Improving Behaviors on the Front Line
FDA’s Partnership with Google to Test the
Effectiveness of Oral Culture Learner Project
Materials
Alan Tart
Chuck Catlin, RS, MPA
Retail Food Program Specialist Global Food Quality & Risk Manager
FDA/ORA/Office of Partnerships
Google, Inc.
118th AFDO Annual Educational Conference, Denver, CO
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Presentation Objectives
• Attendees will be able to describe:
– Differences between oral and print culture learners
– FDA’s Oral Culture Learner Project (OCLP)
– The experiment conducted in partnership with Google
to test the effectiveness of the OCLP materials
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The Faces and Families Behind the Statistics
(Source: http://www.stopfoodborneillness.org)
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Oral versus Print Culture Learners
• Dr. Donna Beegle
• 2004 Oregon Environmental Health Specialist Network
(EHS-Net) Communication Study
• Study conclusion:
– Food employees = oral culture learners
– Regulators = print culture learners
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Oral versus Print Culture Communication:
How we receive, process, & retain information
• Oral
• Print
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Recommendations for Communicating
Food Concepts to Oral Culture Learners
(cont’d)
• Share stories, sayings, vivid examples of outbreaks
• Stress the importance of role modeling
• Have information presented by someone they trust
• Use simple words or examples food workers can relate to
• Present information verbally and often
(Beegle, 2004)
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Recommendations for Communicating
Food Concepts to Oral Culture Learners
(cont’d)
• Minimize power dynamic (with exception, use eye contact)
• Focus on the big picture, not the gory details
• Be interactive
(Beegle, 2004)
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FDA’s Oral Culture Learner Project
http://www.fda.gov/foodemployeetraining
• Multi-language posters, storyboards, and video
testimonials
• Available for free
• Focus on the consequences of not following the food
safety practice
• Are designed to enhance, not replace, existing
training materials
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Foodborne Illness Victim Video
Testimonials
• Available for viewing and download
• Spanish and English closed
captioning
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Partnership between FDA and Google to Test the
Effectiveness of the Oral Culture Learner Project
Materials
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Definition of Insanity
Repeating the same process over and over and expecting
to get different outcomes……
Google-FDA Partnership
Effectiveness Experiment
• At Google, we are always looking for the next 10X
project. Not incremental improvement, but exponential
improvement.
– Google Search Engine
– Voice Recognition and Translation
– Driverless Car
Could The FDA Oral Culture Materials be a
10X Food Safety Training System?
• Could the FDA Oral Culture training
provide the spark to better outcomes
and increased positive food safety
behaviors?
– Learning
– Recall
– Actual Behavior Change
• Google is not working on the true
Neuralyzer
So What Did We Do?
• What were our goals?
– To see a positive directional change in behavioral
performance by using the Oral Culture learning
materials
• We did not do a controlled study
– Not possible to completely control the environment
– Not enough participants (+300)
– Did not provide long enough training (1.5 hour
sessions)
– Be Safe Training
Goal is 100%
Compliance with the
Be Safe behaviors
Google-FDA Partnership
Effectiveness Experiment
• Participants:
– Google Food Team
– Bon Appetit
– FDA
– Santa Clara County, CA Health Department
– Monterey County, CA Hhealth Department
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Google-FDA Partnership
Effectiveness Experiment
• Location: Googleplex, Mountain View, CA
• 35 full service establishments
• Focus on poor personal hygiene risk factor
• Baseline data collection
• All employees had basic CA food handler training &
Bon Appetit corporate training
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Google-FDA Partnership
Effectiveness Experiment
• 24 establishments grouped into three cohorts:
– Cohort 1 received no additional training (control)
– Cohort 2 received food handler training
– Cohort 3 received food handler + oral culture training
• 307 food employees trained
• Behavior change was evaluated using post training audit
data
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Group Activity Using the Oral Culture
Posters/Videos
• What food safety messages
were communicated in the
poster/video?
• How did the poster/video
make you feel?
• Did the poster/video make
you want to ____________?
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What Did We See
• We saw the directional improvement needed to move
forward with Phase II
• Food handlers who received the Oral Culture Training
would stop me as I walked through the kitchen to say we
are working hard not to kill Mrs. Ploghoft
Phase II
• Google will help support the development of an on-line
food handler class that features the Oral Culture
materials (Will help to enhance the current material)
• Google will work with the FDA to help develop daily flash
card reminder training for alley rallies or other quick real
time training reminders
• Continue to measure the progress. We would love to see
10X improvement in food safety behaviors. (100%
Compliance with Be Safe)
Chuck Catlin, RS, MPA
Global Food Quality & Risk
Manager, Google, Inc.
(602) 769-1418
catlin@google.com
Alan Tart
Retail Food Program Specialist
FDA/ORA/Office of Partnerships
(404) 253-1267
Alan.Tart@fda.hhs.gov
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To order free posters, go to
http://www.fda.gov/foodemployeetraining
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To view the testimonials, go to
http://www.fda.gov/foodemployeetraining
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To download the testimonials, go to
http://www.fda.gov/foodemployeetraining
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