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HOPWOOD MANUFACTURING: SEEKING TO HIRE THE BEST AND
THE BRIGHTEST, OR NOT (A)

Timothy A. Ogden wrote this case solely to provide material for class discussion. The author does not intend to illustrate either
effective or ineffective handling of a managerial situation. The author may have disguised certain names and other identifying

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information to protect confidentiality.

Richard Ivey School of Business Foundation prohibits any form of reproduction, storage or transmission without its written
permission. Reproduction of this material is not covered under authorization by any reproduction rights organization. To order copies
or request permission to reproduce materials, contact Ivey Publishing, Richard Ivey School of Business Foundation, The University
of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada, N6A 3K7; phone (519) 661-3208; fax (519) 661-3882; e-mail cases@ivey.uwo.ca.

Copyright © 2011, Richard Ivey School of Business Foundation Version: 2011-12-14

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Professor Robert Harvey did not notice the music streaming from his radio as he drove home on the
evening of April 14. He was stunned by what he had just heard from Hopwood recruiters in a wrap-up
meeting. They had interviewed a dozen Lambert University students, nine for management training
positions and three for summer internships. Had he misunderstood what they had said? Could
representatives of a Fortune 500 company actually state that they could not place a young Hispanic woman
in a manufacturing facility in the South? It was 2006 after all. He did not want to believe it, but that is what
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they said. Harvey wondered what he should do.

LAMBERT UNIVERSITY

Lambert University, a small, church-affiliated liberal arts institution located in rural northern Iowa, had an
enrollment of approximately 2,500 students. It was founded by a group of Mennonites in the late 1800s,
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and it graduated mostly teachers and preachers through the first half of the twentieth century. However,
beginning in the 1960s Lambert began to develop a strong reputation in the natural sciences and in
accounting while continuing to maintain a strong education program. By the early part of the new century,
the university’s pre-medicine program was among the finest in the Midwest, and the accounting
department was one of the best in the nation.

Eighty per cent of the university’s students came from rural northern Iowa, and their homes were located
within a two-hour drive of the school. Many of these students were the first in their families to attend
college. Within that two-hour radius there were also three large (for Iowa) cities, yet few city kids attended
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Lambert. The school was in the middle of the Iowa cornfields, and students from the city generally felt
isolated on its 250-acre campus. As a result, 95 per cent of the student body (and an even greater
percentage of the faculty and staff) was white.

Recently, the issue of diversity had taken centre stage at Lambert. Despite the low number of non-whites,
minority students had generally felt welcome, but in the spring of 2005 an anonymous e-mail hate message

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had been sent to several minority student organizations on campus. This event was used as a springboard

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by the administration to emphasize the institution’s commitment to diversity. Over the next 12 months, the
university hired a consultant who conducted a diversity audit on campus; faculty, staff and students
completed diversity questionnaires; diversity consultants were assigned to all employment search
committees; and diversity was a recurring topic at many campus meetings.

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THE HOPWOOD OPPORTUNITY

Robert Harvey was finishing his eighth year teaching various business classes at Lambert. In early
November 2005 he was contacted by David Maggert who had spoken in his classes as a guest lecturer
twice a year for several years in the late 1990s. In fact, on those occasions Maggert had travelled to
Lambert at his own expense and had not requested any remuneration for his time. In addition, he had hired

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Lambert students both as interns and as permanent employees when he worked for a major auto
manufacturer. Harvey had not seen him for several years and was surprised to hear that Maggert had left
his high level position in the auto industry to join the Hopwood Manufacturing Company. Hopwood was a
billion-dollar producer of recreational equipment including fiberglass swimming pools, hot tubs and
saunas, exercise equipment, swing sets, jungle gyms and various other items. Maggert said that he had
always been impressed by Lambert students and that he would like to meet with Harvey to discuss a new
program he was developing at Hopwood. Harvey agreed and set up a lunch meeting with Maggert, himself
and Sharon Wilson, another faculty member in the School of Business.
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At the meeting several weeks later Maggert explained what he was trying to accomplish. Hopwood had
traditionally promoted people from within, which meant that strong performers in the factory were
promoted to entry-level management positions from which they continued to climb in the organization.
Maggert—who revealed at the lunch that he had not joined the company as an employee as Harvey had
been led to believe but in fact was an independent consultant under contract with Hopwood—sought to
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professionalize the company’s management. He was working to develop a program through which the
company would hire college and university business students as summer interns. From there, the top
performers would be offered permanent positions as managers in training. Maggert was visiting small
institutions such as Lambert where there would be few Fortune 500 companies recruiting, thereby
increasing Hopwood’s opportunity to hire, in Maggert’s words, “the best and the brightest.”

Though a little put off by the fact that Maggert had not revealed his consulting status earlier, Harvey and
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Wilson were thrilled with the possibilities this opportunity might provide. Under the proposal, students
who were selected for internships would be placed in one of Hopwood’s 30 manufacturing facilities around
the United States. The company would pay for relocation and housing, it would provide an hourly wage,
and a performance-related bonus would be available at the end of the summer. As it turned out, the
company would also be interested in recruiting managers in training for the coming spring, even though the
internship program was not yet off the ground.

HOPWOOD VISITS LAMBERT

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Wilson and Harvey worked hard to develop excitement among students for the Hopwood recruiting visit.
On paper it sounded great, and it was unusual to have such a large company that was not an accounting
firm coming to the campus. They began talking about the Hopwood opportunity informally in their classes
and with their top students. Other faculty members in the School of Business were encouraged to do the
same. They then arranged for an evening presentation by Hopwood representatives the night before the

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interviews. The idea was to invite all business students, whether they would be interviewing the next day

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or not, in an effort to generate excitement about the new internship/manager-in-training program that might
carry over into future years. Posters were hung around campus, and the faculty continued to promote the
visit.

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Off to a Poor Start

David Maggert arrived with Wendy Blair, a human resources representative from Hopwood, on April 13 in
the middle of the afternoon. Harvey welcomed them to the university and, for Blair’s benefit, gave the two
a quick tour of the campus. They stopped in the lecture hall where they would give their presentation that
evening to make sure the necessary equipment was available. Harvey was a little surprised that they needed
only an overhead projector. He had expected something a little more sophisticated—even students were

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now using PowerPoint as a matter of course in their class presentations. But he was too excited to let this
minor detail bother him.

Following their short walk, Harvey, Maggert and Blair headed for the coffee shop to visit before the
presentation. During their conversation, Harvey sensed some tension between Blair and Maggert, and he
quickly discovered that she did not have a college education. She was part of the rank and file that had
been promoted into management. As the evening wore on, it became apparent that this new recruiting
program was Maggert’s baby; Blair felt threatened by it and was clearly not on board.
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That evening approximately 225 students showed up for the Hopwood presentation and reception that
followed. Twelve of them would be interviewed the next day. The lecture hall was packed, and Maggert
began the presentation. His portion proceeded smoothly, although Harvey had seen him do much better.
Blair, on the other hand, was not well-prepared. She came across as uninterested and less than professional,
and on more than one occasion during the question-and-answer session, she cut Maggert off or chastised
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him for his response. It was obvious to the few who knew that Maggert was a consultant that Blair was
taking every opportunity to remind him of that fact. As Wilson and Harvey discussed the presentation the
following morning, they agreed that Hopwood’s performance was less than stellar. Certainly a Fortune 500
company could have done better than that. However, if the interviews went well that day, the poor
presentation would fade from people’s memories. Unfortunately, that was not to be.
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The Interviews

The interviews were scheduled to begin on Wednesday morning, April 14, at 9:00. Harvey had a class
scheduled at that time, but he walked over to the Office of Career Services beforehand to greet Maggert
and Blair and to make sure they had everything they needed. When Harvey left for his class at 9:10,
Maggert and Blair still had not arrived, and the first student to be interviewed sat waiting. Harvey
wondered to himself as he climbed the stairs to the third-storey administration building classroom what
else might tarnish the Hopwood visit. His question would be answered soon enough.
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Christine Ramirez was scheduled for the first interview. Ramirez, who was born in Mexico, was a senior
business major with outstanding academic credentials. She had international experience, excellent writing
and oral communication skills (not a trace of an accent) and a strong interest in working with a large
company. She waited patiently for the recruiters, who finally arrived at approximately 9:15. Among the
other students to be interviewed was one black male from Kenya, whose English was good but laden with
a heavy accent, and one white female from northern Iowa. The remainder of the interviewees were white

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males. During the course of the day, Harvey saw two or three of the students who had interviewed with

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Hopwood but learned nothing unusual. One student commented that the interview was quite short; the
others remarked that their interviews were relatively comparable to what they had experienced with other
recruiters.

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The Post-Interview Meeting

Harvey returned to the Office of Career Services shortly after 4:00 that afternoon. The final interview was
scheduled to end then, and he wanted to talk with Maggert and Blair about their impressions before they
left the campus. Harvey gave the pair about 15 minutes to talk privately after the last interviewee left
before knocking on the door and inviting himself into the room where the interviews had been conducted.
Blair and Maggert sat side by side comparing notes at the oval-shaped table. Harvey sat facing them.

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Maggert greeted Harvey warmly and thanked him for returning to visit; he and Blair had some issues they
wanted to discuss.

Maggert: Bob, this was a good group that we saw today, and they did a nice job with the interviews.
For the most part they were well-prepared and quite professional. We do have some general
concerns, however, about the fit between the students here and Hopwood.

Harvey: Tell me about your concerns.

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Blair: Well, let’s take Bill. What a nice kid. I swear I thought he must be a student pastor
somewhere. He’s just a real nice young man, and northern Iowa is exactly where he should
stay. I think he has an offer with a small company nearby, doesn’t he? He ought to take that
offer and stay here. I don’t think he could survive in the kind of environment we work in.
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Harvey: Who else did you have concerns about?

Maggert: David Smith was another one. He did well in the interview, but with that baby face of his I
think he’d get eaten alive in our customer service department.

Harvey: [silence]
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Maggert: We were quite impressed with Christine Ramirez, though. She did very well.

Blair: She was excellent. She’s bright and talented, and she handled herself very well. But we’re not
sure we can make her an offer.

Harvey: Why not?

Blair: Well, you know that many of our plants are in the South.
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Harvey: Yes.

Blair: Well . . . many of the people who work in those plants grew up in the South. They’ve lived in
the South all their lives.

Harvey: Yes.

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Blair: I just don’t think that we can place a young Hispanic woman in that environment.

Harvey: [silence]

Harvey could not believe what he was hearing. The meeting wound up shortly thereafter, and the parties

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exchanged perfunctory thank yous, but his head was spinning. He knew that discrimination still occurred,
but he had never heard anything so blatant from people in such high positions. The words swirled in his
mind as he drove home. He couldn’t imagine how Sharon Wilson would react.

CONCLUSION

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The following morning, Thursday, April 15, Harvey entered Wilson’s office and closed the door behind
him. It was not unusual for the two to meet privately to discuss important issues related to the business
school. They regularly brainstormed together and bounced ideas off each other, but this was different. The
stakes were higher than usual, and they needed to decide what to do quickly. After Harvey explained what
had happened the previous afternoon, Wilson recounted a similar statement made by the Hopwood people
when she hosted them for lunch the previous day, only the lunch statement was directed not only at the
“young Hispanic woman” but also the black male student from Kenya.
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There was no misunderstanding then. Both faculty members had heard the same thing from Hopwood
Manufacturing’s recruiters, and they knew that such behavior could not go unchecked, especially not at
Lambert University. Wilson and Harvey (both of whom were white) were Lambert graduates, and they
knew that, aside from general societal standards of decency, Maggert and Blair’s behavior was simply
unacceptable in the Lambert environment. One of the focal points of the Lambert Statement of Mission
was a recognition of “the infinite worth of every person.” The people at the university, including Wilson
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and Harvey, believed in that principle, and it guided their conduct. Now they would have to decide what
corrective action was appropriate.
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