Action Steps for Hathaway Jones Company - Case Study Example

The company wanted to enter China's luxury market goods market which was reported to be growing by 70% each year. The plan was to open up new stores in the three largest cities of China which include Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shanghai. The other very important objective of the company was to select a winning team that would lead this new entry into the Chinese market. These stores had to have the most talented and qualified human resources to enable them to do well in the new market space. For this reason, all the actions that this company would commit itself to afterward should be pointed towards achieving one goal of having a winning team or workforce that can lead their new venture in China.
Statement of Issue

The issue that requires a decision, in this case, is whether to employ Mimi Brewster, daughter of John Brewster who is a good friend to the Hathaway CEO, Fred, to lead a team that would open the flagship store in Shanghai. It is hard deciding on whether to employ her or not, to consider both her negative and positive sides of her. On the positive side, Mimi is a strong candidate for the position with both good education and experience background that fits the fashion industry. With her experience working with the largest clothing, shoe, and accessories company in the United States, where she launched two new brands, she made a very good candidate to be chosen to sell the Hathaway agenda in China.

On the other hand, the vice president of Hathaway, Virginia Flanders, found non-palatable information from Google about Mimi that would make her consideration decision hard thing to make. The information that was printed in the Alternative Review in 1999 identified Mimi to have been the leader of a non-violent, but vocal protest group that was known to have helped mobilize campaigns against the World Trade Organization. Another newspaper featured Mimi's photo, trying to protest against how China treated a dissident journalist, sitting outside China's San Francisco. According to Virginia's findings, it wasn't wise to employ Mimi since such news would just come up one day, and that would jeopardize their business presence in China.

Solution Alternatives
There can be three different courses of action that can be employed to rescue the situation. The first option is, for the company to decide not to employ Mimi as it would be risky for the company when someone shall dig the information up and use it to expose Mimi. The company will stand to lose its customers to its competitors due to the bad history that could be associated with Mimi as a top store manager in Shanghai. It would, for this reason, be better to just not employ Mimi. The second option would be just to risk and employ Mimi and assume that people will understand that whatever happened took place long ago.

Stories about Mimi that were revealed took place long more than eight years ago. More so, the information revealed about Mimi was not something so bad that could tarnish the image of the company in China. The third option could be to consider Mimi's candidature but publish to the media a statement distancing Mimi from such long-time acts. In this way, they would seek the public's attention to these issues about Mimi so that they can see the reaction of people. The intention here is to make the public realize that the new Mimi is a changed one and has no old deeds but just wants to sell different agendas of Hathaway.
Recommendation

The best option, that the company should go for, is just considering Mimi's candidature after clearing her name. The qualification and experience, that the candidate have is so immense that she cannot be left to be picked by the competitors. Mimi, with her adequate knowledge of China's business and fashion industries, is the best candidate to go for the flagship of a store in Shanghai. She will, for this reason, become the best candidate to help Hathaway meet its objectives as she has adequate knowledge of the industry and the fact that she understands China better.
Action Steps

To ensure that this action plan works, the company needs to take ups the following steps:
Publish in the major dailies' on China televisions about Mimi, mainly the story about what was revealed to her. With this information, the company should try to clarify that such actions were committed by the candidate long ago, and it is not something that should be used for a reference currently. That Mimi is now a new person and will majorly be selling Hathaway's business agenda in China, nothing else. After the publication, reactions will come from the public that will help the company decide whether to hire Mimi or not. It is most likely that the public will understand the situation. After that, the company will go ahead and consider Mimi’s candidature without any worries. Read More