (Hogan, 2016). The people
at the company work for more than 50% of the hours in the restaurant and the operations
can’t be run without them. McDonald in Australia is continued to hire employees. Thousands
of the employees aging 18 are hired to meet the need of the business. The employees are
always given the opportunity to grow and progress at McDonald's. The company also take
pride in employing young people and is one of the largest employers in Australia. It also
helps employees top to build their skills and offers a foundation to their great career (Hardy
and Howe, 2015).
Recommendations
It is suggested to McDonald to take proper measures at the time of hiring employees. the
employees should be hired on the 50:50 basis. 50% of the employees hired by the company
should be experts whereas 50% should be below or 18. The company should give less focus
on saving its profit margins. Earlier McDonald has a strategy of hiring employees below the
age of 18 so that less payment can be made. As there is the rule in Australia that the minor
employees can be paid less than the prescribed rate. McDonald took advantage of this as it is
legal to pay fewer payments to the employees. So in such a scenario, it is suggested to the
company to decide the proportion of the hiring. The company should reduce its percentage of
hiring employees below the age of 18. Add on, such employees should not be exploited and
provided with the proper working conditions (Nicholson, Pekarek and Gahan, 2017).
It is also recommended to McDonald Australia to pay all the employees on an equal basis. It
can only help minor employees to save themselves from the exploitation. There should be no
difference. The older employees should be focused more by the company as they are the loyal
ones and contribute more to the operations of the company. The older employees should be
retained as they can even guide to the new employees who reduce the burden of the
managers. The equal pay is the only situation which can improve the condition faced by the
workforce.
McDonald's is recommended to establish a strong committee which can contribute to the
employees. Such a committee should work for the employee's concern. It should be given the
highest priority to the working condition of the employees. The committee should be handled
by the Australian government, not by the employees of the organization. As the authority of
McDonald can manipulate the things. The committee should be liable for reviewing the

Managing across global culture 6
performance of the employees along with the factors causing to degrading their performance.
If the employees face any threatening activity then they should immediately complain to the
committee. The employees at McDonald should also be given feedback form in order to
know the problems faced by them. Sometimes it happens that the employees do not speak
about their problems face to face. In such a situation, feedback forms can be really helpful for
the solution of the problems faced by the employees. The employees can write about the
problems faced by the management in the feedback form. The management can also take the
proper measures on the basis of the feedback form.
The employees should also be provided with the rest breaks and the unnecessarily long hours
should be ignored. The campaign should be launched providing ten minutes of rest breaks.
The employees should be hired by McDonald's only if they possess the certain quality
otherwise they should be ignored. The employees should be hired through various initiatives
like Snapchat, Linked In and more. The interest of the job seeker should also be identified.
McDonald's should hire different employees for the long working hours, holiday days,
weekends or for the overnight shifts.

Managing across global culture 7
References
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professional space. Transnational social work: Opportunities and challenges of a global
profession, pp.89-106.
Ceil, C., 2017. Service Quality and Branding Strategies at McDonalds.
Crane, D., Kawashima, N. and Kawasaki, K.I. eds., 2016. Global culture: Media, arts, policy,
and globalization. Routledge.
Davis, P.J., 2018. Advice for getting the best out of your employees: ignore the
problems. Human Resource Management International Digest, 26(5), pp.1-4.
Davis, P.J., 2018. Advice for getting the best out of your employees: ignore the
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Davis, P.J., 2018. Getting employees involved in strategy planning. Journal of Business
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Hardy, T. and Howe, J., 2015. Chain reaction: A strategic approach to addressing
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Hogan, B., 2016. Workplace relations: The urgent need for change. Institute of Public Affairs
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Kaine, S., 2016. Women, work and industrial relations in Australia in 2015. Journal of
Industrial Relations, 58(3), pp.324-339.
Krueger, K., 2019. Franchising outlook: Franchising: Not an industry but a way of doing
business. Australian Restructuring Insolvency & Turnaround Association Journal, 31(1),
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Lee, A. and Lambert, C., 2017. Corporate social responsibility in McDonald’s
Australia. Asian Case Research Journal, 21(02), pp.393-430.
McDonald, P., Thorpe, K. and Irvine, S., 2018. Low pay but still we stay: Retention in early
childhood education and care. Journal of Industrial Relations, 60(5), pp.647-668.
Moore, T.S., 2018. [In Press] Why don't employees use family-friendly work practices?. Asia
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Nadolny, A. and Ryan, S., 2015. McUniversities revisited: a comparison of university and
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Managing across global culture 8
Nicholson, D., Pekarek, A. and Gahan, P., 2017. Unions and collective bargaining in
Australia in 2016. Journal of Industrial Relations, 59(3), pp.305-322.
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