The Human Rights Campaign Foundation studied how LGBTQ+ identity surfaces and unfolds in the workplace, how environment can affect the retention and productivity of all employees and how organizations can identify and address opportunities to improve climate.
Anecdotal evidence supports that LGBTQ+ inclusion efforts improve recruitment, development and retention tools; however, little empirical data exists to support this. Evaluating the success of policies and practices that promote inclusion is difficult because most employers do not have a sense of how many LGBTQ+ employees they have or where in their businesses LGBTQ+ employees actually work. Having business metrics of LGBTQ+ employees to quantitatively evaluate these programs is critical to a viable, fully inclusive diversity program.
Some employers use LGBTQ+ employee group membership numbers to generate estimates, but this method is limited by the scope of such self-selected groups over a highly dispersed work force. More recently, employers have gathered statistics through anonymous employee engagement or satisfaction surveys and confidential and secure employee records. In both cases, whether employees disclose their gender identity or sexual orientation is optional and voluntary and any reporting or direct access to the data is designed to ensure confidentiality of employee information.
The findings were striking: a majority 51% of LGBTQ+ workers continue to hide their identity from most or all co-workers, and younger workers are even more likely to hide — only 5% of LGBTQ+ employees ages 18 to 24 say they are totally open at work, compared to more than 20% of older workers.
Employers need to proactively communicate the purpose for the questions and the confidentiality of survey answers to address these concerns and maximize the response rate among LGBTQ+ employees over time — particularly since those who may experience the most negative outcomes at work (those who are completely closeted) are most likely not to self-disclose.
Image: