Coming Out at Work: download myGwork's new #WorkingWithPride guide

Nobody is required to come out at work. Not to be a good colleague, not to be authentic, not to help the organisation's statistics. If you decide to, it should be because it makes your working life better, and on terms you chose.

That is the starting point of Coming Out at Work, the latest guide in myGwork's #WorkingWithPride series of practical workplace resources. It is written for two readers at once: the person deciding whether, when and how to come out, and the colleague or manager they choose to tell.

Coming out at work is not one conversation. It is a series of small disclosures, each to a different audience, and you control the order, the pace and the stopping point. Telling one person is complete in itself. The guide is built around that idea.

What's inside

Part one is for you. Four questions to answer on paper before you decide anything: why now, who first, what you want to happen afterwards, and what your exit is if it goes badly. A map of the six separate audiences that "out" can mean, from one trusted colleague through to clients and the public, and why you can stop at any level indefinitely. Then six situations with the actual words to use: telling one colleague, telling your manager, letting the team know without making a speech, correcting an assumption in under two seconds, coming out as trans or non-binary and the three-part plan that goes with it, and what to do when it goes badly.

Part two is for the colleague or manager they tell. The four things to do in the first thirty seconds, in order. The five things not to say, including the well-meant ones that land wrong. What to do in the week after, which is where goodwill usually goes wrong by someone doing too much rather than too little. And how to recover when you slip.

It ends with a one-page pocket card: eight scripts, four for each reader, that you can keep on your phone.

Download the guide

The full guide is free to download as a PDF.

For the complete #WorkingWithPride series and more resources on LGBTQ+ inclusion at work, visit the myGwork Academy. If you have any questions about the guide, contact [email protected].

This guide is intended for informational and best practice purposes only. Nothing in it is legal advice. Protection for LGBTQ+ employees varies by country, is subject to frequent change, and may be partial or absent where you work. Please check what applies to you before acting on anything in it, and seek independent advice where needed.