For Queer Professionals when Rainbow Flags aren’t enough:

Navigating Toxic Workplace Cultures with a LGBTQ+ identity

Rainbow flags, acknowledgement of June as Pride Month, adding pronouns to your email signatures. These have all been symbols to denote that organizations observe (or at least want you to think they observe) the legitimacy of queer identities. Organizations, especially those that are community facing, appear to work very hard to signal a welcoming culture to clients and customers. Your organization may sponsor the local Pride gala, or have a LGBTQ+ internal affinity group, or maybe host a “LGBTQ+ 101” workshop as professional development to ensure everyone is open to new perspectives, on the surface fostering an inclusive culture. Often, I write about topics from the standpoint of a professional of color, but today on National Coming Out Day, on this post I am leaning into my intersectional Black queer identity when I say, WE see right through all the surface level efforts. Yes – your donations, special interest funds, affinity groups, and pronoun signatures cannot mask the underlying culture of intolerance your organization has.

Don’t believe me? You should.

Over the past few years as DEI policies and education standards have been stripped away, so too have been rights and policies protecting LGBTQ+ individuals in the workplace. It is not uncommon for a Queer professional to experience microaggressions from “inclusive” organizations or to experience a latent form of gaslighting that has the employee wondering “am I crazy”, “did I make this up?” “Is this really happening?” or my personal favorite “be f’in for real” *rolls eyes*. Even when an organization is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in policy and behavior, Queer professionals are not safe from moments when colleagues feel threatened by these same initiatives and launch dangerous assaults (verbally, physically, and ideologically) in a place that presents as safe.

Not too long ago I recall a situation in my professional career where there was a workshop devoted to understanding pronouns to roll out a new initiative of all employees including them in their email signatures. About an hour after the workshop, there was a very aggressive complaint from a mid-level employee regarding that he “didn’t believe in pronouns” and that he was “refusing” to include them in his signature. After an intense word battle with his supervisor, he came back the next morning and launched a homophobic tirade on senior leadership and announced his resignation. Before you ask – yes, yes, he was who you’re picturing (a caricature of Ned Flanders from the Simpsons if you will) but despite a good thing that this organization was attempting to accomplish, the hurt feelings, fear, and defiance of this employee directly harmed leaders and colleagues.

Another situation occurred in an organization that provides funding to LGBTQ+ serving organizations and is categorized by hiring queer staff members, celebrating holidays affirming queer community members, and even housing a fund that raises money to provide grants to LGBTQ+ organizations. This same organization has had repeated incidents of homophobic and transphobic behaviors observed by staff and leadership and when reported nothing has been done to address the harm these actions caused the employees involved.

This post is not about shaming organizations nor trying to tell them what to do.

Frankly, any place where racism is thinly veiled there is almost a guarantee that homophobia, transphobia, sexism, ableism, etc. will exist in tandem. I am writing to address the greatest common denominator in these scenarios – the Queer professional that gets up everyday to work for a better tomorrow, led by the community’s heart and the pressure of knowing that your existence seeks to both represent a better future for those behind you, while you take the beatings of now shielding yourself to continue to hold the door open for others. For the Queer professional that shows up in “non-traditional clothing” eliciting stares from colleagues while still being both fashionable and presentable, slaying your daily tasks. To the Queer professional in leadership, who knows that if you don’t say or do anything about your organizational culture, there will likely never be anyone else occupying your space should you decide to leave and move on to another opportunity. To the Queer professional that must manage their digestive functions because there isn’t an inclusive restroom for them to handle their human business. To the Queer professional of color, that is marginalized and minoritized daily in their jobs who experiences microaggressions from members both in and outside the LGBTQ+ community.

This is for you. I see you – I am you and on this National Coming Out Day, my hope is that you continue to see yourself in all your splendor.

That you never let the systems that oppress you silence you and that you continue to show up, loud, proud, and authentic – even when the odds are stacked against you. May you always remember that there’s space for you too, and if they don’t make any HOLD that space for YOU. Always. Even when they think you are shoving your pronouns or identities down their throats. When they refuse to acknowledge both your “she” and your “they”. When your PTO request for Juneteenth and Pride week is questioned or denied, stand in your power - out of the shadow of the rainbow flag they thought was enough.

PS – Take that time off anyway

You earned it.