Quotes
“As a parent, I know how difficult it can be to encourage your kids to eat well.”
“As you get little pockets of success, then suddenly the light bulbs go on in everyone's head, and more leaders get more confident and make more, bigger decisions, and customers respond well, and it becomes a bit of a flywheel.”
“Bringing out service staff on to the dining floor does change the atmosphere.”
“Businesses increasingly have to differentiate themselves around their people, as much as their product, because thing are so replicable now.”
“Chicago is a wonderful, vibrant city with wonderful food cultures to it, wonderful talent downtown.”
“China and Hong Kong represent an enormous growth opportunity for McDonald's.”
“Consumers, when they've only got a couple of quid left in their pockets, are choosy about how they want to spend it.”
“Customers have access to information that gives them much more control over their lives.”
“Everyone likes a burger now and then, and that's absolutely fine.”
“Fear of decision-making is one thing I personally resist, and I'm trying to encourage others to resist as well.”
“I take it personally when people belittle our employees and misrepresent our record as an employer.”
“I think the greatest demand actually comes from within, not from outside.”
“If the pace of change outside is moving more quickly than the pace of change inside, you get a bit left behind.”
“If you don't want fries with your Happy Meal, you can switch it for a fruit bag or a portion of carrot sticks. I think that is the sign of a progressive business.”
“I'm honest and fair, but I don't dispense false kindness.”
“It is customers that decide if we succeed.”
“It makes me sad there is still some intellectual snobbery out there.”
“I've never met him, but I love the simplicity with which Warren Buffett describes good and bad businesses and how he makes his investment decisions.”
“Long-term sustaining growth is a minimum expectation for us.”
“Many people have strong views on McDonald's.”
“Me and my mate used to go across the park, jump on the Met line to get the Tube into Harrow. There was a sports shop we always used to go into, and there was a McDonald's. We used to go off with three or four quid in our pocket. That would cover our train fare, mooching around Harrow, and going to McDonald's.”
“Moving our headquarters to Chicago is another significant step in our journey to build a better McDonald's. This world-class environment will continue to drive business momentum by getting us even closer to customers, encouraging innovation and ensuring great talent is excited about where they work.”
“My motivation at the moment is around knowing how it feels to turn a business around, and I can't wait to have that feeling again.”
“No one likes uncertainty.”
“Ordering should be the most enjoyable experience, but at McDonald's, it can be one of the most stressful points in time.”
“Our customers, system, and shareholders are best served when we direct our focus and energy towards executing against these critical customer expectations.”
“Part of how we decide how we allocate our media is we have fairly sophisticated ways of measuring our return on marketing spend, which helps us best analyze the most effective way and medium in which to spend our marketing dollars.”
“People come into McDonald's two to three times a month - to extrapolate that to the cause of obesity is a real stretch.”
“The average customer comes into McDonald's three to four times a month, and I'm absolutely convinced that can fit in very comfortably into a balanced diet.”
“The business cannot ignore what customers are saying when the message is clear: We're not on our game.”
“The consumer is going through a period around the world of uncertainty - whether geopolitical uncertainty, economic uncertainty - and that makes them a little nervous as well.”
“The counter is a barrier.”
“The McJob tag is misleading, and demeaning to our staff and franchisees.”
“The parents that we speak to, and the parents that are our customers, are very comfortable with the way that McDonald's fits into their lives.”
“The progress we have made in a short amount of time gives me confidence we're making the right moves to turn around our business and reposition McDonald's as a modern, progressive burger company.”
“There's a lot of businesses that are working hard, who are at the top of their games. Therefore, it's always going to be a market share fight.”
“There's absolutely no doubt consumers have more choice than ever, and the standards of all that provide food have improved over time.”
“Ultimately, the bread and butter of McDonald's is delivering great service, great quality food, at affordable prices day in and day out.”
“Ultimately, we're in the service business. We will always have an important human element.”
“We are putting the customer at the center of everything we do and are directing our resources towards those innovations and investments that will strengthen our ability to deliver a better McDonald's experience over time.”
“We have to hire, retain, and develop the best staff.”
“We need to execute fewer things better.”
“We're allowing technology to take out the non-value-added manual elements of the McDonald's experience.”
“We're guided by consumer data, and it helps give us the confidence to invest where the consumer is going.”
“What I've looked to do is try and become a change agent for good, to create the behavioral changes, the cultural changes to really embrace urgency, adopt a higher tolerance to risk, and just encourage people to make decisions.”
“When we look at some of the greatest creative ideas we've come up with, they have originated literally from all corners of the world and have crossed all different types of media as well. So while there's still traditional TV, which is clearly a very compelling media, it's also cyber, mobile, outdoor.”
“When you expand a business as fast as McDonald's did, part of the strength you have is the process and the efficiency.”
“When you get an invitation to come back and be part of the team that will be the architect of the next generation of growth, when you get an opportunity in a business of the size and scope of McDonald's, that's incredibly attractive.”
“When you get things right, good things happen.”
“When you're in a turnaround situation, you cannot incrementalize your way out of it.”
“Whenever you want a radical shift, it rarely happens.”
“Whether that's in communications or marketing or strategy, you need people to come in with a fresh perspective.”