Business Lessons from Movie 'The Founder'

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‘The Founder’ movie shows the story of Ray Kroc, a struggling salesman turned Founder of McDonald’s. In 1950s, Ray Kroc met Mac and Dick McDonald, who were running a burger operation in Southern California. Ray was impressed by the brothers' speedy system of making the food and saw franchise potential. Ray expands the McDonald’s restaurants through franchisees, pulls the company from the brothers and creates a multi-billion dollar empire. This movie teaches many important business lessons, a few of them are as follows:

• Be Curious: Curiosity is an important characteristic to get fresh ideas.Ray Kroc was not able to sell his milkshake machines at many restaurants, but when he got an order of 6 machines from a far away restaurant, he got curious to understand why so many milkshake machines were ordered by a single restaurant. Here, he could have simply delivered the order, could have avoided travelling a long distance to figure out the reason, but he was curious and decided to visit the restaurant.
• Explore New Ways: Just because something is not done in the past, doesn’t mean it can’t be done in the future. Innovators refuse to accept status quo and inefficiency. They explore new ways by taking inspiration and ideas from various fields. To improve the efficiency of their business, McDonald brothers Mac and Dick took the assembly line concept perfected by Henry Ford for cars and applied it to hamburger business.They optimized it for their business through chalk drawings on a tennis court and orchestration of their team members’ steps. They made sure that speed should not impact quality standards on everything from cleanliness to the number of pickles per patty.
• Solve Customer Problems: When a business provides what customers need, it doesn't have to convince customers and look for them. Supply of the right product creates demand.Drive-in restaurants were already popular places in America but the wait was usually long, and often food was wrongly assembled when arrived. This was not the case at McDonald's. As compared to many other restaurants that Ray Kroc visited, McDonald’s was able to serve the high-quality food at lightning-fast speed and low cost without sacrificing quality. Though McDonald’s had huge lines, customers were happy with quality and service.
• Think Big: Thinking big requires stretching the boundaries of possibilities. It enables acceptance of new challenges and creation of capabilities to overcome those challenges. McDonald brothers innovated and mastered the efficient restaurant business model and decided to have one best in a class restaurant instead of multiple mediocre restaurants. Ray Kroc thought big and with his persistence, he innovated and mastered the art of business expansion through franchisee model.
• Sell Your Vision: Visionaries manage to get people on board by appealing to their emotions and aspirations. McDonald brothers were passionate about the product - hamburgers, whereas Ray Kroc was passionate about business potential. He convinced them for expansion through franchisees by making them visualize that “McDonald’s can be the new American church… And it ain't just open on Sundays.”
• Select Right Partners: Partners should be selected for adding value instead of just giving their name and money.More than experience and resources, a strong desire to come up in life matters. To scale up McDonald’s, Ray Krock wanted to have multiple franchise owners who follow his guidelines of standardization, automation and discipline. Firstly, he selected a few rich franchise owners, but he found that they were not following his inputs. Later, he carefully selected hard-working middle-class individuals for their work ethic and ambition. This idea proved to be hugely successful as these new franchise owners were focused and willing to follow Ray Krock’s guidelines.
• Look for Next-level Innovation: Instead of falling in love with one innovation, to remain competitive, it is important for businesses to spend time and effort in creating the next innovation. McDonald brothers brought efficiency by innovating assembly line operations for their restaurant. They focused on just a few high selling items such as burgers, fries, and drinks, and figured out an efficient way of order delivery. For scaling up the business, Ray Kroc introduced standardization, automation, and discipline. Later, for reducing the cost, Ray Kroc pushed a vastly cheaper powdered milk for the shakes as opposed to buying and freezing the ice cream.
• Tolerate Frustration: Giving up on tough situations is an easy option, but with the ability to tolerate frustration, one can create his path to success. McDonald brothers refused or delayed on many ideas of Ray Kroc such as using powdered milk, tie up with Coca-Cola, renegotiation of contract terms, basement in store etc. Instead of giving up, Ray Kroc tolerated the frustration, for the time being, he had lesser power, found new ways and rules to make himself more powerful than McDonald brothers and then controlled the business terms and conditions.
• Apply Fresh Perspective: Some of the greatest business models are created by looking at the challenges and situations from a fresh perspective.When Ray Kroc was going through financial challenges, he met Harry Sonneborn, a financial expert who gave him a new perspective that Ray Kroc was not in the food-service business, he was in the real-estate business. Harry showed him another way of making money off the deal with McDonald brothers on selling hamburgers and franchisees. This new way involved creating a real estate company that would buy up (or lease) the land on which all McDonald's would be located.
• Carefully Negotiate Contracts: Well negotiated legal contracts create defenses and add to competitive advantages. Initially, Ray Kroc agreed to a complex contract that stipulated that all business decisions must go through the McDonald brothers. Later, instead of putting in writing the deal of providing 1% of McDonald’s earnings to McDonald brothers, Ray Kroc offered them a handshake deal on this term. The movie shows that McDonald brothers were legally forbidden from using their own last name on the signage of their restaurant and they were unable to prove their handshake agreement and were thus denied any royalties from the McDonald’s corporation.

(Views expressed are author's personal and don't necessarily represent any company's opinions.)

Original Author of this Article: Harsh Pamnani

Marketer & Author

Source:https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/288156

New Interview Style

Forget the phone—your next employer wants to interview you over text messages

The next time you apply for a job, don't be surprised if the recruiter follows up with you via text message. It may sound like a scam, but a growing number of hiring managers are using text-based screenings as a way to recruit talent.

"I wouldn't be surprised, at least for newer professionals, if it becomes a pretty commonplace thing," TopResume's career expert Amanda Augustine tells CNBC Make It.

Augustine explains that time is money for many recruiters, whose pay is contingent upon placing candidates quickly. Communicating with a candidate over text instead of the phone can be a more efficient method for some companies.

Jose Luis Pelaez/Getty Images

"A recruiter's initial mindset is, 'Who can I get rid of out of the pile and narrow it down to a smaller group of who is best for the role,'" she says. "So I see text messaging as being another way for recruiters to say, 'I don't have to waste my time on a phone call.'"

Aman Brar, CEO of text-based interviewing platform Canvas, naturally agrees. He launched his company in June 2017, after noticing just how time consuming it could be for recruiters to connect with candidates through the traditional processes.

"Even when you are talking with family and friends you are often texting," he says. "Just imagine if you use Bumble or Match.com and you had to have a phone conversation to connect with someone. So I thought we could create a platform to make [hiring] less awkward and create authentic conversations up front."

According to a Gallup poll, sending and receiving text messages is the most common form of communication for many Americans under 50. As companies continue to find ways to connect with the next generation of employees, Brar says that it only makes sense for texting to make its way to the recruiting process.

OpenTable CEO on the secrets to insanely productive meetings  

In less than a year, he says his platform has caught the attention of many Fortune 500 companies and startups who are looking for more effective ways to recruit talent. One company that was an early adopter of Canvas is OpenTable. Before Canvas was launched to the public, Brar and his team worked with the reservation service company to test how texting would impact its hiring process.

OpenTable SVP Scott Day says that in addition to allowing recruiters to have multiple conversations with different candidates at once, communicating over text helps the company to zero-in on ways it can improve its recruitment questions. Unlike a traditional phone conversation, he says a transcript of a text conversation provides insight into what questions a candidate takes longer to respond to and at if at any point a candidate seems to have lost interest.

"It becomes a test for us in terms of figuring out which questions are best for the type of candidate we are looking for," he says.

Day adds that text-based screenings also allow OpenTable to give applicants an inside view of the company's culture via pictures and video before they come in for an in-person interview.

He admits that texting with recruiters may still seem awkward to many job seekers, which is why the company still gives candidates the option to have a traditional phone screening if they choose. However, he says few candidates take the company up on this offer.

"It's literally in the single digits since we started nearly a year ago," he explains.

Augustine predicts that OpenTable's method will soon be the most common form of recruitment communication.

"Emails can get lost and people don't want to wait for a response," she says. "I think text messaging is a channel that hasn't been saturated yet, particularly from the recruiting standpoint, and I don't see it going away anywhere anytime soon."

Source:https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/22/your-next-employer-wants-to-interview-you-over-text-messages.html?__source=linkedin%7Cmain

How digital marketing helps in Business Growth?

Nowadays, customers can obtain any information anytime and anywhere. All thanks to the Internet and technology. Hence, it is quite vital for the business owners to remember that social media or digital platforms can heavily influence the image of their companies. Digital marketing is a process of developing brand awareness online. In the era of a digital world, Digital Marketing tools and techniques provide much-needed insights to business owners with the best chances for competition, survival and even business growth.

The Internet has evolved positively and has simplified the process of conducting business online. Owing to the technological advancements, it has opened new doors to small and medium-size enterprises to utilize the resources in enhancing the business operations. Basically, this has drastically narrowed the gap between the big industry players and small players. So, if you don’t have a result-oriented digital marketing strategy up your sleeves, it will be difficult to stay competitive in the virtual business world.

As a business owner, if you are sticking with the traditional means of marketing, it’s high time you shift to the marketing the digital way to grow and establish a strong presence on the Internet. In the era of digitalization, it is advisable to opt for this new and innovative way of marketing for the growth of your business.

Here are some reasons why your business needs an effective digital marketing strategy:

• Cost Savings: Those dependent on traditional marketing are bound to spend more for promotional activities. Opting for digital methods have proven to be cost-effective and one can cut down promotional costs by about 40% without neglecting the end goal of marketing. This is because, as a business owner, you have multiple marketing channels to utilize and get favorable results without increasing the overall expense.
• Greater Engagement: Social media is an integral part of a digital marketing plan and it fosters better connection with the targeted audience. It is a path aimed at reaching and segregating the audience based on their feedback, interest, and behavior to meet promotional goals. Social media channels provide valiant support in creating a client list being more specific in the promotion of products or services. When it comes to traditional ways, it is difficult to have such liberties.
• Higher Conversion Rate: Digital marketing enjoys an edge better conversion rates over traditional marketing options. Top marketers have backed SEO, email marketing and social media marketing to boost up the conversion. Basically, it will streamline the process of fostering effective and timely interactions with the wider audience to achieve higher conversion rates. This strategy would significantly increase the leads, sales or subscribers far more quickly.
• Higher Profitability: Traditional way of promotion does not assure of profitable returns on the investment. While digital marketing has proven that small or large size business has experienced around 2.8 times better profit growth. This is achievable on the account of implementing apt digital marketing techniques that can lead to exceptional conversion rates. All in all, it is the fuel to take your business to another level.
• Good Reputation: A good digital marketing strategy enables a business build up a reputation online. With a good reputation, customers are able to show more confidence in products or services offered leading to greater customer loyalty. They may eventually act as great references.
• Mobile Customers: The digital marketing strategy focuses on reaching out to mobile users. According to a recent research, mobile devices have proven to be a vital factor in helping customers take informed decisions. Therefore, it's important to plan and reach out to users by offering them valuable inputs about the products or services, deals or special offers, and more to increase the sales.
• Building Credibility: With virtual marketing techniques, a business owner is empowered to spread the word on the social media channels in a precise manner. The customers can share their positive reviews by virtue of business social media accounts. Around 90% people show trust in a product, where their friends or close ones have recommended it. This ultimately proves to be decisive in building the right credentials to become a strong player in the industry.

In short, digital marketing strategy can act as a catalyst to enable businesses to think differently and keeping in times with the disruptions happening in the marketing world and evolve their strategies around it.

 

Credit: Anand Kadam, Digital Marketing Manager at Intelegain Technologies