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Management 310
Project 3: McDonald’s Analysis
Food chain restaurants have been growing around the world because of its easy
accessibility and its hot and ready meals. McDonald’s has been dominating the fast food industry
for many years because they have found a system that works. When visiting one of their food
chain restaurants you come across many eye-opening observations. One of the main observations
is when you visit one of their locations you realize that McDonald’s does resemble a machine.
Everyone in the workplace has a specific job to do. For instance, you have those packaging the
fries, you have others making the burgers, you have those serving drinks, you have some
working in the drive-thru, you have other handing the food to the people in the drive-thru and
others to the restaurant customers. Everyone has a job to do, and it’s a very repetitive one, just
like a machine. Everything has a step by step process. In this restaurant there is a division of
work were employees are specialized in different areas as explained before. Everyone has a
specialization to do in order to finish the product, which in this instance is to give the food to the
consumer. McDonald’s also resembles a machine by their form of standardization. The reason
for this is because although they have employees working for them now they can always be
replaced by another set of employees doing the same thing. For instance, they all greet
customers, they get paid the same amount, and they all certain rules that they need to abide by. If
at a point they decide they do not want to work for the company anymore McDonald’s can just
hire someone else, train them the same way, and it will not affect the company in any way,
because just like a machine it can be replaced by another one doing the same or even better job.
In Frederick Taylor’s principles it is explained that the rule of thumb needs to be replaced
with the scientific theory because of its reliability. McDonald’s does not stay in the same routine
they find ways to make work simpler and quicker. For instance, the McDonald’s I have visited
had a kiosk. This kiosk helps you order your food, pay and receive a receipt. This reduces the
number of cashiers they need to have and the cost of an employee. Another one of Frederick
Taylor’s principles is to train and develop each employee. McDonald’s does it by having a hiring
process where if they like your application they will hire you and train you as a crew member.
From there they will show you step by step process on how to prepare meals, take orders,
keeping the restaurant clean, and customer service. Third, cooperating with the employees to
ensure that methods are being followed. They do this by hiring a regional manager and
supervisor to ensure that everyone is doing what they have to do to ensure that the company is
receiving the most out of their buck. Last but not least, McDonalds needs to ensure that they are
dividing the work equally between managers and workers. McDonald’s tries to ensure that
everyone is working at the best of their ability. For instance, if they know someone can’t work as
a manager they will be kept as a crew member. Managers will make sure that employees are
doing their daily tasks in a timely matter, they also make sure every customer is leaving happy.
They make sure custodians are keeping the restaurant clean and supplies are being restoked.
While the regular crew members would only have to worry about their own task. Like Frederick
Taylor’s theory is being implemented into factories it is implemented here as well since this
company is working as a factory since most of the tasks are being repeated.
According to Max Weber’s six characteristics of bureaucracy McDonald’s does have
hierarchical authority. Everyone working for the company has a position which some have
higher levels than others like a pyramid. For instance, you have crew member that’s report to
managers, that report to regional managers, that report to supervisors, that report to branch
managers etc. This gives McDonald’s the opportunity for authority to travel through the levels of
hierarchy. Weber’s rules of rules states that the bureaucracies depend upon written rules and
communication. For instance, when a situation arises that has never been dealt with the employer
will take that into consideration and implement rules and regulations that will make sure that
don’t happen again. He also, believes that there should be a division of labor. McDonald’s does
this by having cashiers, employees that have the food ready, and others that hand the food to the
customers. This increases how fast a company works if you have someone doing all of this tasks
at once then they would take longer to complete it. McDonald’s achievement-based advancement
lets crew members follow management positions that will pay better and let them make
differences. For instance, when working in management the person can make changes to make
the company work faster or find ways to save money in order for the store to work better.
Another one of Weber’s characteristics is efficient operation where the employee effectiveness
and job functions are important. For instance, McDonald’s will make sure that orders are being
fulfilled in a timely manner. They have timers in the screen to see how long the customer has
