May 1983, WCC engaged McKinsey and Company, Inc.  (the "McKinsey Group"), a management consulting firm, to assist in that effort.  After the McKinsey Group released its report in January 1984, WCC merged its four corporate divisions--Industrial Equipment Financing, Financial Services, Real Estate Financing and Business Financing--into two larger bodies:  Commercial Services and Capital Financing.  During the process of restructuring, a number of management positions within WCC were eliminated.


3
Contemporaneous with WCC's commissioning of the McKinsey Group, Phillip N. Lockhart, who was employed in the Financial Services division as District Manager of WCC's Pittsburgh Office, was terminated from his position on May 3, 1983, ostensibly because of an unfavorable audit of his office.  He was 58 years old at the time and had been anemployee of WCC's since 1960.  On July 21, 1983, Lockhart filed a formal written charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC"), alleging that WCC discriminated against him on the basis of his age because several WCC branches were being consolidated with the Pittsburgh Office, and the resulting new management position was being filled by an employee who was 34 years old and who had less experience than Lockhart.  In September 1984, the EEOC informed Lockhart that it would take no further action on his charge;  he then proceeded on his own behalf.


4
Lockhart commenced this suit on April 11, 1985, claiming that he was discharged from his position with WCC on account of his age, in violation of Sec. 4(a)(1) of the ADEA,1 29 U.S.C.