Why You’re Always Talking About Sexual Orientation at Work

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Whenever I meet with businesses to talk about their inclusion strategies, one question invariably comes up. Why do we need to talk about sexual orientation in the workplace? Essentially, people outside of the community still aren’t sure why they would ever talk about sexual orientation at work. What they often don’t realize is that we’ve always been talking about orientation but limiting that discussion to one.

Asking someone when they first realized they were straight is seen as a tongue-in-cheek question. A questioned that is positioned more to elicit a specific response, rather than an answer. The truth is, at one point, they did realize it. At one point, everyone becomes aware of their attraction. The difference in same-sex attraction is this realization needs to be articulated; it needs to be reconciled against what the person’s environment has already told them what it means to be gay (bisexual, lesbian, pansexual, asexual, etc.).

Let’s be real here for a minute. We live in a heteronormative society. Being straight is commonly the default assumption. So when a new coworker puts up a picture of his wife from his wedding day, he’s indicating something about his sexual orientation. New female coworker puts up a picture of her wife from their wedding day, and she’s indicating something about her orientation.

Even this is not a direct expression of sexual orientation. Either new coworker could identify as bisexual. Or pansexual. Or asexual. So the point of actually knowing someone’s attraction is if they choose to disclose it to you.

Culturally, we are conditioned to make assumptions based on our pre-defined list of understanding. Breaking away from these limitations and attributions is a critical aspect of inclusion.

Developing strategies for inclusion and diversity means opening up the organization to new perspectives. Along with this comes a steep learning curve around all the ways in which we unconsciously label and compartmentalize each other. Gay, straight, transgender, non-binary, bisexual, polyamorous….all of these elements intersect and create our unique humanness.

Does this mean that we need to share details of our personal sex lives? No, of course not. But that does mean that we need to stop moving people from one assumption box (in this case, straight) to the next assumption box (in this case, lesbian or gay).

Unpacking this new perspective of sexual orientation also sheds light into the attributions applied to straight couples and everyone else in the world. Heterosexual relationships are framed against love, dating, courtship, etc.. Conversely, other relationship models and orientations are thought of in terms of specific sex acts.

Straight couples are rarely confronted with the “how will I explain this to my children?” refrain that is all too familiar among their queer counterparts. Imagine spending decades having your spouse’s introduction spark stunned silence. Or worse, really inappropriate questions.

Speculation of how same-sex couples occupy gender roles is another phenomenon. “Which one of you is the husband?”. (Spoiler, neither). For someone who is LGBTQ, even something as mundane as being asked, “have any plans for the weekend?” can cause stress in an unaffirming environment. Imagine having to pretend that your husband or wife is your roommate. Or having to make excuses for missing the company picnic because you are not sure how others will respond to your same-sex partner.

Bringing the subject back to a point, how does all of this fit into developing an inclusion strategy? Glad you asked…follow me.

A key difference between diversity and inclusion is fully embracing each person’s unique perspective. For gender and sexual minorities, this means breaking the pattern of assumptions.

Building a cohesive and high performing team starts with establishing a safe environment for taking risks or trying new strategies. The same is true for cultivating inclusion; people must feel valued and recognized as themselves. Each unique aspect of an individual contributes new perspective and approaches to solving problems.

Bringing an individual’s whole, authentic self to the organization requires courage. Developing an enthusiastically inclusive workplace, that takes leadership.

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