Gathered by Richard Tonowski, Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission (EEOC)
SELECTION CASES
G’day, mate. You’re out 19 million quid.
Outback
Steakhouse is a national organization of Australian-themed casual
restaurants. The franchise in Colorado
entered into a settlement with the EEOC valued at $19M. The issue was non-promotion of women to managerial
positions.
As with
several other recent EEOC selection cases, the substance of the suit was on the
looseness of the selection procedure. In
EEOC’s view, the problem was a “tap on the shoulder” initial step. There were no applications. Managerial prospects were identified by their
supervisors. The procedure was more
formalized in later steps, including tests that were not at issue in the
charge. For EEOC and the charging
parties, too few women got the call to advance.
