EEOC v. Morton Buildings, Inc.

No. 3:04-CV-02122 (N.D. Tex. June 5, 2006)
The Dallas District Office of the EEOC filed this Title VII case alleging that the
defendant, a national construction company in Illinois, discharged the charging
party (CP) from her sales consultant position at its Texas office because of her sex.
The manager of the McKinney office hired the CP, who had 30 years of sales and
marketing experience (20 in commercial real estate construction and sales), as a
sales consultant in December 2002, despite initial resistance from the Western
Region manager who pressed him to hire an inexperienced male instead. The
regional manager made statements to the CP and other staff suggesting that he
was uncomfortable with women working in construction sales. In June 2003,
during a period of decreased sales, the defendant fired the CP, ostensibly for lack of
production. Defendant retained male trainees who were hired at the same time as the
CP and who had made fewer sales for the defendant than the CP had. The CP and
was the only female sales consultant in the McKinney office and one of only four in
its five-state Western Region.
Under the one-year consent decree resolving this case, the defendant will pay the CP
$275,000 in monetary relief and provide her with a letter of reference agreed to by
the parties. The defendant will conduct two training sessions on the requirements
of federal anti-discrimination laws at the defendant’s construction center facilities in
the Southern Plains Region and will report to the EEOC on all sex discrimination
complaints made during the term of the consent decree, including the resolution of
such complaints.

What could the HR department have done to mitigate risk in this case and/or what can they do to mitigate risks of this nature in the future?

Rubric