Just tell me I didn’t want their stupid job anyway.

[Lordfrontpaw]

So I applied for a job. All going well with the forms until I got to the ‘about you’ section

I was asked my sex and it was explained that HMRC only GIVES 2 OPTIONS

Then came - in roughly this order - am I trans? What is my gender, did I have school lunches (that would be back in the 70/80s), what did my dad do (Christ sake he died almost 20 years ago), what’s my religion, and a million other things (the very last one being did I consider myself disabled).

I answered ‘prefer not to say’ to all except the gender one where they thoughtfully had an option of a free text box.

I blew it didn’t I?

No, I can’t imagine it’ll make any difference.

I think the monitoring form will be separated from the application form. But do you really want to work there?

What did you put in the 'gender' bit?

I don't think they can hold that against you! So let me get this straight, you said Female, but the other stuff like what your dad did for a living, you had the balls to say ''prefer not to say''.

What kind of job requires this info?

Monitoring forms are completely anonymous. They are only collected so that organisations can monitor the diversity of their recruits and if, for example, only white, female catholics were applying for all the jobs they might think about how to pitch the job ad for a wider range.

They are collected and stored separately.

Didn’t say female...

Just watching Lionel Shriver and Douglas Murray talking about picking the prefer not to say option, the whole audience (huge) is laughing.
Nix the whole identity thing is his final word.

I wish the option was ‘dont know’

Those sound like standard civil service questions which are for HR monitoring an d not given to the recruiting manager. The free school meals / dad thing was a social mobility thing.

It’s very sexist to ask what your dad did. Did they ask about your mother too?

The civil service has made a pledge to employ people that are reflective of the wider community. So people on free school meals, people who’s parents were not in professional jobs, care leavers etc etc. Part of that is monitoring who is applying for jobs to see if they are appealing to the right people. I’m not saying it’s right or wrong but that’s what it is.
Makes no odds for your application though.

If they’d asked about my mum (I was so people off by then) I would have said what she used to tell people when they asked her what she did for a living - ‘washes the elephants in the circus’

It wasn’t a civil service job.

Civil Service wouldnt ask what your father did!

I applied for a role recently and was sent the equalities form, first question was is your gender male, female, transwoman, transman, prefer not to say, I ticked prefer not to say and unsurprisingly I didn't hear anything back.

I was surprised to get the forms prior to an interview, but wondered if some companies are using the equalities forms to weed out candidates 'unsuitable' views.

I think it'll be fine!

I applied for a job recently and the equal opportunities form was a Word document. I amended 'gender' to 'sex' so that I could tick female. I doubt anyone will notice.

I had to completely ignore the question 'is your gender identity the same as your gender assigned at birth?' because to me that's pretty much like asking a lifelong atheist 'is the church you currently attend the same as the one you were baptised in?' Neither 'yes' nor 'no' is correct.

You said it was HMRC, that’s civil service. And they ask what level of education your parents had because it’s an indicator of social mobility.
And I know not filling it in makes no odds.

It's fine. I've been involved in a few civil service recruitment exercises. It's just to monitor diversity and social mobility. The actual postholders won't even see it. (I always cross out 'gender' and put 'sex' too..) Good luck with your application!

I wish the option was ‘dont know’

I think that application form is absolutely foul , and making a big deal out of the gender question is petty and trivial.

For several of those questions for many people the answer will be "I don't know".

Really get a sense of perspective- there was a silly question which you can easily ignore and intrusive and potentially triggering questions about the applicant's childhood but the silly gender one is the one you think is worth complaining about.

There needs to be a box for 'fluid' so they get advance warning that your name and preferred pronouns will be liable to change with the wind direction. That should keep HR on the hop!

No the sex question was just on there - they asked sex and explained that the 2 options were the only ones HMRC accepted!

Dido - you don’t know my background or what may or may not ‘trigger’ me (but I’m an big old girl so nosey questions about my childhood don’t bother me).

The fact is that the questions are all about box ticking and quotas.

Dido - you don’t know my background or what may or may not ‘trigger’ me (but I’m an big old girl so nosey questions about my childhood don’t bother me)

Gosh posts are so often taken to be about "me, me, me" on here. I wasn't remotely referring to you or your background.

I assume the question about school lunches was trying to find out whether the applicant qualified for free school lunches. The question about father's occupation is utterly irrelevant to a job application.

You have a startling lack of imagination if you can't imagine that many applicants would not want to answer or even be able to answer those questions.

There is plenty to object to on an objective level on that application form. The gender issue is petty and irrelevant.

‘Really get a sense of perspective’ wasn’t referring to me? Oh well I must’ve misunderstood.

The questions about family (also marital status) came under the gender (the first thing they asked was ‘are you trans?’ Then about gender ID, then sex) and disability one was last.

So I was irritated being asked an irrelevance like gender/ID in the first instance, while an aspect that is pretty important - and a group who needs to be ‘included’ - was bottom of the whole form.

It appears that some things are seen as more important than others.

I tick 'prefer not to say' on almost everything now.
Unless I am asked what sex I am. That I will (usually) answer.