What should I say?

[BossDilemma24]

I’ve name changed for this.

I have been in my job for almost 6 months. Things are going well and my boss has supported me (I’m In HR and part of a brand new senior team with a specific objective to disrupt). Org has very old school values (very white male dominated) and has jumped on DEI, investing millions in all sorts of projects to improve opportunities for those in under represented ethnic categories etc.

All was going well and I was starting to gently agitate around the gender piece, which currently doesn’t really create any great issues. There are gender neutral toilets but these have been added separately and the female and male toilets remain untouched. All good. At least one of my colleagues is gender critical too.

Until Pride month, when boom! Announcements that we are a top 100 stonewall employer. Had to do Trans Inclusion training with someone from “Inclusive Employers”. Well, what a car crash that was. I spent the first 20 mins listening to how misgendering is literal violence and then some unqualified stat about how 25% of employers surveyed said they wouldn’t employ a trans person. I dropped a link in the chat to a survey where 40% of employers said they wouldn’t employ women.

There was a nod to “the media” kicking up “anti-trans” rhetoric about what it is okay to say and not say at work without any detail, so I said that there had been several Tribunal cases over the last few years which had clearly established that gender critical beliefs are valid (presenter said people could their own research on that). My boss was present during this and liked my comments.

I have my first 121 since the session with her today. I feel like I should tell her how uncomfortable that session was for me. Staff survey comments use words like “compelled speech” and “HR will shut you down if you think differently to them” and I’ve had interesting conversations with her about true inclusion coming from curiosity in people, not crap like that but with my probation review pending I don’t want to create waves for myself.

Interestingly, the only colleague that states her pronouns in meetings has not been joined by other colleagues in the team so maybe it was a tickbox exercise for more than one of us.

Any thoughts? My ND brain is racing.

Well done for dropping the counter stats. I think as your boss publicly liked them you should be OK to raise your thoughts on the training in your meeting.

I don't see the point in bringing it up at all. What are you trying to achieve? I'm not sure why you brought in a stat on women in employment during an LGBTQ talk. You say the firm is very white and male, then perhaps your meeting would be an ideal time to talk about that.

I would not talk about how uncomfortable you were, but instead point out that the training was factually incorrect and misleading and that this provider should not be booked again to make sure your company does not get sued for the discrimination and harrassment of gender critical women as so many other employers currently are.