Reference no: EM133363148

DaleCorp is an international company with a plant located in Fort Madison, Iowa, that produces canned meats. Entry level employees at the plant are assigned to the sausage packing area where workers daily lift and carry up to 18,000 pounds of sausage, walking the equivalent of four miles in the process. They are required to carry approximately 35 pounds of sausage at a time and must lift and load the sausage to heights between 30 and 60 inches above the floor. Employees who worked in the sausage packing area experienced a disproportionate number of injuries as compared to the rest of the workers in the plant.

DaleCorp implemented several measures to reduce the injury rate starting in late 1996. These included an ergonomic job rotation, institution of a team approach, lowering the height of machines to decrease lifting pressure for the employees, and conducting periodic safety audits. Starting in 1998, injuries in the department began trending downward. In 2000, DaleCorp also instituted a strength test used to evaluate potential employees, called the Work Tolerance Screen (WTS). In this test job applicants were asked to carry a 35-pound bar between two frames, approximately 30 and 60 inches off the floor, and to lift and load the bar onto these frames. The applicants were told to work at their "own pace" for seven minutes. An occupational therapist watched the process, documented how many lifts each applicant completed, and recorded her own comments about each candidate's performance. Starting in 2001, the plant nurse, Martha Lutenegger, also watched and documented the process. From the inception of the test, Lutenegger reviewed the test forms and had the ultimate hiring authority.

For many years, women and men had worked together in the sausage packing area doing the same job. Forty-six percent of the new hires were women in the three years before the WTS was introduced, but the number of women hires dropped to fifteen percent after the test was implemented. During this time, the test was the only change in the company's hiring practices. The percentage of women who passed the test decreased almost each year the test was given, with only eight percent of the women applicants passing in 2002. The overall percentage of women who passed was thirty eight percent while the men's passage rate was ninety seven percent. Overall injuries and strength related injuries among sausage workers declined consistently after 2000.

One of the first applicants to take the WTS was Paula Liles, who applied to DaleCorp in January 2000 and was not hired even though the occupational therapist who administered her test told her she had passed.

EEOC and DaleCorp offered testimony by competing experts. EEOC presented an expert on industrial organization who testified that the WTS was significantly more difficult than the actual job workers performed at the plant. He explained that although workers did 1.25 lifts per minute on average and rested between lifts, applicants who took the WTS performed 6 lifts per minute on average, usually without any breaks. He also testified that in two of the three years before DaleCorp had implemented the WTS, the women's injury rate had been lower than that of the male workers. EEOC's expert also analyzed the company's written evaluations of the applicants and testified that more men than women were given offers of employment even when they had received similar comments about their performance. EEOC also introduced evidence that the occupational nurse marked some women as failing despite their having completed the full seven-minute test.

DaleCorp presented an expert in work physiology, who testified that in his opinion the WTS effectively tested skills which were representative of the actual job, and an industrial and organizational psychologist, who testified that the WTS measured the requirements of the job and that the decrease in injuries could be attributed to the test. DaleCorp also called plant nurse Martha Lutenegger who testified that although she and other DaleCorp managers knew the WTS was screening out more women than men, the decrease in injuries warranted its continued use.

DaleCorp argues the WTS was criterion valid because both overall injuries and strength related injuries decreased dramatically following the implementation of the WTS.

You have now laid out an argument on both sides: which is correct? Who would win the case: the EEOC (saying illegal discrimination did occur) or DaleCorp (illegal discrimination did not occur)? Why? What changes (if any) do you recommend DaleCorp make to the hiring process?