Trans Awareness – Promoting Proactive Inclusion

Trans Awareness – Promoting Proactive Inclusion

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Trans Awareness Week

So it’s Trans Awareness Week this week, and International Men’s Day on the 19th of November. 

I talked about the importance of International Men’s Day a few months ago and encouraged more people and organisations to recognise this day. 

So, in deciding my focus for my blog this week, I’ve decided to focus on Trans Awareness.

Gender equality goes beyond just acceptance; it’s about creating an environment where everyone, regardless of their gender identity, feels valued, respected, and comfortable.

Often, we see organisations making accommodations only when a trans person joins the team. While these adjustments are crucial, we should strive to change the system before someone of a different background arrives. 

This proactive approach is a powerful demonstration of our commitment to fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace.

By taking these steps in advance, we can ensure that our workplaces welcome all individuals, regardless of their gender identity, from day one. 

It’s about challenging norms and stereotypes, reevaluating policies, and creating a culture that supports everyone, regardless of where they fall on the gender spectrum.

Here are a few ways we can promote proactive inclusion:

Training and Education: Invest in training and educational programs that raise awareness about different gender identities and experiences. This will help to dispel misconceptions and create a more informed and empathetic workforce. Done well, these programs occur irrespective of how many employees identify this way. Done badly, they can come across as “Riley uses they/them pronouns, so now we need to do this training.”

Policy Review: Regularly review and update your workplace policies to ensure they are inclusive and sensitive to the needs of all genders. Ensure that gender-neutral language is used and that accommodations are readily available. Done well, you are engaging expertise in this area (remember “nothing about us, with us”). Done badly, you are relying solely on the cisgender voices that you already hear a lot from.

Listening and Feedback: Create a platform where employees can provide feedback and raise concerns about gender-related issues. This feedback should be actively used to make necessary improvements. Done well, it should incorporate respectful conversations and inclusive decision-making. Done badly, it can become a fight about who’s concerns matter more. 

Visibility and Representation: Encourage trans individuals to share their stories and experiences, fostering greater understanding among employees. Done well, you pay for a speaker who wants to speak on this topic and share their experience. Done badly, you coerce the trans person in the team to speak on behalf of their community (when they perhaps don’t want to).

Let’s seek to build workplaces that are not only welcoming but also proactive in their efforts to embrace all gender identities. 

By making these changes beforehand, we can pave the way for a more inclusive, equitable, and diverse future.  

Stop Focusing on Fixing Women

Stop Focusing on Fixing Women

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When considering your organisation’s 2023 plans, perhaps ANOTHER Women in Leadership program is not the answer.

The solution to gender diversity problems is not to ‘fix women’ but rather to fix the flawed criteria and crooked systems that continue to impede many women’s access to power.

I find it incredible how organisations can run Women in Leadership programs for years and years, and have generation after generation of women leaders raise the same systemic issues (or in some instances worsening issues).

Yet, these organisations continue to think that the solution is another ‘Women in Leadership’ program.

If you want to consider a better way forward, perhaps consider who else needs to be developed.

Bloke Coaching is a program that helps everyone to understand male privilege, patriarchy and prejudice, and work proactively to address the barriers encountered by women and other genders which perpetuate inequalities.

Maybe it’s time to shake things up.

Mansplaining Flowchart by Kim Goodwin

Lesson 3 – What to do mid-mansplain

Always when explaining anything, look out for cues from the other person/people.

👉 High frequency (polite) nodding

👉 Noone is writing anything down; perhaps fiddling with their pen

👉 No further comments or questions; conversation has become a monologue

👉 Uncomfortable silence after you have finished speaking

👉 Pursed lips and ‘biting

👉 You are asking yourself questions and answering them

👉 someone has attempted to interject but you have continued to talk over the top of them

👉 Others avoid direct eye contact with you

👉 Others have begun to look at each other or stare at their notebooks or intensely at your slides.

👉 Others encourage the topic to be changed or attempt a redirect.

If one or more of the above are present, perhaps it’s time to pause and double-check if other people need you to continue.

Perhaps try one of the following:

🔉 “Just checking, do you need me to go into this further?”

🔉 “Just checking, how comfortable are you already with what I’m going into?”

🔉 “Just checking, who would like me to explain this?”

🔉 “Just checking, who else has something to add?”

🔉 “Just checking, do you need this level of detail from me?”

We can all unconsciously (or accidentally) become a mansplainer.

However it’s when we are mid-mansplain, and we choose to ignore the signals other people are sending us and continue our course of action, that we are wholly deserving of the labelling.

We can be better than that.

👇Use the comments to share other signs that would-be-mansplainers should look out for.

How to NOT to Mansplain – In 3 Easy Lessons

How to NOT to Mansplain – In 3 Easy Lessons

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Lesson 1 – You Don’t know as much as you think you do

There is a tendency that the less we know about a topic, the more we overestimate our own knowledge or competence with that topic.

There’s a name for it – the Dunning-Kruger Effect.

It’s a thing. Now you know. So don’t be that person.

Remaining silent and listening to others is a perfectly ok thing to do.

 

Lesson 2 – Ask yourself, are you Mansplaining?

Print the below flowchart. (Flowchart Credit: Kim Goodman)

Paste it at the back of your notebook or pin it next to your monitor.

Refer to it in order to test assumptions you may be making.

Extension: Check in throughout the conversation about some of those assumptions. Eg. Perhaps you have been asked to explain one thing but check in again before you start explaining more than that particular thing.

It’s not too difficult. You can do it.

Mansplaining Flowchart by Kim Goodwin

Lesson 3 – What to do mid-mansplain

Always when explaining anything, look out for cues from the other person/people.

👉 High frequency (polite) nodding

👉 Noone is writing anything down; perhaps fiddling with their pen

👉 No further comments or questions; conversation has become a monologue

👉 Uncomfortable silence after you have finished speaking

👉 Pursed lips and ‘biting

👉 You are asking yourself questions and answering them

👉 someone has attempted to interject but you have continued to talk over the top of them

👉 Others avoid direct eye contact with you

👉 Others have begun to look at each other or stare at their notebooks or intensely at your slides.

👉 Others encourage the topic to be changed or attempt a redirect.

If one or more of the above are present, perhaps it’s time to pause and double-check if other people need you to continue.

Perhaps try one of the following:

🔉 “Just checking, do you need me to go into this further?”

🔉 “Just checking, how comfortable are you already with what I’m going into?”

🔉 “Just checking, who would like me to explain this?”

🔉 “Just checking, who else has something to add?”

🔉 “Just checking, do you need this level of detail from me?”

We can all unconsciously (or accidentally) become a mansplainer.

However it’s when we are mid-mansplain, and we choose to ignore the signals other people are sending us and continue our course of action, that we are wholly deserving of the labelling.

We can be better than that.

👇Use the comments to share other signs that would-be-mansplainers should look out for.

Do You Wipe The Seat?

Do You Wipe The Seat?

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Speaking on behalf of most men, accidently peeing on a toilet seat happens often.

When this happens, you are faced with a decision – to clean it up or to move on and pretend it wasn’t you.

Hopefully you choose the former.

But evidence suggests that many of us choose the latter.

I would presume that when using a public toilet as opposed to one in your home, the chances increase that you will move on and pretend it wasn’t you. (I’m sure there’s a research paper in that).

Again, I point to evidence. Evidence that I’ve seen in public bathrooms.

Now what do you do when you see pee on the seat when you arrive?

Do you clean it or do your thing and leave it?

Those who make the latter choice may convince themselves that it wasn’t them so they have no responsibility to clean it up.

They count themselves lucky that it wasn’t a number 2.

Perhaps unconsciously, they thank their cis-male privilege that they don’t have to sit down to pee.

Our fellow (cis-female) humans do not have this privilege.

𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗼𝗻 𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝗮𝗺 𝗜 𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀?

Well, what do you do when you seen inequality within the system? Do you wipe the seat, or leave it for others to do it?

Any by ‘others’ I mean it will usually be a woman that has to do it, or perhaps a cleaner (let’s call them the DEI team).

You may not need the seat wiped in order for you to be ‘successful’ with what you are trying to do.

You probably notice ‘the pee’ but it doesn’t inconvenience you enough to do anything about it.

It may not have been you that put ‘the pee’ there in the first place.

But to walk past it and do nothing, only perpetuates the obstacles encountered by others, who don’t share your privilege.

It is much easier for us to do nothing, but that will only ever help people like us to ‘succeed’.

We have all left pee on the seat. Maybe it was ours. Someone else’s. A combination.

It is not someone else’s job to clean this up. And we shouldn’t only wipe the seat when it will serve us.

The reality is noone is going to call you a ‘champion of change’ for wiping the seat, but it’s the things that you do when no one else is looking that determines your level of commitment to making the system fairer for everyone.

Now, I’ve heard enough horror stories from female bathrooms to know that women can contribute to this problem as well (particularly in public bathrooms).

Speaking to the women, perhaps you have successful ‘squatted over’ the system. Well done you, but that doesn’t help the women that aren’t like you, or other genders.

Women who have succeeded in the system also have a responsibility to ‘wipe the seat’ for others, ensuring the system is fair for everyone, not just people like them.

Take a moment and look down.

Look down at the systems and processes that you’ve successfully worked through to get where you are.

There is plenty of pee to clean up.

No excuses. Wipe the seat.

“H-e-y-G-u-y-s” “Hey Everyone!”

“H-e-y-G-u-y-s” “Hey Everyone!”

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I’ve been working on changing my go-to of referring to a group of people as “guys”.

It has NOT been easy.

There are, of course, plenty of people—including many people who aren’t men —who have no problem being addressed as “guys”, and have come to think that word has become entirely gender-neutral and don’t see a reason to change.

So what prompted me to change?

First, I noticed when and how I referred to groups of people as “guys”.

– a group of only men ➡️ “guys”, even sometimes “fellas”.

– a group of a majority of men ➡️ “guys”

– a group of about 25% men ➡️ “guys”

– a group with only 1 man or less than 10% men ➡️ still “guys” but I’m only now starting to notice that it maybe it’s not the best word.

– a group of only women ➡️ I’ve still referred occasionally to them as “guys” but I’m very conscious of the word coming out of my mouth. NB. I’ve never felt comfortable using the word “ladies”, even with a group of all-women.

What I noticed about the above is that even when there is a majority of non-men, this still doesn’t stop me. It’s only when there are no men or few men, that it becomes an unusual word to use.

Aren’t I therefore unknowingly confirming that groups or men or a majority of men is (or should be) the norm and that I’m only prompted to be inclusive to non-men when they far outnumber the men?

That’s not good. And it’s not helping to correct a system that favours men, it’s perpetuating it.

Side note, I was once a part of an email distribution list that included EAs, PAs and admin assistants. The emails all started with “Hi Ladies”. I wasn’t the only man on this list. It felt uncomfortable, but I never spoke up about it.

So – like everything – it’s been hard to rewire my brain. It’s the same rewiring that I’ve done with people’s correct pronouns.

It’s not easy, but it is important.

My discomfort is worth someone else’s comfort.

I’m trying and I’m still not getting it right all the time.

I’m also positive that none of my workshop groups has noticed. But that’s the whole point, we only notice when someone refers to us incorrectly.

Male privilege is not thinking twice about being referred to as a group of “guys”. But we would notice if (when) we are part of “ladies”.

Post below your thoughts and if you have been making the change.