June is Gay Pride month and that's why I'm posting these articles about LGBTQ. When you read this, I hope you will have empathy and compassion for them:
May 24, 2018 "It might be 2018, but LGBTQ employees still face obstacles": Today I found this article by Jennifer Lewington in the Globe and Mail:
In 2006, at age 40, bank executive Lawrence Spicer quietly announced he was gay to his family, close friends and a supportive boss.
But in 2014, he signaled his decision to become a visible leader on LGBTQ issues by participating in a workplace event put on by his employer, Royal Bank of Canada, on National Coming Out Day. In an in-house video, watched by an estimated 18,000 employees and yielding the highest number of viewings for an internal news story that year, Mr. Spicer went public about his sexual orientation.
Such a declaration is not a single event, observes Mr. Spicer, who has spent his entire 30-year career with RBC and now is its vice-president of audit, personal and commercial banking.
“People need to realize that coming out is not this once and done thing: You are always coming out,” he says. “If you are leading a business and you are meeting your next client you would have to choose” whether to reveal your sexual orientation.
The ability to answer that question – in effect to be authentic without fear of reprisals – underpins a new program to be offered this October by the Smith School of Business at Queen’s University in Kingston for senior leaders who self-identify as LGBTQ.
“How can people be their authentic selves in an organization and do it with confidence?” asks Tina Dacin, director of Smith’s Centre for Social Impact. Its new week-long LGBTQ executive leadership program, believed to be the first of its kind in Canada, was “inspired” by a pioneering version successfully developed three years ago at Stanford University’s graduate school of business in California.
On issues of respect for sexual orientation in the workplace, “we say we are ahead and we are not,” she says. “That is the sad reality — we are not as far ahead as many would like to think.”
During the course, an expected cohort of 30 candidates from private and non-profit employers are to be taught traditional MBA material layered with
diversity and inclusion topics,
such as how to lead change,
develop “authentic” leadership,
manage one’s career
and sharpen skills in negotiation,
consensus-building and responding to conscious and unconscious bias.
Tuition is about $6,000.
Beyond the academic component, Dr. Dacin says she hopes the program will nurture professional networking. “The biggest thing for the participants is that they will have a robust and engaged network of peers,” she says.
Ultimately, Dr. Dacin aims to develop a similar program for leaders who are not gay but who want to work with the LGBTQ community to promote a welcoming workplace.
Despite legislative and other changes, she says, “on a day-to-day lived experience, [gay] people still experience a lot of obstacles, such as stigma, bias and opportunities for promotion.”
In his case, Mr. Spicer says he has earned promotions to increasingly senior positions in Canada and the Caribbean without exposure to bias or stigma.
When he first came out after almost two decades with the bank, he credits the workplace tone set by his then-boss, Jennifer Tory (now RBC’s chief administrative officer). “She was an ally long before we had the label ally,” he says. “She created the environment.”
Since his decision to go public with his sexual identity, Mr. Spicer has become a national and globally recognized spokesman on LGBTQ issues. He is a graduate of the inaugural Stanford program, executive chairman of RBC Pride since 2014, a sponsor of youth awards, and also serves on the advisory committee to the new Queen’s program. For the past two years, he has been the top Canadian on the Financial Times of London list of LGBTQ global business leaders.
He says what he found invaluable about the Stanford program — and what he hopes will be replicated at Queen’s — is the opportunity for participants to share their experiences.
“When you think about leadership development or developing executives to go to more senior positions in an organization, whether it is LGBTQ, women or other diversity groups, you have got to create networks,” he says.
“You create contacts you can bounce ideas off for the next thing you are doing for a pitch or presentation. You have got to have the safe spaces.”
Mr. Spicer counts himself as fortunate in the career support he received at the bank before and after he came out. “I was in a stable relationship, had financial security, had my education and had a place to live. ... I wasn’t at risk,” he says. At work, he adds, “I had mentors around me and came up on the leadership track without revealing that [my sexual orientation].”
But he says younger members of the LGBTQ community still face hurdles at work. “Generation X and millennials are coming out earlier but they are at more risk [than him],” he says. “They don’t have their education finished and they may not have stability around them.”
As a result, he says stress is a constant factor. “That is what it means to be gay in the world,” he says.
commonsense1234
With our push to hire minorities, a lot of the time the job ads might as well say that "white males need not apply".
While on a macroscopic level this group may be wealthier and historically advantaged compared to other groups .... but unfortunately that is little comfort to the unemployed or underemployed white male who just wants to have a fair shot at making it in society.
It is a real shame that skin colour or religion is a deciding factor in excluding people from opportunity.
Merit should really be what matters. But rewarding merit is not a sexy thing these days. I feel saddened for what is becoming a lost generation as refugees and minorities needs always come first.
Paggs
he says. “If you are leading a business and you are meeting your next client you would have to choose” whether to reveal your sexual orientation.
Your sexual orientation has no place in business, no one cares if you sleep with men, women, trans or mountain lions.
Get over your insecurities. That's why you won't be promoted in the future, too insecure in your own skin.
opoel
You've got to be kidding. Business doesn't exist in a vacuum. As a gay man, I have to make mental calculations every single day on how colleagues and clients will judge me (for better or for worse).
You must work with robots if a person's marital status, whether or not they have kids, even what they do on the weekends doesn't impact your impression of them as a person and a colleague. And seriously, if your boss told you that they had sex with a mountain lion, you wouldn't care?
Sept. 1, 2022 "Workplaces still hostile for too many LGBTQ2S Canadians: activist": Today I found this article by Bill Kaufman on the Financial Post and Calgary Herald:
More than half of the country’s LGBTQ employees still feel compelled to hide their identities in the workplace, say social justice activists.
While those research results show there’s plenty of room to improve inclusion at the office and work site, Jade Pichette said they prefer to see that figure as a glass half full.
“As someone who’s been doing this for two decades, I see 50 per cent as progress,” said Pichette, director of programs at Pride at Work Canada.
The Toronto-based, trans feminist activist said there is a willingness among employers to ensure their LGTBQ staffers feel comfortable, are paid and promoted equitably, and are included in the inner workings of their companies.
Pride at Work Canada, said Pichette, has partnered with 250 Canadian corporations to provide education and guidance on how to do just that.
“There are people in basically every company who are trying to make a change,” Pichette said, but noted there’s still a major acceptance gap in the places where avoiding interaction isn’t an option.
“There are many stories of people who are not out in their workplace, where it’s not a very safe and welcoming space,” said Pichette, adding threats to physical safety is part of that reality.
“We have made a lot of progress and I’ve seen that change, but now there is a backlash.”
That pushback against LGBTQ equality has led to a 60 per cent increase in hate crimes against that community in the past few years, said Pichette, by people alarmed by the progress the community has made in gaining acceptance and amplified by social media.
It’s hateful vitriol related to the harassment directed at female journalists and politicians, and those of colour, Pichette said.
That comes amid a backdrop of a genuine desire to nurture more welcoming workplaces, though that can be a challenge, said Pichette.
In Alberta, that’s especially true in the province’s extractive industries, where encouraging words at the head office don’t always translate into practise in the field.
“They’re not historically the industries known to champion inclusiveness . . . but there are challenges in every province and territory,” said Pichette, who’s moderating a panel discussion on the issue Thursday evening as part of Calgary Pride Week that continues until Sept. 5.
There’s a mindset on some work sites that making LGBTQ colleagues feel they belong isn’t a priority, “a mindset of ‘why do we need to do this when we need to make sure the truck’s running all right,’ ” said Pichette.
Those superficial attempts at inclusion, or rainbow-washing, is a reality, but Pichette said organizers of Calgary’s Pride Week have a way of keeping the corporate and institutional communities honest by screening their inclusion for the annual parade.
“By judging them on measures of inclusion, it prevents a bit of that rainbow-washing.”
And to create that change, Pride at Work Canada has enlisted companies in Alberta such as those in the construction and energy industries, among others.
Across the country, there’s also a wage disparity that often leaves the LGBTQ employees on the shorter end, Pichette said.
“Straight men make more than gay men,
who make more than lesbians
who make more than straight women and bisexual men,
who make more than bisexual women,
who make more than transgendered people,”
said Pichette.
“Bisexual women make less than half of what straight women in Canada make
. . . trans people are much more educated than average but are less likely to find work and constant work.”
To remedy that, companies should publicly list the salaries they offer as well as the pay for various levels of the organization for clarity, said Pichette.
One of the Alberta-based companies partnering with Pichette’s organization is TC Energy, which says its partnership with Pride at Work Canada provides resources to bolster the diversity and inclusion it’s committed to.
“We promote education and awareness resources for inclusion for all employees, building awareness and understanding on topics including gender identity, expression, orientation and pronouns,” spokeswoman Suzanne Wilton said in a statement.
“We share stories of LGBTQ2+ employees, advocates and allies to amplify diverse voices, increase awareness and encourage representation.
The company, she said, also matches donations raised by employee volunteers that benefit the LGBTQ community.
Cenovus Energy incorporates Pride at Work in five employee networks and has been involved in the program for three years, the company said in an email.
“We incorporate Pride at Work’s educational opportunities and support programs into our other activities, which includes participation in local Pride parades, such as Calgary’s on Sunday,” the email said.
More information on the initiative can be found at prideatwork.ca.
BKaufmann@postmedia.com
Twitter: @BillKaufmannjrn
Workplaces still hostile for too many LGBTQ2S Canadians: activist | Calgary Herald
