Which candidate should get the job? A case study in diversity and recruitment

Alex Pelletier, the CEO of Juno, a Toronto-based toy company, nodded his acknowledgment. He knew that Stuart Landry, his chairman, wasn’t berating him for a problem they were already working to fix — Stuart just wanted to discuss it over lunch before the board met the following week.

One big agenda item would be Alex’s decision on a key hire for Juno’s Asia operations. The person would be the second-in-command, reporting to the head of the unit, John Chang, and would help oversee Juno’s mainland-China manufacturing along with sales to Asian distributors, which had risen in recent years to meet the demand for Western entertainment.

It was a critical role, and the plan was to find someone with experience in the region and the potential to grow the business who could eventually succeed John and take his board seat. Ideally the person would also diversify Juno’s leadership ranks — which, to Alex’s chagrin, were still mostly white and male.

Like many other CEOs, Alex had in recent years committed publicly to supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives internally and racial justice efforts externally. He’d spent much of 2020 both dealing with pandemic-related supply-chain delays and store closures and hammering out the company’s diversity policies and plans.