Canada's Globe and Mail has an article out today about a major shift that has taken place in the corporate world: More and more, it's OK to be openly gay at work. The article cites HRC's annual workplace report which documents that more than 50 percent of Fortune 500 companies now offer same-sex benefits to employees and their partners, and 86 percent include sexual orientation in their non-discrimination policies.
That's very cool, and I'm wondering:
EVEN MORE INTERESTING TO ME, however, and I'm not sure the Globe author realizes she was hitting on this, is that the article also touches on one of the great gay secrets of all time: The gay network.
"Through in-house activities at [Ernst & Young] and events [that Mr. Cole, the young 23 year-old interviewed for the article] attends with members of GLBT committees at other Bay Street firms, Mr. Cole has made business connections he would not have otherwise made as an entry-level staff accountant, says Bruce Goudy, a 44-year-old partner with the firm, and one of Mr. Cole's role models."
And why does this young gay guy get access to a much more senior executive? Because he's a card-carrying gay guy.
Isn't it true that your gay card gets you entree in the business world? Call it the gay mafia, call it family, call it what you will -- and I'm not talking about favoritism, anything illegal or sleeping your way to the top -- the fact is that we do help our own, and we always have. This is nothing new.
If everyone in the "real world" is connected via six degrees of separation, then in the gay world that gets cut down to about two. Want to get an interview at XYZ company? Work your gay contacts. What? The company you want to interview with is on the other side of the country and you know no one in that city? No problem. Someone you know has worked with, dined with or slept with someone there (or knows someone who has.) And, the gay man or lesbian across the country who works in that faraway company, whom you've never met before, will be more than happy to talk to you -- because you're family.
The same thing goes for house hunting, vacation tips and anything else where networking will help you acheive the results you need.
The gay card: Don't leave home without it.
Call me old-fashioned, but this is one benefit of being gay I hope never goes away.
Do you have any good stories about how the gay network helped you? Post it as a comment here.
6 comments:
Kenneth -- I hope straights don't read this thing. You are giving away classified gay secrets here!
I have been nothing but hurt by being openly out at my job. I’m a federal employee, down on paper there is no problem. It is all done out in the open. Many employees see it everyday. However no one wants to lose their positions or their jobs. Nothing is documented down except their hatred for someone unique and not of the norm. I had one supporter who told me not to give up. They told me to remember that Jesus was also not of the majority and look what they did to him...abused him verbally, beat him and hung him on a cross to die. With this information I have been able to stay working in this job for 4 more years. Not all work places are a plus when you are gay. By the way to look at me you would thing I was straight. The only reason they knew I was gay was I got engaged, being a woman we always like to express our excitement. With regret the wedding never took place. Sincerely thetop2dy
the gay network helped me find friends and my first flirt.
i guess it depends where you work. I won't play the DL game and the people at work respect me for it. Though as is always with the majority of people-they just don't want any details and don't really consider it in the same class as their "normal" lives.
we should all be so fortunate...it is my rigid belief that my coming out to a single (as in one) coworker/supervisor who seemed to show genuine interest in my less than chipper mood one day cost me my job. i showed him no interest except that which is appropriate in the workplace - maybe that was the problem, huh? lo and behold however, just two workdays after my coming out, i was out...out the door! so much for honesty in the small university campus workplace.
I'm sure that being out at work, can be a hassle, as I experienced gay/bi
sexual harrassment, from straights, while working at Pizza Hut in Littleton, CO, in the late 90's. Being Bi and OUT, for as long as I can remember, job related crap from straights, since 1968, when I worked at the Joliet Army Ammunition Plant, just south of Joliet, Ill. This is a sad situation, for mankind, but it simply, shows,
how far, America, needs to go still, in sexual understanding, acceptance and education. The hit show, "All in the family," did more to promote equal rights, for
minorities, including, gays, bi's and lesbians, than the U.S. government has before
or since.
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