Diversity in the Workforce: McDonalds

By: Natalie Beasley



“Diversity may be the hardest thing for a society to live with, and perhaps the most dangerous thing for a society to be without.”
McDonalds understands this struggle, and are currently working to make their workforce a more diverse one. Internationally, they have launched a campaign with ads that say, we don’t hire all these different nationalities, but that they hire individuals. This is a strong message for McDonalds to spread.
Large corporations all around the world are actively trying to launch these different diversity campaigns. They realize that diversity adds a lot to an organization, and by having a corporation that is diverse; in turn the corporation is more well rounded. McDonalds believes that their workforce needs to represent the customers that they serve. With McDonalds being the leader in the fast food industry, they have a very large fan base, and are able to reach out to a very large audience.
In the early 1970s when this entire campaign originally began, the employees of McDonalds started creating different employee networks like Women's Leadership Network, Home Office Asian Network, McDonald's Black Employee Network, and the Hispanic Steering Committee. Those networks eventually evolved into the National McDonald's Diversity Advisory Council.
McDonalds is very proud of their accomplishment with implementing diversity into their corporation. They have the largest number of minority and female franchisees in the fast food industry. More than 37% of all McDonald's U.S. Owner and Operators are women and minorities. They are also prided in that their number of Hispanic franchisees combined is actually larger than any other single Hispanic business in the country. Ofelia Melendrez-Kumpf, vice-president of the southwest region, has become a spokesperson for the Hispanic culture.
One of McDonalds largest accomplishments was being include in the Human Rights Campaign “Buying for Equality” guide, a leading publication from a nationally known and well-respected GLBT advocacy group..
From a public relations standpoint, McDonalds is getting their message out there very effectively. With even more advertisements, they will see even more success with developing a more diverse workforce.