Client Spotlight: Chad Hohensee and The Original ChopShop

Scottsdale, Arizona | Locations: 18 | Employees: 50+

Big growth doesn’t stop our friends at Original ChopShop from seeing their people– in fact, a culture where every worker gets the coaching and development they need is part of why they made QSR’s top 25 Best Brands earlier this year!

ChopShop is a place that aims to inspire people to just feel good– about where they are, and what they’re eating. 

“We like to call it food for everybody, like, not just everybody but for every body,” explained Director of Learning and Development Chad Hohensee. “Anybody can come in and feel good about  what they’re eating.”

But those feel good vibes the brand inspired in customers wasn’t a part of its initial learning and development strategy. 

Their LMS was a grim warehouse full of material, a”repository of a bunch of information that you go to because someone says, ‘Well, you gotta go there to find it.’” Chad explained.

It was boring, cumbersome– anathema to the brand’s philosophy, and the way Chad, as a learning and development professional, felt about training.

“[Traditional LMS] takes all of the fun outta training. This training should be fun. It shouldn’t feel like it’s hard work to do.“

Until they found 1Huddle. 

“1Huddle feels fun. You’ve got competition, you’ve got points, you’ve got scores… You’re connecting very quickly  to what you just learned, and you feel accomplished.“

What follows is a full transcript of our conversation, edited for length and clarity.

Watch Our Interview with Chad

Full Transcript

Chad Hohensee: My name is Chad Hohensee, I’m the Director of Learning and Development for Original Chop Shop. We’ve been with One Hollow for a little over two years now. 

Can you tell me a little bit more about the Original ChopShop brand? 

CH: Sure. At Original Chop Shop, we believe our mission is to inspire others to just feel good. You know, through food as fast fuel, ready-to-go meals that you can feel good about eating. We like to call it food for everybody, like, not just everybody but for every body, cuz anybody can come in and feel good about  what they’re eating. 

Gamification was something that we saw as a great addition to the foundation of how we were training our people. The shoulder to shoulder training, especially in the restaurant industry, is the most important part of training. You are in it every day. If you are with somebody that can teach you the right food safety procedures or how to juice or how to make one of our amazing bowls, someone’s gonna be right there to teach you. 

But then you’ve still gotta be able to check for understanding, and check their knowledge and make sure they understand the lessons that they were taught that day, and that they feel good about what they did.

And they can have that connection where maybe the first, the first five minutes they talk about this one important thing, you don’t need to talk about it again in the shoulder, shoulder training. Well, 1Huddle gives you that opportunity for the communication to come back and touch on those things. It allowed us to really up level with a great support team at the team’s fingertips.

And they can just go through our training, dive into it and go, “Oh man, I remember everything that I was taught today,” or, “I remember what I was taught a week ago,” or whatever! 

What’s your favorite thing about 1Huddle?

CH: It’s that easy. Right there. Easy to get to. Easy. Yep. My favorite thing about 1Huddle is the ease from top to bottom. It’s easy to get in, play a game. It’s easy to create a game. It’s easy to see where your team is going or where they need to go. It’s easy for them to get a trophy and give awards that way. It’s very easy to understand. It’s very instinctual. It’s  very natural to use. 

How would you  differentiate 1Huddle from, say, an LMS? 

CH: So LMS generally just becomes this repository of a bunch of information that you go to because someone says, “Well, you gotta go there to find it.” That’s what LMS has actually just come down to.

It takes all of the fun outta training. This training should be fun. It shouldn’t feel like it’s hard work to do. 1Huddle feels fun. You’ve got competition, you’ve got points, you’ve got scores… You’re connecting very quickly  to what you just learned, and you feel accomplished. 

Do you get any surprising feedback from some of your players?  

CH: I love that our team uses the player feedback function. But I think the thing to us that we used to find surprising but no longer do, is when we see, okay, well when is our team playing our game? Oh, there’s a 3:30 AM ,you know, did somebody just wake up and, sitting there like, go  “oh, I gotta play that game! I gotta get my games in1”

They really wake up in the morning, brushing their teeth, and they’re like, all right, let’s talk about greeting guests or something like that. So I think that’s one of the things we found surprising– Any time of day, there’s gameplay happening.

Crushing it, Chad! Thank you so much.

About 1Huddle

1Huddle is a coaching and development platform that uses quick-burst mobile games to more quickly and effectively educate, elevate, and energize your workforce — from frontline to full-time.

With a mobile-first approach to preparing the modern worker, a mobile library of 3,000+ quick-burst employee skill games, an on-demand game marketplace that covers 16 unique workforce skill areas, and the option for personalized content, 1Huddle is changing the way organizations think about their training – from a one-time boring onboarding experience to a continuous motivational tool. 

Key clients include Loews Hotels, Novartis, Madison Square Garden, PIMCO, TAO Group, and the United States Air Force. To learn more about 1Huddle and its platform, please visit 1huddle.co.