As I watched this year’s Boston Pride parade, I couldn’t help but get emotional.
Swaddled in rainbows, glitter, and multi-colored flags, I experienced something on the streets of Boston my closeted child self could’ve never dreamed of: Loud and proud queer celebration. My partner, friends, and brother stood beside me, all covered in flags representing their own identities, and cheered as floats full of queer elders, children, and parents alike paraded by. For any LGBTQ+ person who’s ever felt alone, Pride is spiritually cathartic.
However, for many attendees, there’s one part of Pride that often takes away from their emotional experience: its corporatization. In Boston Pride 2019, 44.5 percent of parade groups marching were business groups, the majority of members of which are cisgender and heterosexual. For some, this is not necessarily a bad thing: More groups marching means a higher approval of LGBTQ+ people, right?
For some companies though, the act of marching in Pride is just that: an act. When closely examined, some companies that claim to be “LGBT-friendly” have not in fact attempted to help LGBTQ+ people in any way apart from wearing their colors. The phenomenon of companies wanting to appear LGBT-friendly in order to attract customers has come to be dubbed as “rainbow capitalism”, and it’s a well-known controversy in many LGBTQ+ circles.
But that leaves the question, what can companies do to accommodate LGBTQ+ workers? How do you know which companies are actually supportive, and which ones aren’t? What is considered an “LGBT-friendly work environment” anyway? Let’s dive into it.
What is LGBTQ+ workplace inclusivity?
To be inclusive, at its root, is to ensure that the various needs of a diverse group of people are all being met. In business, this means to be inclusive on two levels: both in individual businesses and in the wider scope of the business community.
In the case of the LGBTQ+ community, this means to be considerate of the specific accommodations that LGBTQ+ employees require, even if those considerations differ from those that straight, cisgender employees need.
In individual companies, this means considering the needs of the LGBTQ+ community in relation to your particular company. Do you have equal hiring policies for LGBTQ+ workers? Are your LGBTQ+ employees understood and respected in your workplace? These are just a few of the questions employers can ask themselves when considering whether their companies are LGBT-inclusive enough.
On the community level, an environment needs to be created that allows LGBT-owned businesses to thrive. This means ensuring that LGBT-owned businesses are benefiting from economic growth, and are not facing discrimination. One of the ways companies can support LGBT-owned businesses is by reaching out to specific organizations. The LGBT Chamber of Commerce, for example, holds meetings three times a year to address community concerns.
“One of this group’s focuses was supply and procurement,” said Grace Moreno, the LGBT Chamber of Commerce’s executive director and CEO. “How can companies make sure that, in their procurement departments, they are raising the numbers of LGBT-owned businesses that they work with, so that the economic flow will flow through some of the LGBT-owned businesses in the community?”
Why should we care?
Morally, I think it's important that companies strive for inclusivity for all minority groups, whether these groups are people of color, people with disabilities, people of religious minorities, etc. I feel that it is important that we acknowledge the ways in which our society has systematically limited career opportunities and equality for different types of people.
For LGBTQ+ people specifically, many are still facing challenges in the workplace because of who they are and how they present. In a 2018 survey conducted by the Human Rights Campaign, 46 percent of LGBTQ+ employees reported being closeted at work. One in five have had coworkers tell them to dress in a more masculine or feminine manner, and 53 percent report hearing jokes made about lesbian, gay, or transgender people in the workplace. In the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey, 12 percent of respondents reported losing a job because of their gender identity or expression.
But there are other reasons to put inclusivity practices in place for LGBTQ+ employees besides it simply being the "right thing to do". Many young people coming out of college and graduate school today are not simply looking for any job that floats their way: They want to work at morally-responsible companies, companies that are inclusive of different types of cultures and backgrounds. In a 2016 survey by the Institute of Public Relations, 47 percent of millennials consider diversity and inclusion an important factor in job searching.
"I think corporations are realizing this is the pool of talent, and the new generation isn't so worried about how much money they make, they're more worried about what kind of place they're working," said Moreno. "This really prompts the companies to get up and say, 'Hey we need to do this differently, we need to do this better.'"
What are some of the biggest issues with LGBTQ+ inclusivity right now?
1. A lack of understanding
Right now, one of the greatest obstacles to true inclusivity in the workplace is a lack of understanding.
“I think there's a lot of mystery around who we are. People fear what they don’t know,” said Moreno. “But a corporation has the ability and the power to be able to help the people in their organization learn and grow and be around each other.”
To address the issue of lack of understanding, many companies organize training sessions. However, according to Ev Evnen, the interim director of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition, these can sometimes hurt rather than help, especially when it comes to topics most non-LGBT people are uneducated on, such as transgender cultural competency.
“You can't use a one-and-done model of training, and training really need to be a sufficient length,” said Evnen. “There's been research that has shown that trainings on trans-cultural competency under 3 hours can actually increase prejudice.”
2. A lack of universal medical coverage for LGBTQ+ employees
Will an individual’s company offer paternal leave if they’re in a gay male couple? Does company-provided insurance cover medical transition-related costs for transgender employees, and does it extend to coverage for the transgender children of employees? Sometimes, the needs of LGBTQ+ employees differ from those of non-LGBTQ+ employees, leaving them unsatisfied.
One important step for transgender employees is ensuring that gender-affirming medical care is covered in company health insurance, as well as having policies and plans for people who need to take time off to transition.
3. A lack of consideration for transgender employees
Speaking of transgender employees, one of the greatest issues with LGBTQ+ inclusivity in the workplace right now is the lack of consideration of trans experiences and needs. This starts at the root: hiring.
In the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey, 22 percent of respondents reported being fired, being denied a promotion, or not being hired for a job they applied for because of their gender identity or expression.
“We know that trans folx face unemployment rates at about three times the national average, that is, and looking at a more intersectional perspective, that is much higher for trans women, for black and indigenous trans folx, for a lot of people,” said Evnen. “So I think the best thing that people can do for trans inclusivity is hire us.”
Another issue that trans people often face in the workplace is a lack of respect for their personal pronouns. Evnen, who is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, reports working at a job where they were prohibited from putting their pronouns in their email signature. For any trans person, this is disrespectful. But for nonbinary people in particular, this is a problem: Without pronouns in a signature, misgendering will be rampant, since many people are still unfamiliar with genders outside of the binary.
“I am uninterested in working for a company where I cannot be my full self, where my trans identity is going to be a problem,” said Evnen. “It's just no longer worth it to me because it takes too much of a toll on my self-esteem and my mental health.”
So what can companies do to create work environments that are more LGBT-inclusive?
What’s the best thing you can do when you don’t know what to do? Ask someone who does.
“I think the first step is to really get involved with some organizations that are doing the work,” said Moreno. “Ask yourself, how do we get involved with what the knowledge base is out there, what's happening, what's really going on in the world of inclusion?”
The LGBT Chamber of Commerce, for example, has a number of partner companies that work directly with them to implement inclusivity initiatives in their workplaces. Among them are Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Eastern Bank, PTC, Boston Scientific, and JetBlue. Three times a year, these companies come together with the Chamber to discuss the next steps they can take to better include LGBTQ+ employees in their workplaces.
The Chamber holds events as well. Recently, they held a transgender job fair to promote the hiring of transgender employees. Before the fair, a diversity training was held for trainees to promote correct pronoun use as well as educate employers on transgender cultural competency.
Another important step employers can do is to simply talk with their LGBTQ+ employees. Ask them what they feel is inclusive about the environment they work in, ask them what isn’t. Training is another big step. But not just one-and-done couple-hour training: Training that is in-depth where LGBTQ+ people, and trans people in particular, can come in and tell their stories. Personal stories can give people new perspectives about the lives of people they previously didn’t know much about and open new avenues for discussion that can reduce the ignorance and fear people may harbor toward the LGBTQ+ community.
One of the most important things companies can do is to make their companies trans-friendly. Ensure that gender-neutral bathrooms are provided for nonbinary employees, and for trans employees that may feel uncomfortable in binary bathroom spaces. Strongly encourage all employees, even cisgender ones, to put their pronouns in their email signatures to normalize the practice of sharing pronouns.
“I think the really important thing is having non-discrimination policies that include gender identity and gender expression, and then having a really robust grievance and discrimination reporting and action policy,” said Evnen.
Some Boston companies have already been making great strides in inclusivity practices. MassMutual, for example, has an active Pride Business Resource Group that offers financial seminars for LGBT couples. It also supported the 'Yes on 3' campaign for transgender equality back in November, and has made a number of concrete considerations for transgender employees, such as gender-affirming medical care coverage, gender-neutral bathrooms and a guide on supporting trans employees.
“Our suite of benefits include caregiving, family planning, and fertility, with surrogacy coming soon, and paid paternal leave,” wrote Paula Tremblay, the Communications and Media Relations coach at MassMutual.
Eastern Bank offers employees these health care coverages as well. It also has a robust anti-discrimination policy, and frequently makes charitable donations to LGBT organizations, including the Human Rights Campaign and the Mass. Trans Political Coalition. Eastern Bank holds and speaks at a variety of LGBTQ+ events supporting legislation and equal rights.
“We’ve been awarded a 100% score on the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index (CEI) for six consecutive years,” wrote Nancy Stager, Executive Vice President of Human Resources and Charitable Giving at Eastern Bank. “Eastern Bank is a loud and proud supporter of the LGBT community and has, over the past many years, combined philanthropic efforts with volunteerism and public support of pro-LGBTQ legislation.”
PTC, along with MassMutual and Eastern Bank, is a corporate founding sponsor of the LGBT Chamber of Commerce. It has also undertaken medical benefits and anti-discrimination policies, as well as hosting and making its presence known at a number of LGBTQ+ rights events, such as the LGBT Chamber of Commerce Transgender Job Fair and hosting a Professionals for Trans Rights event.
Companies like these demonstrate the difference between simply marching in Pride and in actually making a difference. Labeling yourself an “ally” isn’t enough: Companies need to be willing to put in the hard work needed to truly create an inclusive environment.
“Like if you give us a corporate contribution and that's all you're willing to do, that's not good enough for us, we don't want just your corporate contribution," said Moreno. "To us, that's just buying you rainbow rights and that's not what we're about. You have to provide a senior level of management at our corporate round table to be able to help shape and then implement some of the things we see as making a difference.”
