Fagot, fifi, queer. These are some of the qualifiers that were thrown in my face in the morning on the way to school. I was 9 years old. I was afraid of the bus. I was afraid to walk home alone and meet the guys from the neighborhood. I was afraid of the gym locker rooms. I was afraid of the gym itself. I was afraid of the cafeteria. I was afraid of the guys’ toilets. I was afraid of the few minutes before the start of class, where I could find myself with a pen thrown behind my head.
Posted yesterday at 3:00 p.m.
As a child, I often fantasized about changing schools, villages, towns or even countries. Inevitably, it leaves scars for a lifetime, this intimidation. If you are reading these lines and you are gay, bi, lesbian, trans or non-binary, you have surely experienced the same thing. Or worse. Banal, some would say. We have gone elsewhere. It’s 2022. It’s still funny.
When I got one of my first jobs, one of the ones I had chosen, as I would have liked to choose my school to find people who looked like me there, I deliberately made the choice to go to work in an open environment, where I wouldn’t have to hide.
Today, I am 40 years old and I realize, looking in the rear view mirror, that I have always chosen to work in open, inclusive environments, respectful of differences. Companies where the question of sexual orientation was not a taboo issue that would be an impediment to moving forward.
When I am called to give a conference or corporate training, sometimes on the issue of diversity, I freely discuss my work experiences with these open and caring bosses who have also allowed me to be who I am. today.
A few months ago, one of the directors with whom I gave a workshop admitted to me that in the broad spectrum of diversity management in her company, the question of sexual orientation was still a taboo issue. A middle of guys, all probably very open, but where some things left unsaid surely prevented others from talking about their lives freely, without fear of judgment or opportunities for advancement. To confirm my intuitions, I contacted the partner of Formations Infopresse, the Fondation Émergence, whose mission is to educate, inform and sensitize the population to the realities of people who recognize themselves in sexual diversity as well as plurality. gender identities and expressions.
A survey that the Foundation conducted in 2021 revealed that 65% of LGBTQ+ workers had experienced at least one situation of sexual or psychological harassment in the workplace in the past five years and that 28% said that none colleague was unaware of their identity. And I’ll just touch on one shocking statistic when it comes to trans people: 30% of trans women mentioned in another survey that they had been turned down for a job because of their gender identity.
So, if I summarize, harassment and shelving still concern more than a third of all LGBTQ+ people in Quebec who work in companies. We are in 2022, I remind us, a year where we talk so much about inclusion and benevolence in business.
In this month of Pride, all over the world, I think it is essential to address the issue of training managers and employees of all companies on the issue of diversity. Sexual, of course, but also cultural, gender, generational… Let’s commit to giving concrete tools to professionals in all industries, even the most conservative and traditional ones, to enable them to freely address differences, to break down barriers as well as the biases which are unfortunately still too numerous and, above all, to provide models for future generations to follow.
It is with all this in mind that I have given myself the mission as an entrepreneur to develop, with the complicity of Danièle Henkel, a certification program in Equity, Diversity and Inclusion composed of training and workshops to enable participants. to become agents of change. Fondation Émergence also offers training on the inclusion of LGBTQ+ people in the workplace. And we are creating our first face-to-face EDI (Equity, Diversity, Inclusion) Summit on November 23 at Formations Infopresse in Montreal.
Let us give ourselves the mandate to create welcoming workplaces. We can no longer afford to leave anyone behind. And to those who doubt, I will say this: do not underestimate those who cannot be themselves around you in your organizations. Some may quit their jobs because of it. And all your benefits can’t change that.
Let’s reach out. Let’s be proud. Together.