Pride Month 2025: How Offices Can Go Beyond Policies and Build Inclusive Spaces

Pride Month 2025: How Offices Can Build Inclusive Spaces

“Rainbow logos, social media marketing campaigns, and office celebration parties at headquarters are ubiquitous each Pride Month. Even while tokenistic and they do count towards raising awareness, I often wonder whether we are really building spaces where LGBTQIA+ individuals can live and breathe on a daily basis or just building inclusive workplaces in June,” Shruti Swaroop poses this question.

She notes that “being included” should be a “habit,” and not an isolated incident. “While policies that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity are important, they are not enough. Although policies can set the tone, our daily deeds, words, leadership choices, and workplace traditions determine whether or not people feel appreciated, safe, and noticed at work,” she adds.

Swaroop cites her experience in teaming up with firms spanning across various backgrounds and says that she has “witnessed disconnect between purpose and action.”

Elucidating the same, she points out that while firms “have inclusive hiring policies, diversity charters, or gay partner schemes,” the real question remains “how is a trans worker welcomed through the onboarding process? Do non-binary friends get named and respected or asked to give their pronouns? Do we stop microaggressions or homophobic humor when we see them?”

Don't Miss:5 Must-Visit Delhi Monuments Celebrating India’s Forgotten LGBTQ+ Past

How To Ensure Genuine Inclusion

The HR departments are not solely responsible for creating an inclusive culture, says Shruti Swaroop. “In my book, Microaggressions at Workplace, I have spoken about creating psychological safe spaces that help create a world that’s truly inclusive. Everyone has a responsibility - Inclusion is a strategic need,” she adds.

What’s worth noting that “voluntarily educating ourselves and others on the ordinary lives of LGBTQIA+ people is important to forming habits of inclusion,” she observes.

Sensitizing managers as to not have “unconscious assumptions” that may “distort performance reviews. It is about creating spaces in which employees can disclose their stories without threat of castigation or being "outed." It does, in fact, involve learning - and unlearning - on a daily basis,” Swaroop adds.

Exactly at this juncture, leadership plays a key role.

“Issues are addressed inclusively through top-down language modeling. Inclusive policies soon become performative policies unless leaders call out exclusionary behavior, give LGBTQIA+ individuals a voice, or stop it. This notwithstanding, it makes a significant statement across the firm when executives consistently practice inclusive behavior by way of speaking inclusively, endorsing LGBTQIA+ talent, or simply listening with compassion,” she suggests.

Another step offices can take to make it inclusive for the queer community is to bring it up “with colleagues, team managers, and even vendors is required. Under normal circumstances, I would recommend that companies bake inclusion into regular operations, including small things like inclusive benefits for all, inclusive promotion practices, or inclusive communications training,” Swaroop notes.

“Let's shift the discussion this Pride Month from what we vow to be doing for the LGBTQIA+ and move in the direction of actually doing it in our everyday lives. Let's see beyond promises and posters and start braiding inclusivity into our words, our structures, and our actions,” wraps up Shruti Swaroop.

Don't Miss:Bias Against The LGBTQ+ Community: Gen Z May Be The Generation That Finally Ends It

If you liked the story, please share it. For more such articles, stay tuned to HerZindagi.