127.6 Promotion, job assignments, and terms and conditions of employment

In this sex discrimination case, the employer’s asserted nondiscriminatory reasons for assigning female employee jobs as a loader/packer rather than a driver and for sending her to Class B truck driver training rather than Class A truck driver training were not shown to be a pretext. Burt v. Skaleski Moving & Storage, Inc. (LIRC, 4/8/13).

The Complainant, a female, was the first woman to hold the position of patrol officer in the sheriff’s department. The Complainant was unlawfully discriminated against on the basis of her sex when she was denied a promotion to the position of patrol sergeant. One of the members on the selection committee was biased against the Complainant because he did not want a woman in a superior role to the male patrol officers. He recommended that a male candidate be selected. The selection committee accepted the recommendation of the detective captain, as was its practice. The sheriff also accepted the captain’s selection, as was customary. The Respondent’s subsequent attempt to use its anti-nepotism policy to justify not promoting the Complainant (who was married to a fellow police officer) was a pretext for unlawful discrimination. Thobaben v. Waupaca County Sheriff’s Dep’t (LIRC, 12/23/11).

In a failure to promote case, the Complainant need not prove at the initial stage that she was the most qualified person for the promotion in order to make out a prima facie case. Foust v. City of Oshkosh Police Dep’t (LIRC, 04/09/98).

Discriminatory attitudes are not unlawful unless they actually result in discriminatory treatment. In this case, there was evidence that the Respondent’s operation’s manager stated that he thought that men made better managers. However, no unlawful discrimination was established where the record indicated that the operation manager’s selection of store managers was in fact not limited to males and that he retained a number of female store managers. Currie v. Garrow Oil Corp. (LIRC, 06/16/95).

A Complainant failed to prove that a police chief’s decision to demote her back to police officer from sergeant was motivated by her sex or sexual orientation where (1) the police chief initially sought out the Complainant for promotion, knowing the Complainant’s sex and sexual orientation; (2) the chief had a history of hiring and promoting females and lesbians; and (3) the chief had information which supported his conclusion that the Complainant lacked the interpersonal skills necessary to supervise other employees. Kemmerer v. City of Madison Police Dep’t (LIRC, 06/30/93).

There was nothing inherently unfair or inequitable in the Respondent’s practice of promoting candidates in rank order based on a composite score reflecting three factors: a written examination, performance ratings, and seniority. The Complainant in this case did not prove that the Respondent’s method of weighting seniority was adopted with the purpose and intent of impairing the Complainant’s promotional opportunities because she is female. Schiller v. City of Menasha Police Dep’t (LIRC, 01/14/93).

A part-time female employee could not prove sex discrimination in job assignments by comparing herself to a male employee who worked full time and whose job duties were not substantially similar to her own duties. The appropriate comparison group for such a female employee was the other part-time employees who performed similar job duties. Meisner v. Gervasi (LIRC, 09/30/92).

A prima facie case of sex discrimination involving promotion includes the following elements: (1) that the Complainant is a woman, (2) that the Complainant was not selected for the promotion, and (3) that a male who was less qualified than the Complainant received the promotion. In this case, the Complainant did not establish that the male who was selected for the promotion was less qualified than she to receive the promotion. Sobkowiak v. Trane Corp. (LIRC, 09/06/91).

An employer discriminated by promoting a male with greater experience to a position in which a female employee had been performing favorably for three years. The male’s engineering degree did not justify the selection because it was not required for the position. Gehrke v. 3M Co. (LIRC, 06/28/84).

Where a female was bypassed for several promotions and job opportunities but failed to show that she met the qualifications for the positions, there was not probable cause to find sex discrimination. Although the woman’s immediate supervisor did express negative attitudes toward women, she failed to show that these attitudes were ever a part of the employment decisions. Tomaszek v. Western Publ’g (LIRC, 06/16/82).

A female hospital administrator was discriminatorily denied promotion where the negative performance evaluations she received were done by a male supervisor, were subjective in nature, were not shared by other hospital administrators, were inconsistent with her previous appraisals and were used to select a male who had already been informally chosen. Williams v. County of Milwaukee (LIRC, 04/15/81).

It was discrimination to deny female employees the opportunity to do jobs involving moving heavy objects and driving forklift trucks, where the employer made that decision on the basis of sex stereotypes unrelated to the actual ability of any one individual to perform the particular job. Veach v. WARF Vitamin Concentrates (LIRC, 04/01/80).

The job assignment of a female inspector to the heaviest and least desirable job constituted sex discrimination, where her supervisor assigned newly hired male inspectors to lighter jobs to discourage women from coming into, or remaining in, his department. Rau v. Mercury Marine (LIRC, 05/19/77).

An employer discriminated against a female employee where promotional opportunities were not posted in the building in which five of the seven female custodians worked and where no male custodians were similarly disadvantaged. Haug v. Ohio Med. Prod. (DILHR, 08/05/75).

An employer discriminated against a female employee where it removed the sexual connotation from job titles but did not discontinue its practice of placing women in the lowest paid positions. Haug v. Ohio Med. Prod. (DILHR, 08/05/75).