Is Stonewall Crumbling - And How Should Employers React?

May 16, 2024

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IS STONEWALL CRUMBLING – AND HOW SHOULD EMPLOYERS REACT? As any smart HR professional who's been paying attention will know, suddenly everyone is talking about Stonewall – and not in a good way.

Once considered a solution – a trusted, credible advisor on best practice for workplace policy concerning sexual orientation (or ‘gay rights’) – now the organisation is viewed as a problem by many employers, pulling them into complex, personal and controversial issues around politics, sexuality, medicine and identity.

Is it time to drop off the Stonewall Workplace Equality Index and withdraw from the Diversity Champions scheme?

Looking back, was it a mistake for employers to trust Stonewall - or was their error not realising sooner that the organisation had changed direction?

Do employers need to wise up to the deepening schisms with the 'LGBTQ community' as fault lines appear around definitions of once-straightforward terms such as 'gay' and 'lesbian'? Why do some lesbians, gay men and bisexual people not feel welcome in the 'LGBTQ' staff networks - and what should employers do about that?

By hosting 'LGBTQ' speakers and trainers who openly challenge the Cass Review, are employers taking a position on the medicalision of gender distressed children - and which employees might be uncomfortable about this?

And do these discussions even belong in the workplace?

In this episode, Julie Scanlon and Tanya de Grunwald chart the evolution of Stonewall's complex and shifting relationship with employers, and ask the biggest question of all: What should employers do next?

Chapters:

00:00 Intro

05:45 How did this happen?

31:03 Why didn't employers notice sooner?

43:20 What next?

Links: Nolan Investigates: Stonewall (BBC Sounds) https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p0...

The roadmap:

Are you an HR director reassessing your organisation's policies around gender identity and trans inclusion? Contact Tanya de Grunwald via LinkedIn for more information about the roadmap she and Julie have created...