McDonald’s came to us to create a fully immersive virtual reality digital twin of their restaurant for management and franchisee training.
Overview
McDonald’s initially came to us looking for help to visualize their restaurants to allow them to showcase their multiple restaurant configurations in 3D.
This initial work received high praise throughout the global teams at McDonald’s so they challenged us to think of innovative ways to use the 3D as a learning platform.
Our approach
With the brief set by McDonald’s, we came up with the idea of building a ‘point of view’ VR-enabled role-play game that would allow the learner to be fully immersed in the restaurant experience.
‘in-game’ features included:
> Ability to create different scenarios for different job roles – trainees to management
> Build tasks that tested human factors such as response time and decision making
> Ability to add in challenges, such as more customers, angry customers or safety hazards like spilled drinks, in real-time to test and gauge reactions
> Gamification, via leaderboards and ‘awards’, to encourage participation, engagement and desire to replay the game to test and rest their skills.
The training team at McDonald’s have access to reporting tools to get the real-time progress and performance of each learner.
Our platform also allowed the team at McDonald’s to test out new or concept processes and procedures in safety, without any risk and with minimal cost. One such process was the on-demand food production system – the data gained from the tests meant they could see how to test and tweak the process ready for roll out.
The results
The initial UK version created an instant impact, helping to train managers in the vital tasks, processes, and customer management effectively.
Due to its success, it was then rolled out internationally – as of early 2020 it is being used in 10 different countries. Over 10,000 managers have used the training platform and it is seen as a flagship training tool within McDonald’s.
