Welcome to our LGBT+ staff pages.

Royal Holloway is a Stonewall Diversity Champion, dedicated to creating a workplace where LGTB+ staff can be themselves and reach their full potential. Stonewall is an LGBT+ rights charity which campaigns for the equality of lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people. Its key priorities are:

To empower individuals
To transform institutions
To change hearts and minds
To change laws

The Stonewall Workplace Equality Index is a benchmarking tool for employers to measure their progress on LGBT+ inclusion in the workplace. Employers who participate in this scheme are required to demonstrate their work in 10 areas of employment policy and practice. Staff across the organisation also complete an anonymous survey about their experience of diversity and inclusion at work.

Royal Holloway is rising in the Stonewall Equality Index scale with each submission and is now ranked 200th out of 503 organisations who participated in the 2020 index, and 29^th of 54 Education Sector entrants (which includes Further and Higher Education Institutions). This reflects a rise of 74 places when compared to our previous rating, when we were 274 out of 430

Feedback from Stonewall on the application suggested that the College was doing well in a number of areas, including having a proactive LGBT+ Staff Network, developing more inclusive policies and guidance, and focusing more on offering a wider and more in-depth programme of equality training. The College was also commended for developing a well thought-out allies initiative.

Despite our progress and achievements, we are committed to continuing to work hard to make things better. 76% of LGBT participants agreed that they feel able to be themselves at work, with only 56% of colleagues who identify as bisexual agreeing. We have actions in place to address this, including rolling out Safe Zone LGBT+ Awareness training for all staff, disseminating new ‘How to be a Trans Ally’ and ‘How to be an LGBT+ Ally’ guides and continuing to offer the Introduction to Trans Awareness e-module via Moodle. Our LGBT+ staff network now has a Bi and a Trans rep in place, and we have also offered Active Bystander training sessions to managers at the College.

Further key issues we are focusing on include: developing robust reporting process for bullying and harassment; engaging in initiatives which are representative of the diversity of the LGBT+ community; and profiling role models from the LGBT+ community at Royal Holloway.

LGBT+ Staff Network

Staff at Royal Holloway operate an LGBT+ Staff network. You can find out more about the network here. Alternatively, you can email the LGBT+ Staff Network.

Policies and guidance

Royal Holloway has developed a Dignity at Work: Anti-Bullying & Harassment Policy, which aims to explain the College Grievance Policy & Procedure and to support and empower staff to make appropriate complaints against bullying, harassment, victimisation and discrimination in the workplace. We are also developing a Transitioning at Work Policy. College policies can be found here.
Coming Out @ Work Guide – a step-by-step, evidence-based introduction to the coming out process in the workplace. This was prepared, for staff, by our LGBT Staff Network.
We have a Transgender Equality and Transitioning at Work Guidance (for staff) and will offer trans awareness workshops to staff to complement the documentation and guidance we have developed.
We have produced 'How to be a trans ally' and 'How to be an LGBT+ ally' good practice guides which can be found here.

Trans Awareness

Trans is an umbrella term used to describe people whose gender identity does not correlate (in part or in whole) to the gender they were assigned at birth. There are many different gender identities that fall under the trans umbrella, including transgender, non-binary, agender, genderfluid and genderqueer. This list is not exhaustive; gender is a spectrum which includes man and woman, but lots of other variants and intersections in between and separate from these labels. Gender is distinct from sexuality, so a person can be heterosexual and trans.

Royal Holloway is currently developing a suite of actions to promote awareness of trans issues and provide support for trans colleagues and students. Support includes: