Situation 1

A customer has been browsing in your section for about 10 minutes and is looking increasingly dissatisfied and frustrated. He approaches you and asks whether you have a particular book that he is looking for, and after checking on your computer, you have to inform him that it is currently ‘out of stock’.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which one you believe to be the response to the situation you would be ‘most likely to make’ and the response to the situation which you would be ‘least likely to make’.

A). Apologize that the book is unavailable and suggest he try Morethanpens.co.uk or another online retailer instead.

B). Offer to order the book for the customer and let him know how long this will take. Offer to call him when the book arrives.

C). Give the customer the ISBN (book serial number) of the book so that he can easily and quickly search it out elsewhere, either online or at another bookshop.

D). Suggest he try the Alpston branch of More Than Pens (which is the nearest neighbouring town, 40 minutes drive away) or other bookshops in Saldringham.

Situation 2:

It is a Tuesday morning and a colleague in the stationery section is away on sick leave. At 11am you are on your way to the staff room to take a quick tea break when, passing through the stationery section, you notice that it is in a reasonable amount of disarray. Products have fallen on the floor and been left lying there, shelves are untidy and some products are on the wrong shelves.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which one you believe to be the response to the situation you would be ‘most likely to make’ and the response to the situation which you would be ‘least likely to make’.

A). Take your tea break and then on the way back quickly tidy up a few bits and pieces if it’s still in a state.

B). Go back to your section and ask your team leader whether you can be spared for 10 or 15 minutes to help out in stationery. If agreed, offer your help to the stationery team leader to quickly tidy up the area and take your tea break at 11.30am.

C). Do nothing. The stationery team leader probably has it all under control and will deal with it soon. It’s understandable that there’s a bit of a mess as someone is away and you don’t want to insult the stationery team by mentioning anything.

D). Inform the stationery team leader that there is a problem with the presentation of the section.

Situation 3:

It is late June. You have just had your monthly ‘book section’ team meeting and your team leader has given you a special target for next month. You have been asked to work towards increasing sales of children’s books by 15% compared to last July’s figures. July is always a difficult month for children’s products as it is the end of the summer term and families don’t tend to spend money on books or stationery for children at this time. You will not have any extra budget available to achieve this goal.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which one you believe to be the response to the situation you would be ‘most likely to make’ and the response to the situation which you would be ‘least likely to make’.

A). Put a hand-written poster near the till promoting the great range of summer activity books that More Than Pens stock for children.

B). Pick out a selection of summer-themed books and ‘summer holiday’ activity books and put them near the front of the children’s area.

C). Tidy up the children’s book area and make it look as presentable as possible.

D). Approach as many customers with children (or who look like they may have children or grandchildren) and politely mention to them that More Than Pens has a great range of summer holiday activity books and story books for children and show them where the children’s books are.

Situation 4:

You are doing a stint on the till on a busy Saturday afternoon. You are working on the main bank of tills at the exit to the shop where customers from all parts of the shop can go to purchase their items. Suddenly the credit card transaction system stops working and one of the team leaders tells you that it will be 15 minutes until the system provider can fix the problem. There is a long queue of customers waiting.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which one you believe to be the response to the situation you would be ‘most likely to make’ and the response to the situation which you would be ‘least likely to make’.

A). Talk to the team leader and suggest that someone goes down the line of customers informing them of the problem and how long it will take to resolve. This will save customers queuing up in case they have no cash or chequebook on them.

B). Continue serving customers and apologise about the lack of availability of credit card payment.

C). Ask the team leader what to do.

D). Take the opportunity to take your afternoon tea break as it appears that most customers will have to come back later when the system is working again.

Situation 5:

Fiona Potter has delegated a project to you regarding the non-medical staff induction training course. The course has been run internally by Fiona and her colleague for the past few years but now her role has become busier and the HR Director has authorised the appointment of an external supplier to deliver the course and to refresh the content of the course.

The project you are running has involved putting the course out to tender with various training suppliers and receiving bids back from the suppliers containing information on content of course, who would deliver it, length of course, expertise of the company, price to design and run the course and other relevant information. Fiona has given you the job of shortlisting the applicants; there are 20 companies who have bid and Fiona wants a shortlist of five to ask in to deliver a formal presentation. She has asked you to shortlist the bidding companies over the next two days.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which response you believe is the most effective.

A). Place all 20 suppliers on a grid and allocate points on a 1 to 5 scale according to each factor about which you have information (e.g. a company might score ‘1’ on price but ‘5’ on experience-level of their trainers).

B). Order the companies in terms of their prices and shortlist the five lowest-priced bids since the NHS should always be cost-conscious.

C). Ask Fiona and the HR Director for their views on what the key criteria should be for shortlisting the bidders and use this information to structure your decision-making.

D). Email a contact in at the Alpston University Hospital Trust who has done this type of thing before and ask for input on how to shortlist the bidders.

Situation 6:

You have had an email from a senior manager in the Finance department, Sally Arkwright, who will be your placement supervisor when you join the team in 3 months’ time. She is keen that you are aware that you will be joining the department at their busiest time. You are due to start in Finance in January which is the peak financial planning season. The staff will be working flat out to produce the annual business plans and budget allocations for each department in Sutton & Sykes and to align this with the projections of profit & loss for the business. Your supervisor feels that it is very important you are aware of this so you can ‘hit the ground running’ when you join the team. You have never worked in a finance role before.

Review the following responses A to D and indicate which response you believe is the most effective.

A). Search on the internet for information about business planning, budgeting and profit & loss calculation.

B). Email Sally and ask whether it would be possible to have a one-to-one meeting with her before you begin your placement to find out as much as possible about the projects on which you might be working.

C). Thank Sally and say that you will contact her in December, a few weeks before your placement, and ask for specific details of your projects.

D). Email Sally thanking her for her early warning. Ask her whether she can provide any information on the projects on which you might be working in January.