Work & Workplaces

Work is a major part of many people’s lives, and it makes sense, as it can involve a lot of our time and energy.

Work can take many forms, from an office 9-to-5, to working in a shop or restaurant, to doing sex work, to freelancing, to making a creative practice or hobby into something that pays the bills. Work can also include things you may not be getting paid for, like internships, apprenticeships or traineeships, volunteering, and activism and advocacy.

No matter how many hours you spend in a workplace, whether you’re casual or full time, if you’re coming out for the first time, or moving into a new workplace that doesn’t know your history, or whether you love or hate what you do, you deserve to feel safe and respected by your colleagues, clients and managers, and in your workplace day to day.

To develop this page, we worked with ACON’s Pride in Diversity team who offer LGBTQ workplace inclusion services and specialise in HR, organisational change and workplace diversity across Australia.

For many trans people, social gender affirmation includes being out at work. This might include your workplace outlining the support that available to you, including a support team and training for all staff, or this might sometimes mean an uphill battle with those around you.

We have developed a Gender Affirmation Policy and Guidelines Template with ACON’s Pride in Diversity.

These guidelines include a lot of great information about how to start talking about gender affirmation in the workplace and developing a plan, including information specifically for your support team.

Affirming who you are at work might include:

Working with your support team

Griffith University write in their Gender Affirmation Guidelines of the importance of finding people to work with and for you. They say “an early step in engaging your colleagues is to nominate a support team. Decide who you want to have as your key support team during this process.1”

This team might include your:

• Direct supervisor / manager

• HR representative

• Equity, Diversity and Inclusion specialist, or an Equity Champion for your area

• Trusted colleague who is willing to support you

Name, title, and pronouns

Having people use your name and pronouns is a great way of feeling more able to be yourself in a workplace. This may be a request that you make yourself, or something you ask HR or management to do with you.

Some workplaces may require a statutory declaration confirming that you are affirming your gender. It can also be good to wear a badge that has your name and pronouns on it for at least a little while. If you’ve got some colleagues or friends at work who are supportive, you could ask them to also wear their name and pronouns in support of you, and to help correct others if they get your name and pronouns wrong.

Putting your pronouns in your email signature affirms them regularly to others, and you can ask the people in your support network to do this too. This may end up becoming standard policy.

Social affirmation may also mean changing your title, to either Mrs / Ms / Miss / Mr, or to the gender neutral Mx.

Logins and email addresses

Part of changing your details at work will be updating these in the computer and online systems you work with. When updating your name, management or HR will be able to let IT know what changes will be required.

If you change your email address, it can be helpful to have your old email account redirect to your new one so you are able to catch emails sent to the incorrect address.

Bathrooms and facilities

Using bathrooms and facilities that are affirming is an important, but often scary step for many trans people. Talk with HR about what is possible, but legally you are able to use the bathroom that best affirms your gender.

Many workplaces only have binary gender (male and female) bathrooms. You are able to choose the bathroom that feels most comfortable (or least uncomfortable) to use. For more information about bathrooms, you can visit our Bathrooms page in the Allies section, or direct your support team to it.

Uniforms and dress codes

There is no legal reason to not let you wear the uniform that best affirms your gender. If you are unsure what this might look like, have a conversation with HR or management about the best option for you. Organisations like Dressed for Success and Fitted for Work provide clothes and styling services for all women, trans and cis, and can assist with a new work wardrobe, as well as offering resume and interview skills coaching.

For non-binary people, this may look slightly different than for people with binary genders.

Leave and support

You may want flexibility around leave during gender affirmation or while coming out in the workplace. This like appointments and medical processes take time, it’s also important to time for yourself during this big social change.

You, or your supervisor, could contact HR for advice on what leave entitlements you may be able to access, including options for flexible working arrangements as well as any supporting documents you may need to provide.

Training and resources

For information geared toward allies, check out our pages for employers and colleagues.

Pride In Diversity is an ACON project working with employers and organisations to help them support their LGBTQ+ employees, including trans and gender diverse employees. They write that no matter how your organisation looks now, they “work with your team to understand the importance of LGBTQ+ inclusion and to map out a strategy that will enable you to successfully work towards best practice.”

Sex work is a form of work that some trans and gender diverse people do. Sex work can look like different types of work, workplaces and income streams.

In NSW, sex work is decriminalised, which means that anyone over the age of 18 is able to provide sexual services to a person over the age of consent in exchange for money, goods or favours. For more information about the legal state of sex work in NSW, check out Scarlet Alliance.

The Sex Worker Outreach Project (SWOP) is the leading peer based sex worker organisation in NSW, SWOP offers education, health promotion and supplies for sex workers in NSW, including those who are trans or gender diverse. You can get in touch with SWOP via their website, or in person at their office in Surry Hills.

You can also contact and join Scarlet Alliance, the Australian Sex Workers Association, through their website.

In almost every part of our lives and work, trans people have the same rights as cis people. It is unlawful to discriminate against a person who is trans, or is presumed to be trans, and this includes in the workplace.

The Sex Discrimination Act makes it unlawful to treat a person less favourably than another person in a similar situation because of the gender-related identity, appearance, mannerisms or other gender-related characteristics of the person … in many areas of public life including employment.

The Australian Human Rights Commission

It is unlawful to prevent a trans person from getting or staying in a job. You have the right to a safe place of employment that affirms your gender. For more information about your rights, you can visit our Rights and Justice page. You can also contact the Inner City Legal Centre who offer a state-wide free legal service for trans and gender diverse people.