The entire plant needs a fresh coat of paint so you, as the operations manager, are charged with securing a painting contract to accomplish this. You locate four painting contractors and ask them for their performance on four criteria

Their responses, along with your minimum standards and the importance you place on each criterion, is shown in the table. Assign scores from 1 to 5 where 1 is terrible and 5 is excellent, for each contractor's performance on each criterion and determine who should be awarded the contract. Write a brief explanation for all the 1s and 5s you assign.

Contractor Cost
20% Paint Time
25% Experience
20% References
20% Paint Quality
15%
1 $22,000 5 days 15 years Positive 20 year
2 $20,000 4 days 10 years Strongly positive Lifetime
3 $25,000 8 days 3 years Positive 25 year
4 $22,500 5 days 25 years Strongly positive 20 year
Minimum Standard Less than $25,000 Less than 1 week 5 years in business No negative references out of three 15 year guarantee

What will be an ideal response?

Answer: Answers will vary. Contractor 3 cannot meet the paint time criterion, does not have 5 years of experience, and is past the limit on cost. They should either be excluded from bidding or possibly assigned a score of 1 in each of those categories. Contractor 2 is best in cost, time, and paint quality and is tied for best in references and should probably be the highest overall score.