Search results

The purpose of this paper is to develop a cross-level conceptual model of organizational- and individual-level outcomes of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT)-supportive policies for all workers regardless of their sexual orientation.

This is a conceptual paper based on an integration of propositions from perceived organizational support and organizational justice theories.

The model suggests that LGBT-supportive policies should be related to perceptions of organizational support directly and indirectly through diversity climate and perceptions of distributive, procedural, and interactional justice.

The model implies that employees should feel more supported and more fairly treated among firms with LGBT-supportive policies and practices, and that these feelings will be reciprocated.

This is the first paper to develop propositions about the outcomes of LGBT-supportive policies for all workers, and advances the literature by developing a multi-level model of outcomes of these policies.

The paper aims to investigate the effect of uncertain times on LGBT-supportive corporate policies, exploiting a novel text-based measure of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) that was recently constructed by Baker et al. (2016). LGBT-supportive policies have attracted a great deal of attention in the media lately. There is also a rapidly growing area of the literature that addresses LGBT-supportive policies specifically.

The authors execute a regression analysis and several other robustness checks including propensity score matching (PSM) and an instrumental-variable analysis to mitigate endogeneity.

The authors' results show that companies significantly raise their investments in LGBT-supportive policies in times of greater uncertainty, reinforcing the risk mitigation view where LGBT-supportive policies create moral capital with an insurance-like effect that mitigates adverse consequences during uncertain times. The effect of EPU on LGBT-supportive policies is above and beyond its effect on corporate social responsibility (CSR) in general.

The authors' study is the first to explore the effect of uncertain times on LGBT-supportive corporate policies. The authors contribute to a crucial area of the literature that examines how firms respond to EPU. In addition, the authors enrich the literature on LGBT-friendly policies by showing that EPU is one of the significant determinants of LGBT-friendly policies.

The purpose of this paper is to summarize the limited body of research that focuses on the efficacy of sexual orientation anti-discrimination legislation in reducing discrimination.

Reviews past research that documents overt and subtle forms of workplace discrimination against gay, lesbian, and bisexual individuals and describes how legislation plays an important role in changing social norms and underlying attitudes.

Empirically demonstrates that legislation effectively can reduce discrimination.

Informs legislative debate and promotes the expansion and adoption of national, state, and local legislation on sexual orientation anti-discrimination legislation.

The paper introduces a multi-level model to reduce prejudice through supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) at the institutional, organizational, and individual levels. The purpose of the model is to provide theoretically undergirded pathways to explain how societal events calling for systemic changes in DEI practices can engage and inculcate such systemic changes in organizations and institutions.

The model draws upon macro-level (i.e. institutional theory and institutional logics) theories from sociology and strategic management, meso-level theories from leadership and strategy, and micro-level organizational behavior and human resource management theories.

Resting on open systems theory (Katz and Kahn, 1966) as a backdrop, the authors address how institutional changes result in organizational level changes driving multi-level outcomes of increased DEI, reduced prejudice in work-related settings, and performance gains. The authors suggest the recursive nature of the model can trigger institutional level shifts in logics or result in isomorphic pressures that further change organizational fields and organizations.

The contribution rests in a multi-level examination to help understand how environmental pressures can motivate organizations to enact broader changes related to social justice, specifically increasing efforts in DEI inside the operational aspects of the organization. By enacting these changes, the authors suggest the resultant positive changes in organizations will enhance culture and performance, creating isomorphic pressure for industry wide changes that may begin to move the needle on addressing systemic problems that feed prejudicial behavior in the workplace.

Drawing on social identity theory and the concept of perceived organizational support, the authors conducted an online, exploratory survey of 150 lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) workers in 28 countries to examine whether being LGBT provides a unique perspective in the workplace, if they perceive their employer appreciates this perspective, and what effects this has on perceived discrimination and perceived career advancement. Collectively these questions have implications for work engagement and career prospects of LGBT workers. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Multiple regression and qualitative analyses were used to analyze Likert scale questions along with open-ended options.

The majority of respondents agree that being LGBT offers a unique perspective compared to heterosexual workers. The more respondents agree that they have a different perspective, the more they feel discriminated against. After controlling for demographic variables as well as education, tenure, job level, and disclosure, hierarchical linear regression analyses showed offering a unique perspective increases perceived career advantages. Results also showed increased perceived career advantages if the employer appreciates this perspective. Results of a second regression analysis also showed that a unique perspective is associated with more perceived discrimination, unless their employer appreciates this perspective.

Although single-item measures and a small international sample limit generalizability, rich qualitative responses provide insights into LGBT attitudes across multiple countries.

This study can be applied to future understandings of the diverse nature of LGBT perceptions and attitudes in the workplace.

This is one of the first studies to examine LGBT perceptions that they possess a unique perspective that should be valued by employers.

This exploratory study is one of the first to recognize unique LGBT perspectives and examine the relationship between their perspectives and perceived discrimination and career advantages.

This research investigates how and why firms adopt inclusive diversity activities, identifying the mechanisms behind firms involved in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT)–friendly pursuits. By integrating resource dependence theory, institutional theory and stakeholder theory, the authors argue that a firm's LGBT friendliness is affected by marketing orientation and the external political environment.

This study uses the Corporate Equality Index, as reported by the Human Rights Campaign, of 460 (1,540 firm-year observations) firms in the United States between 2006 and 2019.

This study finds a significant, positive relationship between a firm's marketing orientation and LGBT-friendly activities. This research also determines that this relationship is weakened by state-level diversity policies and country-level political uncertainty.

The study results provide unique theoretical and practical implications for the debate on inclusive corporate policy in similar global markets.

This article aims to shed more light on seemingly contradicting labour market outcomes of lesbians: they were found to have similar unemployment rates as straight women but their unemployment spells are significantly shorter. No such contradiction is observed for gays who seem to have on average a higher unemployment rate and longer unemployment spells compared to straight men.

The main hypothesis is that lesbian and gay employees spend ceteris paribus shorter time working for a given employer (employer tenure) than comparable straight people. This hypothesis is tested on EU Labour Force Survey data using multi-level regression model.

Consistently with the predictions, lesbians and gays were found to have significantly shorter employer tenure than their straight counterparts. These differences remained significant after controlling for individual, workplace and occupational characteristics. The results suggest that shorter employer tenure of lesbians and (possibly) gays is driven by labour demand factors.

To author's knowledge this is the first large-scale quantitative study that compares the employer tenure between lesbians, gays and comparable heterosexuals. The study provides additional insight into mechanisms that lead to (lack of) differentials in unemployment probability between these groups.

This chapter reviews previous research on allyship: non-minority individuals who choose to support minorities while working to end discrimination and prejudice. In particular, the focus of this chapter is on how allyship applies to the workplace. We argue that allyship can be a diversity management tool to help reduce workplace discrimination.

To explore this topic, we conducted a literature review on allyship in the workplace and synthesized previous research together. We examined research from both organizational and non-organizational settings.

Our review of previous literature is divided into three sections. First, we discuss what all entails allyship, including knowledge, communication, and, in particular, action. Next, we discuss the many outcomes previous research suggests comes from allyship (including benefits to other individuals, benefits to the overall culture, and benefits to the ally him or herself). Finally, we conclude with a discussion of who is likely to become an ally as well as the journey a person goes through to become a true ally.

This chapter can be useful for practitioners who wish to promote allyship within his or her workplace. Organizations that want to strengthen their diversity and inclusion climate can consider developing ally training programs and promoting ally culture. Additionally, this chapter can be useful for researchers who wish to study the topic. Currently, there is a dearth of research on allyship specifically within the workplace; this chapter can help future researchers identify areas for empirical exploration.