Trojans judge at Taco Bell’s Internal Incubator

Every year, Taco Bell employees have the opportunity to bring ideas to stakeholders and partners in the company’s Internal Incubator, where a panel of judges evaluates each business plan and selects one to implement. On September 29th, 2022, two USC students joined the panel for the Internal Incubator. 

Zach Trail, manager and co-creative director of the program, explained that the idea for the Incubator came from Taco Bell’s CEO, Mark King. 

“He came to us saying, ‘Hey, I want this spirit of restless creativity. How do we make things bigger and better with new ideas, and how can they come from any person at any level? I want this program to get people to challenge themselves to be more creative, think more creative, and give them a formal process to bring their ideas to life.” 

The first Internal Incubator launched in 2021, and since then, four more sessions have been launched, each highlighting a different area to tackle. In the fifth session, the Internal Incubator transformed into an immersive experience, with the goal of developing ideas on how to make working at Taco Bell a “fantastic place.” Team members were flown into Huntington Beach for the two-day off-site session. 

Team members engaged in creative exercises that led to the ideation of ideas. After 70 ideas were created, the session was extended to a final day of presentations where they were narrowed down to a top four. 

As the four teams pitched their ideas, USC students Russell Agustin and Tiana Day joined the experience as judges alongside world-renowned professionals including Tess Melody Taylor, Fernando Claussen, Tim Bergevin and Mike Grams. Judges were asked to provide insights on the business plans that were presented, in terms of enhancing the social impacts that Taco Bell can have on their own employees across the country and worldwide.

“My participation in the Incubator gave me a lot of hope in terms of seeing industry giants change their actions and branding themselves in the context of social good,” said Agustin, a junior majoring in public policy and minoring in social entrepreneurship. “Just seeing them undergo this process and seeing them listen to employees at their own corporation I think was a beautiful thing.”

Agustin explained that he has worked on looking at current systems and practicing creative curiosity in examining ways to change and improve processes.

“My time at USC has taught me that things can always be better, despite the fact that they are really effective or efficient as they are,” Agustin said. “A lot of people are bought into the fact that a process is the best that it could possibly be. But I think what I was able to translate from these programs is looking at something and being like, ‘You know what, this is a good idea, but it could be better.’”

Day, a sophomore majoring in arts, technology and the business of innovation, said she believes the impact of the Incubator stretches far beyond Taco Bell. 

“Our generation is changing the game,” Day said. “And a lot of these corporations who have been in the game for a really long time are finally listening to young people and giving them a space at the table, because I believe this is our future that we’re fighting for.”

Trail noted that employees who participate also have the opportunity to gain something new from the experience. 

“You leave with tangible, new tools that you can take back into your roles and people leave feeling creative,” he said, “even though they might not think they are.”

Correction: This article was updated at 10:27 a.m. on Jan. 12 to reflect that Taco Bell’s CEO is Mark King, not Mark Kane, as a previous version stated. The Daily Trojan regrets this error.