September 2022 DEI Committee Blog

Where in your professional practices are issues of gender and sexual identity present? Which policy areas could benefit from a deeper attention to gender and sexuality, and how?

These questions were among those discussed at the monthly meeting of Women in Government Relations’ Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Committee on Tuesday, September 13, which featured a topic discussion about Gender Identities: Beyond the Binary. The meeting launched with an overview of the Genderbread Person, a framework developed to distinguish intersecting identities that are easy to confuse: gender describes a person’s psychological sense of self, sex is anatomical, sexuality describes who you are attracted to, and gender expression is how you present outwardly. Teasing these identities apart is important because it helps us understand more nuanced diversity that exists beyond the traditional stereotypes of “male” and “female.”

A rich discussion followed. First, members unpacked norms guiding how attire and gender are linked in professional spaces. Prevailing guidance for business attire often enforces a strict binary between men and women, and occasionally requires outdated articles of clothing such as skirt suits and pantyhose. Unsolicited remarks often arise when dressing and styling in ways that defy conventional norms, including opting for pants, flat shoes, and shorter hairstyles that are more personally comfortable. Women are often expected to strike a careful balance in the workplace: look feminine, but not feminine enough to attract attention. Dressing in a way that makes you feel powerful and aligned impacts our confidence and performance, which begs the question: how much talent is wasted through restrictions on how employees dress?

The group also talked about how gender expression differs over time and across cultures. Historically and even today, many of the behaviors that we think of as strictly “male” or “female” are more freely shared across male, female, and nonbinary people. Female fashion often has “menswear” trends; however, masculine-presenting people often have fewer options to wear traditionally feminine attire without being stereotyped as homosexual. This is one of the many strong – and unreliable – associations between gender expression and sexual identity.

The group also discussed allyship: how can we create a more welcoming, inclusive environment for people with diverse gender and sexual identities? After all, “women” is a broad category: efforts to support women must include cisgender and transgender women; straight, lesbian, and bisexual women; and masculine, female, and nonbinary women. Stepping outside the norm entails real risk, which means that allyship from cisgendered heterosexual women is especially important. Members shared small ways they shift the dialogue at work, including using the gender-neutral terms, “spouse” or “partner.” Others talked about pushing back when policies or practices that exclude nonbinary people are justified as benefitting women.

Members talked about the importance of staying curious as change happens, acknowledging that political action around traditional women's issues were hard-fought. As we progress and expand our understanding, how are we opening conversations in welcoming and productive ways? The purpose of DEI is to engage people with different perspectives, worldviews, and backgrounds who disagree. We need everybody to explore frameworks like the Genderbread Person – not to universally adopt it, but to understand why it’s important to those who do use it. Adopting policies or practices simply because they are trending does little to advance DEI. Instead, we need to center our values and answer the call to learn. Every person is entitled to make choices for themselves that are respected, including the more traditional views that got us to this point.

We welcome all WGR members to join us each month at our DEI Committee meetings! Register here for the next meeting on October 11 from 11:30 AM–1 PM (ET). For more information on WGR’s DEI Committee, please reach out to dei.wgr@gmail.com.

This month’s blog is authored by DEI Committee Co-Vice Chair Larkin Willis.