Cultural Diversity Management at McDonald's: An MBA502 Analysis

This presentation, prepared by a Human Resource Management student at an Australian college, analyzes McDonald's approach to cultural diversity. It begins with an overview of the company, highlighting its global presence and commitment to diversity management, initiated in 2011 with Patricia Sowell Harris as Chief Global Diversity Officer. The presentation explores McDonald's diversity factors, including leadership, education, employee networks, and a culture of respect, along with its initiatives for cross-cultural awareness. It then critiques these initiatives, identifying challenges such as communication styles, varied exchange rates, local employment laws, and language barriers. The presentation recommends intercultural communication workshops and training. The student concludes by emphasizing McDonald’s success in enhancing employee's cultural knowledge, and reducing workplace problems related to diversity. The presentation references several academic sources to support its analysis.

Diversity

Introduction
I am a Human resource management student
studying in a reputed college of Australia. I am
student of second year. I am learning the different
diversities in an organization and the methods and
strategies to overcome them.

McDonald’s
• Fast food company of America
found in the year 1940.
• Operated by Maurice
McDonald Richard in California.
• Global headquarter in
Chicago.
• Best known for Chicken
products, cheeseburgers,
French fries, milkshakes ,
wraps and desserts.
• Available in 120 countries and
serves a customer base of 68
million.
• 37,855 restaurants with
210,000 employees in all the
branches.

Cultural diversity
• The quality of various
culture
• The attributes of the
diversity includes gender,
age and race.
• Visible differences in
dress, body language and
traditions.
• Promotion of cultural
diversity is an unethical
practice.
• Cultural diversity cannot
be quantified.

Cultural diversity in McDonalds
• Company started Human
resource Management and
Diversity in the year 2011.
• Patricia Sowell Harris
was the Chief Global
Diversity Officer of that
department.
• The name of the
department to Diversity
Management.
• McDonalds foster
diversity among the three
legs- franchisees,
employees and suppliers.
• Earned recognition from
teams representing
Latinos, blacks, Asians,
women and disable people.

Diversity Factors
Leadership
Diversity education
Employees business
network

Culture of McDonalds
• Respect all customs and
cultures.
• Food is customized
according to the needs of
the customers.
• Globally expanded.
• Does not allow selling
banned food products in
certain countries.
• Eggs are not used in
certain products as it is also
consumed by multi-cultured
people

Cross Cultural Awareness
Cross cultural differences can arise in areas like
Communication
and attitude
Approach of
completing a task
Styles of
decision
making

Efforts to enhance cross cultural awareness
• Building the knowledge of culture .
• Treating everyone as individuals.
•Implementation of the own cultural knowledge.
• Avoid confusions and assumptions.

Challenges faced
communication
Style- tone, pitch,
gestures, signs
Varied exchange
rates
Local employment laws
Rules and regulation
of the country
Language barriers

Recommendation
1. Intercultural Communication workshop
2. Intercultural training of Culture Assimilator.

Success
McDonald’s have faced various problems due
to cultural diversity, but their efforts outstand
them.
They have been successful in training their
employees to enhance cultural knowledge.
Problems in the workplace due to diversity
has been reduced immensely.
Every employee abides by these training
sessions.
Strict and contingent rules are applied in
case of disobeying the norms of the company.