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Interview with Swati Raval, Subway Franchisee

For my informational interview, I had the pleasure of talking with Mrs. Swati Raval,

owner of eight Subway restaurant franchises in the Hampton Roads area, where I grew up. As a

franchisee, she is responsible for keeping all eight of her restaurants compliant under strict

corporate standards, which means she has to tweak her own personal management style to make

sure she is following the management rules set forth by the franchisor. Despite this, Mrs. Raval

makes sure she always leads her team by example; by being ethical and fair. Additionally, she

makes sure to keep her team motivated through job enrichment and empowerment. In this report,

I will discuss what I learned in this informational interview in the context of chapters eight, ten,

eleven, and twelve of the textbook, M: Management, by authors Thomas Batemen, Scott Snell,

and Robert Konopaske.

A typical workday for Mrs. Raval is comprised of reviewing sales data, reviewing daily

operational tasks to ensure that all food safety standards are being followed, reviewing guests’

feedback on websites like Yelp or Google Reviews, providing training to staff both new and

current, monitoring daily schedules, reconciling daily sales and deposits, and conducting phone

interviews for open positions. I was surprised at how many responsibilities the owner herself

actually had, because some of these tasks definitely seemed like they could be delegated to lower

level management. For example, each individual store manager could build and monitor the daily

schedule and maybe even conduct the phone interviews.

Mrs. Raval says the most rewarding aspect of her work is when she gets the opportunity

to provide training to her staff. She says she loves to teach and help her employees learn their job

responsibilities. In chapter eight, we discussed the different types of training. Mrs. Raval utilizes

a combination of orientation training and regular training because she not only has the
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responsibility of introducing new staff to the company and familiarize them with the policies and

procedures, she also has to make sure her current employees stay performing well.

In chapter eight we also discussed the job recruitment process. Recruitment is the

development of a pool of applicants for jobs in an organization. Mrs. Raval does this everyday

by checking the Subway.com website’s for new job applications to her eight restaurants. She

narrows the applications down by location and relative experience. When hiring a potential

employee, she looks for the following qualities, “punctuality, dependability, cheerfulness,

enthusiasm to learn new things, energetic personality, and a positive attitude.” She conducts

interviews over the phone and in-person when necessary. Because Mrs. Raval has to follow the

standards that Subway corporate sets, she has to ask specific questions in this interview, which

make all the interviews structured. All the applications are asked the same selection questions

and their responses are compared to a standardized set of answers.

Mrs. Raval strives to be a strong leader in her organization. She confides in me that it is

not easy to be a woman, especially a woman of color, in charge of over 100 people across eight

restaurants. Despite these obstacles, Mrs. Raval aims to “lead by example.” She says that she

works hard to set an example of what a model employee at her organization should be and that

her employees follow. I believe this is the behavioral approach to leadership as discussed in

chapter ten. The approach aims to identify what behaviors good leaders exhibit and what

relationship that creates with their subordinates. I also believe Mrs. Raval leading by example is

a form of strategic leadership, a form of leadership that gives purpose and meaning to an

organization, envisioning and creating a positive future. When Mrs. Raval leads by example, she

is showing her employees what standard she holds herself to and is telling them they should all

hold themselves to that same standard.

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Mrs. Raval knows that restaurant work for a little bit more than minimum wage can get

demoralizing especially if been in that position for many years, which some of her employees

have been. To keep her employees motivated and excited about work, she tries to focus on each

employee’s individual strengths and encourage them through different responsibilities that play

to these strengths. In chapter eleven, we learned about job enrichment, in which employers can

change a task to make it inherently more rewarding, motivating, and satisfying. For example, if a

store manage shows an affinity for marketing, Mrs. Raval will encourage them to come up with

ways to advertise new sandwich campaigns locally. She is helping her employees by letting them

explore their passions and making their jobs at Subway more satisfying.

Two of Mrs. Raval’s chief responsibilities is conflict mediation between two or more

employees and of course, employee discipline when a company rule is violated. In my opinion,

Mrs. Raval’s approach to conflict mediation is simple and fair. She gives both parties an

opportunity to share their concerns in a professional and polite manner. Once both parties get to

share their concerns, she asks them to come up with a solution that they both can agree on. This

approach is known as collaboration, because both parties work together to achieve the solution

with maximum satisfaction for both of them. Employee discipline is one of the more difficult

part of Mrs. Raval’s jobs because she has to make sure she is being objective and fair throughout

the whole process, otherwise called procedural justice. Mrs. Raval referred to the discipline

process in her organization as a “progressive discipline process.” This means she is consistent in

enforcing the policies and documenting the violations. She says that consistency in enforcing the

policies ensures that everyone is being held to the same standards and will suffer the same

consequences for violating the policies.

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In conclusion, I really enjoyed my informational interview because I actually got to apply

what I have been learning in this course in real life and it showed me that what I am learning is

extremely valuable to managers.

Informational Interview Questions for Swati Raval

1. What is your primary role in your organization?

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2. What does a typical workday look like for you?

3. What do you enjoy most about the work you do? What do you find most challenging?

4. Are you involved in the hiring process at your organization? If so, in what capacity and
what do you look for in a potential employee?

5. What personality or character traits make you an effective leader? How do you apply
these traits to your daily work?

6. How do you go about settling conflict between two subordinates?

7. How does the employee discipline process work at your organization? How do you
ensure you are being fair and objective throughout the process?

8. How do you keep your subordinates motivated and excited about work?

9. To that end, what is company culture like in your opinion? Are employees generally
happy?

10. Where do you see this organization headed in 5 years? In 10 years?