How to celebrate Pride Month in the Australian workplace
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June is Pride Month – an opportunity to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community, and more broadly, champion diversity, equity and inclusion in your workplace.
Pride Month is more than a celebration of your lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer employees. It’s an exciting opportunity for forward-thinking employers to actively demonstrate support for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) across their entire team.
We explain why Pride matters, and how to celebrate Pride in the workplace.
Why celebrate Pride in the workplace?
Celebrating Pride Month isn’t just about shining a light on the value of your LGBTQ+ employees. It reaffirms that you care about your entire team, and provide a safe and inclusive workplace for every employee.
There’s also a strong business case to celebrate Pride Month in the workplace.
We know that workplace diversity drives innovation and creativity, often leading to increased profitability.
But simply building a diverse team isn’t enough. Employees who differ from their colleagues may fear negative consequences at work or feel marginalised – outcomes that are unlikely to nurture a productive team.
That’s why inclusion is so critical to the DEI mix.
Research by non-profit Catalyst, found that when employees feel included, they experience greater trust and increased engagement at work, and as a consequence rates of absenteeism decline.
The upshot is that employers who actively acknowledge Pride Month as a special time, send a powerful message across the organisation that each person on the team is valued for who they are and what they bring to the business.
Related: How to be an LGBTQ+ ally at work
Employees may expect to celebrate Pride at work
Chances are your employees want – and may even expect – to see Pride Month celebrated at work.
A Robert Half workplace survey found that Australians have strong expectations for diverse and inclusive workplaces. Seven out of ten (68%) respondents believe organisations will struggle to hire if they are not transparent about diversity. A similar proportion (69%) say their organisation is ahead of the curve when it comes to DEI, however this still leaves one in three companies with scope to improve.
Adding to these findings, 2023 research by the Australian HR Institute identified a gap between awareness of the value of DEI in the workplace – and active steps being taken. The study also observed that DEI initiatives across Australian workplaces tend to focus on gender, with less effort directed towards other underrepresented groups including LGBTQ+ employees.
Clearly, Pride Month can be your company’s time to shine as an employer that delivers on diversity and inclusion by valuing the unique qualities of each individual.
Alex Minter, APAC Talent Acquisition & DEI Manager at Robert Half, says that for companies aiming to drive inclusion, the LGBTQ+ pillar is one that lends itself to many others.
“Embracing and honoring Pride month every year may seem like a small gesture, but in my opinion, it should have a permanent presence in the workplace as part of the wider inclusion approach," says Alex. "Recognising a marginalised group often carries significance for individuals within that community, and it’s a good opportunity to raise awareness."
Related: Ready to build a stronger company culture? Find out the role DEI can play in a strong company culture.
Ideas for employers on how to celebrate Pride in the workplace
Celebrating Pride Month doesn’t have to be a grand act of rainbow washing the entire office. It can involve smaller, more meaningful acts that hold value in the workplace. For instance, Alex explains, “The month of June can be a time to provide education around the use of pronouns, giving staff the opportunity to update their email signatures, and encouraging people to normalise specifying pronouns.”
Other activities that carry value can involve partnering with external speakers for panel events that showcase lived experiences, or inviting an external organisation to speak about issues relevant to the workplace.
“Businesses need to assume that people have lived experience with the LGBTQ+ community,” notes Alex. “Whether it is a staff member or a member of their family or a close friend, meaningful acts in Pride Month may speak to those individuals and make them feel much more included.”
Alex acknowledges that it can be “a big ask” for those with lived experience to be the workplace spokesperson for Pride Month. An alternative can be to approach LGBTQ+ allies to discuss allyship in a CSR capacity or other ways.
On the issue of how to celebrate Pride in the workplace, the key is to start with education and awareness as the reason behind the event. “It’s not about employers tokenistically changing their logo for a month,” Alex says. “Rather, it’s about letting staff know that inclusion is part of the company’s mandate on an ongoing basis. This lends itself to other celebrations such as International Women’s Day and Black History Month.”
How to celebrate Pride in the workplace and maintain employee engagement
Celebrating Pride at work can be very effective for building a more cohesive and tolerant team, especially if it is personable and supported by business leaders. Options for staff engagement range from allowing staff to participate in local Pride events through to hosting an event in your own workplace.
“Bringing people together and having open dialogue is the most effective way of getting people involved,” says Alex. “It’s much more effective than plonking a rainbow flag in the middle of the office and calling it a day.
“With a highly diverse team, Robert Half has enjoyed success calling on our people to share their lived experiences. We’ve also fostered opportunities for charitable giving geared towards LGBTQ+ communities. These are all ways to celebrate and acknowledge their existence in our lives.”
As no two companies are the same, it can be worth canvassing your team for their ideas on how to how to celebrate Pride in the workplace.
Keeping Pride Month celebrations fresh each year
Rather than taking a ‘rinse and repeat’ approach to annual Pride celebrations, it’s worth developing meaningful activities – and change them up, to ensure your workplace team continues to be eager to learn about the LGBTQ+ community and spread awareness.
Alex explains, “To be effective and engaging there needs to be an incremental building upon the program. Yes, employers need to measure how successful last year’s Pride activities were. But if you know, for instance, that you could have 200 people watch a live event – one they wouldn’t normally have access to, it’s a sure sign you have embraced a powerful opportunity.”
Related: Find out about Robert Half's commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion.
