00-1678 Hoffman-Dombrowski v. Arlington International Racecourse Inc.

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“Although Majchrzak did receive the position that Dombrowski wanted, he was not similarly situated to Dombrowski at the time of his promotion. Dombrowski and Majchrzak were not similarly situated because they did not hold the same or equivalent positions at the time that Arlington decided to promote Majchrzak to the position of assistant general manager at Trackside. See Radue v. Kimberly-Clark Corp., 219 F.3d 612, 618 (7th Cir. 2000) (explaining that an employee must show substantial similarity in order to meet the similarly situated requirement). At that point, Dombrowski was an assistant manager at Trackside while Majchrzak was employed as the assistant director of mutuels. Arlington submits that Majchrzak’s move from his previous position to assistant general manager of Trackside was a lateral move, while it would have unquestionably been a promotion for Dombrowski. Dombrowski has not come forward with any evidence to rebut this contention. Instead, she argues that she was entitled to the promotion because she had more seniority than Majchrzak and Arlington’s personnel policy provides that seniority will be the determining factor between two roughly equivalent candidates. This argument fails, however, because the personnel policy only comes into play if the candidates are equivalent, and as we have just stated, Majchrzak held a higher level position than Dombrowski.”

Affirmed.