To cater training to younger workers, Marco's Pizza developed Marco's University, an online, interactive training system that features animation. The system consists of 12 modules covering topics such as orientation and answering phones.

Working with a company that specializes in e-training, Toledo, Ohio-based Marco's Pizza spent two years developing the online training component, known as Marco's University, for hourly employees. The company contends the online program will help ensure consistency across the system as franchisees open more than 300 units by 2010.

“Often, with anybody in the store-operations end, training can vary depending on the trainer,” says Vice President of Sales, Research and Development Mike Jaynes. “With Marco's University, it really standardizes and communicates the same message across the board to not only the whole chain but also within the store. And the communication of one message results in happier employees because they're all expected to do the same thing.”

Marco's University consists of 12 modules that cover topics such as customer service, phone answering, dough preparation, store safety and delivery. The interactive modules, each about 10 to 12 minutes long, feature animated characters that guide employees through the tasks involved in each position. The character tests the employees on the information, correcting them if they answer incorrectly. The employee must score at least 80 percent on the quiz at the end of the module to move on to on-the-job training in the store. If they don't score 80 percent, they have to take the module again.

Employees log into a password-protected Web site that keeps a record of the modules they've completed and their scores. Most employees can only access Marco's University from a computer at the store. But the company allows employees at new stores to access the program from their homes for two weeks prior to and four weeks after opening.

Eric Chester, a Denver-based speaker and author who works with service-oriented companies to get young employees to work harder and stay longer, says Marco's University should help the company better relate to teens because the interactive, animation-based training is fun, simple, fast and easy to use.

“It's miles beyond handing them any kind of manual or a book. It's certainly appeals to the tech-savvy generation. It's something that pulls them in,” he says. “They're required to participate, take some action, to move the ball down the field.”

Marco's Pizza designed the online training system to be used in conjunction with on-the-job training.

Marco's has tested the online training program in 27 company-managed stores and 13 franchised units since January. So far hourly turnover has gone down 3.9 percent and mystery-shopper scores on phone etiquette and ordering have improved 5 percent.

The company is currently rolling out Marco's University systemwide. It wants all the stores using the component by the end of February 2009. Although new restaurants are required to use Marco's University, it is not mandatory for existing franchisees. To convince older franchisees to sign on, Marco's executives, along with franchise and area representatives, are visiting the stores to demonstrate the system and share early results and testimonials from franchisees who are using it.

Marco's says its online training component will be vital to ensuring consistency of products and service across the system, especially as the chain triples in size by 2010

Marco's plans to develop one or two new modules per year. It is looking into developing modules for management that cover areas such as scheduling and paperwork and for franchisees for a new store opening.

It costs about $20,000 to create a module. Marco's also pays $140 per month to the training company it works with to host the modules on the training company's Web site.

Marco's has already invested more than $250,000 into Marco's University. But the company has no doubt it will see a long-term return on its investment, especially as it triples in size over the next few years.

“We need something to help ensure that consistency as we grow. Marco's University will help ensure that,” Jaynes says. “Though it's difficult to actually quantify the amount of what that will actually make us, I think it's pretty obvious that it will reward us significantly.”

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