Please answer only number 2

CHAPTER 6 EMPLOYEE TESTING AND SELECTION 207 CONTINUING CASE HONESTY TESTING AT CARTER CLEANING COMPANY Jennifer Carter, of the Carter Cleaning Centers, and her father According to Jack Carter, "You would not believe the creativ- have what the latter describes as an easy but hard job when it ity employees use to get around the management controls we comes to screening job applicants. It is easy because for two set up to cut down on employee theft." As one extreme important jobsthe people who actually do the pressing and example of this felonious creativity, Jack tells the following those who do the cleaning/spottingthe applicants are easily story: "To cut down on the amount of money my employees screened with about 20 minutes of on-the-job testing. As with were stealing, I had a small sign painted and placed in front typists, Jennifer points out, Applicants either know how to of all our cash registers. The sign said: YOUR ENTIRE press clothes fast enough or how to use cleaning chemicals and ORDER FREE IF WE DON'T GIVE YOU A CASH REGIS- machines, or they don't, and we find out very quickly by just TER RECEIPT WHEN YOU PAY. CALL 552-0235. It was my trying them out on the job. On the other hand, applicant intention with this sign to force all our cash-handling screening for the stores can also be frustratingly hard because employees to give receipts so the cash register would record of the nature of some of the other qualities that Jennifer would them for my accountants. After all, if all the cash that comes like to screen for. Two of the most critical problems facing her in is recorded in the cash register, then we should have a company are employee turnover and employee honesty. much better handle on stealing in our stores. Well, one Jennifer and her father sorely need to implement practices that of our managers found a diabolical way around this. I came will reduce the rate of employee turnover. If there is a way to do into the store one night and noticed that the cash register this through employee testing and screening techniques, this particular manager was using just didn't look right, Jennifer would like to know about it because of the manage- although the sign was placed in front of it. It turned out that ment time and money that are now being wasted by the every afternoon at about 5:00 P.M. when the other employees never-ending need to recruit and hire new employees. Of even left, this character would pull his own cash register out of a greater concern to Jennifer and her father is the need to insti- box that he hid underneath our supplies. Customers coming tute new practices to screen out those employees who may be in would notice the sign and, of course, the fact that he was predisposed to steal from the company. meticulous in ringing up every sale. But unknown to them Employee theft is an enormous problem for the Carter and us, for about 5 months the sales that came in for about Cleaning Centers, and one that is not limited to employees an hour every day went into his cash register, not mine. who handle the cash. For example, the cleaner/spotter and/or It took us that long to figure out where our cash for that the presser often open the store themselves, without a manager store was going." present, to get the day's work started, and it is not unusual to Here is what Jennifer would like you to answer: have one or more of these people steal supplies or "run a route." Running a route means that an employee canvasses his or her neighborhood to pick up people's clothes for cleaning Questions and then secretly cleans and presses them in the Carter store, 1. What would be the advantages and disadvantages to using the company's supplies, gas, and power. It would also not Jennifer's company of routinely administering honesty be unusual for an unsupervised person (or his or her super- tests to all its employees? visor, for that matter) to accept a 1-hour rush order for cleaning 2. Specifically, what other screening techniques could the or laundering, quickly clean and press the item, and return it to company use to screen out theft-prone and turnover- the customer for payment without making out a proper ticket prone employees, and how exactly could these be used? for the item posting the sale. The money, of course, goes into 3. How should her company terminate employees caught the worker's pocket instead of into the cash register. stealing, and what kind of procedure should be set up The more serious problem concerns the store manager for handling reference calls about these employees when and the counter workers who actually handle the cash. they go to other companies looking for jobs