CASE STUDY / GIAIMO MANAGEMENT
The work wasn’t about inventing more programs. It was about helping existing ones become clearer, more participatory and easier for employees, managers and customers to actually experience.
Strong corporate initiatives already existed. The challenge was turning them into something people understood, participated in and benefited from directly.
THE ASSIGNMENT / WHAT HAD TO CHANGE
Giaimo Management already had access to strong corporate initiatives, employee programs and community partnerships. The challenge was helping people understand what those opportunities meant for them.
Information was often scattered across different channels, participation depended on individual managers, and employees or customers could miss the benefit entirely if no one translated the initiative into something immediate and relevant.
The work became less about creating more programs and more about designing the conditions for adoption: clearer communication, stronger participation mechanics, better experiences and consistent follow-through.
Corporate initiatives, community programs and employee opportunities.
A system that made participation easier to understand, easier to join and harder to ignore.
THE ADOPTION ENGINE
Adoption looked different depending on the initiative. Sometimes people needed celebration. Sometimes instruction. Sometimes a reason to try something immediately. The constant was translation: make the value visible, participatory and useful.
Quarterly People Weeks turned employee appreciation into something visible and participatory instead of another message people might overlook.
Birthdays, milestones, graduation celebrations and other moments became part of a larger experience designed to help employees feel seen inside the organization.
Turn internal culture into something employees could actually encounter.
SHOW. TRY. REWARD. REPEAT.
Digital Block Parties turned mobile-app adoption into a live experience inside the restaurant.
Employees wore QR-code “SCAN ME” shirts. A DJ, characters and in-store energy drew attention, while the team helped customers download the app and place their first digital order on the spot.
Small incentives like free cookies or pies made the first action immediate, useful and easy to understand.
QR shirts + live activation create curiosity.
Employees teach customers in real time.
The first digital order comes with an immediate benefit.
The Archways education benefit existed, but managers and employees had to navigate information spread across multiple websites and handouts to understand it.
I researched the existing materials, organized the process, wrote and edited the content, created the illustrations and designed a 15-page workbook that made the opportunity easier to explain and easier to act on.
The guide was later adopted for broader regional use by McDonald’s Archways leadership.
Across eight McDonald’s locations, community engagement became an ongoing portfolio of fundraisers, school partnerships, celebrations and local activations rather than an occasional sponsorship request.
Spirit nights, graduation trains, back-to-school efforts and other programs gave each location repeatable ways to show up in the communities around them.
Make it clear enough to understand. Useful enough to try. Human enough to care about.
THE SYSTEM, IN USE
The work showed up in different forms, but every piece had the same job: make the next action clearer, more useful or more meaningful for the people on the other side of it.
ARCHWAYS
Employees had access to a valuable education benefit, but understanding the process meant navigating information scattered across multiple websites and handouts.
I researched the source material, organized the process, wrote and edited the content, created the illustrations and designed a 15-page workbook that turned the program into something managers could explain and employees could use.
BEHAVIOR NEEDS FEEDBACK
The food donation and waste program was already operating. I created internal communication that translated the results into something employees could actually see: meals donated, food redirected back into the community and waste kept out of the landfill.
The goal was reinforcement—not another instruction. Show the team the impact of the behavior and give them a reason to feel proud enough to keep doing it.
ADOPTION AT THE COUNTER
During Digital Block Parties, the adoption mechanic lived where the customer action happened. QR-code shirts made the invitation visible, while employees helped customers download the app and complete the process in real time.
MOVE THE PROGRAM TO THE PEOPLE
Hampton Police community engagement officers wanted Coffee With A Cop to leave the restaurant and move into a neighborhood where relationship-building could happen closer to where residents actually lived.
I helped move the activation onsite, provided coffee and breakfast treats, and brought another community organization into the experience alongside us.
Don’t just communicate the initiative. Design the conditions that help people participate in it.
THE RECEIPTS / WHAT MOVED
The work showed up in participation, repeatable systems, community activity and employee experiences that made people more likely to understand, join in and keep going.
A year-round portfolio of school partnerships, fundraisers, celebrations and local activations across eight McDonald’s locations.
Community fundraising became part of the operating rhythm, giving local groups recurring opportunities to participate.
Spirit-night activations regularly generated meaningful store sales during traditionally slower periods.
Recognition, celebration and special employee-experience touches helped make internal culture visible across a workforce of more than 300 people.
During one two-hour fundraiser, a 7U football team collected approximately $700 in direct donations from customers moving through the drive-thru.
That was in addition to what the team earned from store sales during the same fundraiser window.
ARCHWAYS
The 15-page Archways workbook was adopted for broader regional use by McDonald’s Archways leadership.
It also gave managers a clearer way to explain the benefit, supporting more inquiries, applications and participation.
Better adoption didn’t come from louder communication. It came from making the next action easier to see, easier to take and worth participating in.
MY ROLE / WHAT I ACTUALLY OWNED
My role sat between strategy and execution: translating initiatives, building systems, creating participation mechanics, supporting managers, activating community relationships and making sure good ideas became usable experiences.
I designed and supported employee-recognition experiences, People Weeks, milestone celebrations and internal communication that helped make appreciation, opportunity and culture more visible across the organization.
I developed activation mechanics that helped employees and customers understand what to do next—from Digital Block Parties and app-adoption experiences to recurring community fundraisers and in-store participation systems.
For Archways, I researched existing resources, organized the process, wrote and edited the content, created illustrations and designed the full workbook so managers had a clearer way to explain the benefit.
I managed and supported a year-round portfolio of community initiatives across eight locations, working with schools, nonprofits, local organizations and public partners to create useful, repeatable engagement.
I wasn’t only planning from a distance. I was onsite, working with managers, employees, customers and community partners—building, adjusting and reinforcing the experience in real time.
Translate the initiative. Design the participation. Support the people. Keep the system moving.