Employees belonging to the LGBT+ community also suffer from it, an effect that hinders their career development prospects. We take a closer look.
George Arison made headlines last September when Grindr announced his appointment as CEO.
The American businessman thus became the first gay man to head the dating app, and one of the few openly gay CEOs to lead a publicly traded company, along with Apple CEO Tim Cook, who came out officially in the media in 2014.
But despite these few prominent examples LBGT people face multiple obstacles during their careers because of their sexual orientation.
Taboo for some, a private matter for others, sexual orientation remains a factor associated with discrimination in the professional sphere.
Numerous surveys show that LGBT employees are often victims of discrimination within their company, whether it is in recruitment, in the missions they are given or in their pay.
In France, 20% of LGBT employees say they have perceived inequalities in their career development, according to the third edition of the LGBT+ barometer of French association L’Autre Cercle in partnership with IFOP (French Institute of Public Opinion).
Researchers at the University of Sydney recently looked at the effects of this glass ceiling on gay men. They asked 256 Australians to choose a gay man to promote Sydney in a fake ad campaign. Half of the participants in the study, the results of which were published in the journal Sex Roles, identified as gay and half as heterosexual.
The scientists asked them to watch videos featuring six supposedly homosexual white actors.
They acted out the same script in two different ways: one with an “effeminate” voice and body language, and the other using traditional codes of masculinity.
Most of the participants in the study felt that actors with a more traditionally “masculine” attitude would be the most believable in the commercial.
This was true regardless of their sexual orientation. “Both gay men and heterosexual men prefer masculine-presenting men for high-status roles,” the researchers concluded in a press release.
The firm, an old-school ‘boys’ club’?
This study shows how stereotypes about virility can prevent some professionals from reaching positions of power within an organisation, especially those who identify as part of the LGBT+ community.
For French essayist Christophe Falcoz, the existence of this glass ceiling shows how widespread the old-school boys’ club still is in the corporate world.
“A transition from one hierarchical level to another clearly constitutes one of the virility tests of the corporate institution, thus making it possible to verify conformity to a traditional model of masculinity and to distribute power to those who are the best representatives of it,” he writes in an article published in 2014 in the journal Travail, Genre et Sociétés.
Added to this is the self-censorship of LGBT+ employees.
Many try to make themselves as invisible as possible within their organisations, in order to preserve their career development and to ensure their daily well-being at work.
But this tactic often backfires: 17% of LGBT+ professionals report feeling “exhausted” hiding their sexual orientation from their colleagues, according to a 2018 report by Human Rights Campaign Foundation.
Nearly a third even say they are depressed or unhappy at work. A lack of fulfilment that is not without consequences on their productivity and, therefore, on their prospects for professional development.
But what can be done to remedy this phenomenon? Should quotas and affirmative action policies be imposed to encourage diversity in management bodies?
The question is still being debated. However, many companies are working hard to create a more inclusive work environment by implementing LGBTQ-friendly measures, such as training to raise awareness of these issues among all employees.
Many large corporations and companies are implementing these to retain their employees, as younger generations place increasing importance on acceptance of differences.