When you serve as many customers as we do, our customers are society. We were lucky in that McDonalds franchisees came into the pandemic in a very strong position. If you have the golden arches outside your door, youre serving the core menu. Track the status of job markets across the US through online job listings. We have a responsibility not only to serve great food, but to make it responsibly and to enrich the communities in which we operate. New York CNN Business . In my experience, you piece together these lessons from different leaders and ultimately they define your own leadership style. You never know exactly what youre going to get back from customers. Your investments in Drive Thru and digital in restaurants have proven to be fortuitous, even prescient, amid the pandemic. HACER Scholarships for Hispanic Students, Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. I didnt think that we had contemporized our approach to marketing. The new chief executive officer of McDonald's is a Harvard University MBA who played a critical role in the revamp of the fast . Listen as Kempczinski talks to Dr. Murray about human-centric leadership, how to keep stakeholders resilient in times of crisis, the importance of defining your company purpose, engaging in the public square, and more. A common thing that I will hear from people who are not in the industry is that retails a dead-end job. In most major markets, they were at or near record cash flow, which essentially is how much money theyre able to take out of the business. My view is that in this day and age, you have no choiceif you want to control the message, you will be an inauthentic brand and you wont have any resonance. When I travel abroad, I embrace the hospitality of the franchisee that Im visiting. The List 2022 honoree Chris Kempczinski answers 20 Questions, Meet The List of People Shaping Retails Future 2022, Introducing The Visionary 2022: Target CEO Brian Cornell, 10 go-to-market strategies move forward in NRF Foundation scholarship competition, The List of People Shaping Retails Future 2022, NRF Foundation Next Generation Scholarship. So I don't have all the answersBut I am going to outline for everybody some principles about how we're going to approach these issues. So says Chris Kempczinski, President and CEO of McDonalds Corporation, in this interview with Dr. Lori Esposito Murray, President of the Committee for Economic Development, the public policy center of The Conference Board (CED). Together, we served over 65 million customers, on average, every day, providing great tasting food faster with more convenience and better service than ever before. Greg Kelly, a senior partner in McKinseys Atlanta office, conducted this interview. How does the brand remain so cohesive while catering to local tastes? In the end, the report also suggested how situational leadership, systems leadership, and contingency leadership should be applied to McDonald's. References Chu, N. N., 2020. The things you just referenced there are about us getting more aggressive, getting more out of our investment and then embracing our role in culture. You cant ever coast. (19972000), Serves as a trustee of Ronald McDonald House Charities, Eats McDonalds food five days a week; favorite menu items are Filet-O-Fish and the Vanilla Cone. In Australia, we provided consumer staples; people could go to their local McDonalds to get things like bread, milk, and butter. These events dont need to be frequent or long, but it is essential that the employees have some opportunity to interact with the senior executives. He has been with McDonalds Corporation since 2015 and is in his second year as president and CEO. Our franchisees were under significant financial stress; there was a lot of anxiety. Ive taken different lessons from all the leaders Ive worked for and admired. The New Year's message follows a Wall Street Journal report published Sunday that alleged that under Kempczsinki's predecessor, Steve Easterbrook, the company's culture tolerated late-night socializing between senior managers and rank-and-file employees. While McDonald's is a global brand, we are actually a local business. Everybody has a clear sense of it. Not any of the other sauces; just straight-up ketchup. President and CEO I think for us, to be honest, we just had to catch up. And I feel good about what weve done. McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski lays out the fast food giant's new strategy to emerge from COVID-19 a winner. Plenty of things. During an internal McDonald's town hall meeting, Kempczinski vowed that he will look at every senior executive and ask if they "personify the values of our company." In our top markets, our drive-thru service times are now about 30 seconds faster than they were two years ago. So says Chris Kempczinski, President and CEO of McDonalds Corporation, in this interview with Dr. Lori Esposito Murray, President of the Committee for Economic Development, the public policy center of The Conference Board (CED). Then last November, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced that TGIF meetings would be cancelled in favor of monthly meetings and separate forums. He also held in-person town halls with employees in the United Kingdom and Germany in late December. As it turned out, the strong emphasis on our core values in early 2020 really hit home and helped us address the challenges we faced when COVID-19 came along. To lead, you have to be out there talking a lot and, in some cases, saying the same message over and over and over. When you travel abroad, do you have any favorite international menu items?When I travel abroad, I embrace the hospitality of the franchisee that Im visiting. Were rolling out this new cooking procedure around the world. Given your franchise model, how do you ensure during COVID-19 that restaurants can survive the short term and be in a position of strength for the long term?We were lucky in that McDonalds franchisees came into the pandemic in a very strong position. Leadership McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski apologizes for his text to Chicago's mayor "Those comments were wrong," he said in a video to the system amid a furor over the message, which appeared to blame parents for shooting deaths of two kids. Were going to make decisions with the long-term in mind. new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0], In this role, he worked closely with our business leaders and franchisees to identify innovative new ideas and best practices to accelerate system growth. When you travel abroad, do you have any favorite international menu items? There are people who have been at McDonalds their entire career, who maybe started working in our restaurants who are now in some of the most senior positions in the company or who are franchisees running large patches of restaurant. He said he hoped to speak with the victims' parents. Ray Kroc left a legacy. We tend to want to socialize with others who are similar to ourselves, so managers can be exclusionary if they are left to choose their own interactions partners. When youve built your business model on diversity and providing opportunities for everyone, and suddenly a human rights issue comes into the public discussion, it would have been a huge miss for us to not put our voice out there. McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski is trying to change the company's culture after taking the reins in November. Got a confidential news tip? In early November, Brunswick Partner Jayne Rosefield, head of the firms Chicago office and Global Consumer Industries Practice, interviewed Mr. Kempczinski. Theres the promise of potentially what youre going to learn but theres also the risk of starting all over. '&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src= When you look at the career progression that people can have in the retail industry and the career progression that people have at McDonalds, its quite remarkable. In the meetings, employees could express concerns and discuss topics openly and freely. By using this website, you accept the use of cookies. After 65 years of doing this, we still find ways to actually make the product just a little bit better. It was a great reminder about the embedded cost of complexity in our P&L. chris kempczinski leadership style. BY Beth Kowitt. })(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-MFNGH2P'); Brunswicks Digital Investor Survey is a comprehensive review that explores how institutional investors gain information and the impact those insights have on their investment decisions. He builds great teams. If its available, I like a blueberry muffin with that. The CED discussion series, Leadership in Challenging Times, interviews business leaders about the unprecedented challenges facing the nation and how they are helping chart a path forward for both their companies and communities in which they operate. Its probably unlike any other industry out there. When I came to McDonalds, that was probably one of the biggest risks for me. I stepped up my communication to make sure that our employees understood what our plan was to get through thisbut also to get a lot of feedback. Chris is a proud alumnus of both Duke University and Harvard Business School. Keeping McDonald's 'relevant': An interview with CEO Chris Kempczinski, Fast action in fast food: McDonalds CFO on why the company is growing again, Eating out(side): Restaurant dining in the next normal. Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data and Analysis. During his tenure as president of McDonalds U.S. footprint, Kempczinski oversaw the business operations of around 14,000 stores. All Rights Reserved. When you had a leader that acted in a way that was incongruous with those values, it raised a question: Are we as good as we say we are? We also need to be operating in the social-media space much more dynamically. By continuing to use this Site or by clicking "OK", you consent to the use of cookies.OK, On leading during COVID-19: as you would imagine, in a system like ours, where you have not just the company people, but you have a network of suppliers, you have a network of franchisees, you get bombarded with a lot of questions that come in from everybody around the world. Using electronic platforms, the managers can interact on their own schedule. His next novel, the speculative fiction 'BEAUTIFUL SHINING PEOPLE', is out March 2023, Fast Company & Inc 2023 Mansueto Ventures, LLC, Who is Chris Kempczinski, McDonalds new CEO? To me, there is nothing further from the truth than that. We did recognize three or four years ago that delivery was going to be a huge opportunity for us. One thing weve learned during the pandemic is that if we simplify our business and focus on what were great atlike drive-thru and our core menu itemstheres a fantastic benefit for our customers. Finally, I went to Duke and Im a big Duke basketball fan. My answer is: ensuring the relevance of the brand. If we further build out a hybrid delivery model, do we let others, perhaps, ride on our delivery platform? Im hoping its going to stick around. More than 30,000 McDonalds locations around the world now offer delivery. And Kempczinski had been in the role for less than five months when COVID-19 shut down many of McDonald's 36,000-plus dining rooms around the world, sending the company . When you took on the role, quickly establishing values as a central theme of your leadership, was there a sense that McDonalds needed its values updated?I think its precisely because McDonalds had a very strong core set of values that the issue with my predecessor was as traumatic for the company as it was. According to the Wall Street Journal, Easterbrook and other executives, including the former head of McDonalds human resources, David Fairhurst often partied after work with other executives and staffers (Fairhurst voluntarily stepped down one day after Easterbrook was outsted). So when events happen that strike at the heart of our core values, we want to speak out on those occasions as well. McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski talked franchisee relations, the restaurant recovery, and employee wages. Food is such a local experience that you have to give people some latitude to adapt to local tastes. Here are a few questions, along with Kempczinskis answers (watch the video above for all 20 Questions):What is the biggest risk you have taken in your career? If I could go back and do it again, I would be more overt in telling our story. By Philip Delves Broughton Everybody has a clear sense of it. So, credit to the team for getting on that one early. Monthly, forward-looking composite of eight proven labor-market indicators. Steve Easterbrook Separates as President and CEO and as a Member of the . Weve been in the Drive Thru business for decades, so I dont want to say that we had any foresight in that. Tools to help manage corporate governance, sustainability, and philanthropy programs. Mr. Kempczinski wasnt new to the company but unlike previous chief executives, he hadnt joined the restaurant giant decades earlier, either. As one of the worlds leading brands, McDonalds makes a difference in the lives of people every day. Additionally, weve been able to expand the number of restaurants offering delivery to more than 30,000. Michael Grothaus is a novelist and author. In July, in response to the killing of George Floyd, McDonalds posted a video titled, They were one of us. How do you view the responsibility of brands such as McDonalds to take a stand on social issues? The meetings were accompanied by snacks and beer, and employees were encouraged to socialize afterwards.