Trapped in cisnormative and binarist gendered constraints at work? How HR managers react to and manage gender transitions over time

Abstract

This article examines the ways transitioning employees perceive employing organizations’ readiness and willingness to deal with gender transitions and identifies barriers to those employees being able to express their gender in the workplace in their preferred manner. We draw on interviews with 25 transitioning trans persons who, over a period of two years, were interviewed on four occasions and asked about the ways in which their gender transition was handled at work. It appears that societal cisnormative and binarist gender regimes are pervasive in HR practices, restricting the support for, and acceptance of, trans and non-binary employees’ gender transitions in the workplace in several ways. Besides confirming the perceived lack of organizational knowledge about transgender issues in general, and gender transitions more specifically, the interviews reveal that in order to become intelligible for HR managers and colleagues, employee transgender status has to be both visible, and unambiguously attributable to either a male or female gender expression. Everything in-between, gender-non-conforming, non-binary, non-gendered, or mutable seems to be met with confusion and receives less acceptance and support. Furthermore, the results show the temporal and declining nature of support and understanding during a gender transition. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed.