Steven Zhang, regional director of sales for Right Times Uniform Company, is reviewing the rsums and applications

Steven Zhang, regional director of sales for Right Times Uniform Company, is reviewing the résumés and applications and his notes on three job candidates he interviewed for a vacant sales position in the Salt Lake City area. In a few minutes, Steven will meet with Peggy Phillips, regional sales trainer, and Tony Brooks, district sales manager, to choose whom to hire for the vacancy in Tony’s district. Right, Times Uniform provides uniforms to a variety of businesses throughout the country. The professional-looking uniforms allow the businesses’ employees to present a consistent, professional appearance to their customers. Like other companies in this industry, Right Times Uniform provides its customers and employees with enough uniforms to use for an entire week. At the end of the week, a Right Times Uniform customer service driver picks up the dirty uniforms and leaves clean ones for all employees for the next week. and The sales process for Right Times involves a salesperson visiting a prospect, determining if the prospect is a candidate for Right Times’ services, and selling that prospect on the advantages of using Right Times Uniforms. Whether or not a company is a prospect for Right Times depends on the number of employees it has and the importance of presenting a professional image to the public. The range of customers Right Times Uniforms serves is vast, from Joe’s Mechanic Shop with five employees to some of the nicest downtown hotels with over 200 employees.
STEVEN: Let’s talk about our final three candidates for this position. I have an application, résumé, and my interview notes for David, Kathy, and Tim. Do we have any more information on these three people?
TONY: No, we don’t. We all have the same information. One thing you and Peggy may not know is how these people became aware of this job opening. David is the cousin of Richard, one of the reps in my district working down in Provo. Kathy saw our ad in the local newspaper and Tim found out about the opening from our website. The local newspaper and our company website are the only places where we published the job opening.
STEVEN: I’m worried about Tim as a potential employee. He comes from New Orleans, where a high percentage of the population is Catholic. If he’s Catholic, how will he fit into our community here in Salt Lake?
PEGGY: I asked him about his religion. He looked sort of uncomfortable about the question but said he has lived in several places around the country and he didn’t see any special problems with fitting in here.
TONY: Tim is not the one I’m concerned about. David is the one who indicated on his application that he was convicted of a felony. I asked him and he said there was a DUI on his record from 10 years ago when he was 20 years old. Richard never said anything about this when he recommended David. David learned his lesson because he finished college and has several years of good sales experience with an office supplies company. However, do we want a felon on our payroll?
STEVEN: I think David’s record and his lack of a repeat incidence in the last 10 years speak for themselves. What about Kathy?
PEGGY: Did you notice that engagement ring on Kathy’s finger?
She’s obviously in the middle of a very big life change and likely will be distracted by that for some time. I asked her when the wedding was and she said in six months. Her fiancé
is a software engineer who may or may not be staying in Utah for the long term. His family is in Seattle and we all know there are plenty of job opportunities for people in his line of work there. Plus, Kathy’s likely to want to have children soon. I asked her about those plans. She hesitated but finally said that while they want to have children, they haven’t set a deadline for that yet. However, she’s 33 years old and the clock is ticking. I’m guessing she’ll be out on maternity leave sooner rather than later.
STEVEN: We have a lot to consider. What do you say we look at their sales experience and see if we can come to some conclusion? With that comment, the conversation steered toward the sales experience of the three candidates and their potential to perform the job at hand. After a discussion of about 30 minutes, a decision on whom to offer the job to was made and the meeting ended. One last decision made by the group was that if the person getting the offer didn’t take the job, they would try to get another pool of candidates.
Questions

1. Analyze the recruitment and selection process used by Right Times Uniform Company. What was the source of this pool of candidates? What changes, if any, do you recommend to the process?
2. What tests do you recommend the company use to help select its salespeople? Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of such tests.
3. What do you think of some of the questions that were asked of these job candidates? Did the company expose itself to any potential problems by asking them? If so, how?