Wednesday, September 3, 2008

New York Times article on gender transition in the workplace

The New York Times has an article on gender transition in the workplace in Thursday's "Life's Work" column. The writer, Lisa Belkin, creates an interesting contrast between gender transition a decade ago and those of more recent vintage, as well as the changes in legal protections. I was quoted, along with a number of others who have had extensive experience with gender identity issues in the workplace, such as Dr. Mary Ann Horton (Sempra Energy), Lori Fox (Out & Equal) and William Tate (General Motors). I note that the number of Fortune 500 companies protecting gender identity is now up to 153 in the latest Corporate Equality Index, as compared to 125 in 2007. The other item to note is that I wouldn't agree that the rapid rise of private employer policies is mostly due to the Corporate Equality Index. Rather, I would say that it was one of the most visible causes. A lot of the credit goes to GLBT advocates and organizations like Taylor Flynn, Riki Wilchins, Shannon Minter, GenderPAC, NCLR and NGLTF for putting transgender issues in the forefront of GLBT concerns. More about that in upcoming posts. You can find the article here.