A customer once told me she only wanted to work with “biologically female” sitters and wanted me to send her headshots of potential babysitters, so that she could assess if they “looked like biological women” to her. I remember feeling so insulted by the customer’s assumption that all women share one common appearance that’s identifiable in a photo. If you accept that logic, every woman becomes subject to someone else’s opinion about whether she “looks the part.” It reminded me that discrimination harms us all, no matter how you identify.
Discrimination rarely looks like it does in the movies, with emotional tirades, obvious statements or swastika tattoos. When it comes to discrimination, I’ve never heard a customer use slurs or yell. The tone of their request will sound reasonable. You’ll sense though, that the content of their request is wrong.
One of my favorite parts of owning a small business is that it’s mine to shape. My values, my standards, my call. I’ve always been vocal about workplace rights and, while that didn’t always work out for me as an employee, as a business owner it is my greatest asset. I’ve been faced with many moments that put my values to the test, including my decision to support transgender childcare professionals and clients.
Here are 5 things I’ve learned and developed for my business:
1. Start at the Beginning
For new clients, our registration form doesn’t ask for the name of a mom and a dad, it asks for parent/guardian. Families come together in many ways, from the number of parents involved, to the gender of guardians and their relationship to the children. I want potential new customers to see themselves reflected, rather than to start out encountering terms and definitions that don’t fit. When adding their children’s information, parents can select gender identifiers, share pronouns, tell us about their family and what matters in a childcare relationship.
For staff, our application invites nannies and sitters to share their identity and pronouns, so we can use them correctly from the first interaction, rather than placing the onus on the applicant to notify us during interview. When team members create their profiles to share with families, they choose what to include. A caregiver’s gender identity is theirs to share on their terms, not ours to publicly disclose.
We ask candidates to describe specific times they have cared for families with backgrounds, beliefs or values that differ from their own. We seek to understand how candidates define and experience difference, and hear stories of the connections they’ve made.
Visiting our website, you’ll see the Progress Pride Flag in the footer of every page:
- Rainbow stripes representing the gay and lesbian movement for equality and visibility
- White, pink, and light blue stripes representing the transgender community
- Brown and black stripes representing people of color and those lost to or living with HIV/AIDS
These small gestures signal something important: I thought of you, before you arrived.
If you’re like me and love high quality photo design on your website, you’ve had a hard time finding diverse, authentic stock photos. Cost is a consideration for small business, too. I suggest starting with free sites such as The Gender Spectrum Collection, Affect the Verb, and Pexels.
2. Have Fun in Your Community
This year, we are applying as exhibitors to Boulder PRIDE Fest. If selected, it will be our first time attending. I try new things, and I hope you will, too. Find the open doors in your community, and walk through! In Boulder, Colorado, we have the Rocky Mountain Equality Center, which offers cultural events, meetups, and education. From brunches for the LGBTQ+ community and allies, to art shows and speakers, they offer perspectives on supporting your customers and staff.
There is no substitute for engaging in real conversations with people, but your staff and your clients are not responsible for educating you or telling you what you might be doing wrong. Resources include:
- Out & Equal, an organization working exclusively on LGBTQ+ workplace equality. Out & Equal offers live zoom engagement groups, and great toolkits and training resources.
- Local LGBTQ+ resource centers, like ours at Out Boulder County, or these support organizations with Transgender Center for the Rockies, can help you foster connections and find events to attend.
3. Grow Beyond Good Intentions
Being welcoming is a great starting point and not the finish line. A staff member can be a lovely person and still accidentally misgender a client or their child, or feel at a loss for how to respond when someone says something inappropriate. That’s not a character flaw, it’s a gap in knowledge and it’s our responsibility to close it:
- During orientation, our staff receive training on our policies for inclusion and professional communication with clients and their children and, this coming year, will have additional learning opportunities on caring for gender diverse families and children.
- I write blogs, like this one, and share my experiences.
- Periodically, our newsletters include information for clients who want to foster professional working relationships with transgender or nonbinary staff, but aren’t sure where to start.
- As the leader of my business, I’ve completed education through Envision:You (now part of Denver Family Institute), including their Q is for Questioning workshop, a free series of interactive workshops (virtual and in-person) led by licensed clinicians and LGBTQ+ community members. These workshops provide adults in the lives of youth with education on LGBTQ+ identity and mental health.
Other things that have helped me to develop a more complete perspective:
- Groups like SpeakOut and Human Rights Campaign offer excellent workplace training guides and laminated visuals to post.
- This podcast list and book list are great starting points with insights from experts and individuals with lived LGBTQ+ experience.
- In the childcare industry we are lucky to have Sort Of, an HBO Max three-season series featuring nonbinary nanny, Sabi Mehboob.
- If you learn by watching, start anywhere that catches your interest, such as the Transformer documentary, Pose on Hulu/FX, or this TED talk by transgender dad, LB Hannahs.
4. Plan Ahead Rather than Reacting
We don’t wait for a staff member or client to have a discriminatory experience before we act. Our policy on inclusion and diversity is displayed on our website here, in our registration form and in our candidate application, so that everyone has the chance to understand our values in advance. My website and forms weren’t always this proactive; I have learned some hard lessons.
We ask questions during onboarding, and we consistently check in. If someone raises a concern, I take it seriously and use my professional HR background to review the matter with a step-by-step process. I’m willing to terminate a client or staff member relationship if needed, and I follow up with the person who raised the concern. You won’t be left wondering what happened to your report, or whether it mattered.
5. Know Your State’s Laws
We follow developments in Colorado’s youth gender-affirming care laws through organizations like Rocky Mountain Equality Center and Children’s Hospital Colorado. These laws can directly affect the children in our care and their parents’ plans and needs.
In our case as an in-home childcare agency, Colorado House Bill (HB) 22-1367, amended in 2022, expanded Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act (CADA) to include in-home domestic service workers, including a provision that gender may be taken into consideration in the context of childcare-related domestic services. This provision could be used to exclude transgender caregivers, and that concerns us. At the same time, it means that our caregivers work in homes where they are welcome and will not face hostility.
In Closing
We will never use a client’s preferences as an excuse to treat a transgender childcare professional as less placeable or less valuable. If we see a pattern suggesting that someone’s preferences are less about earnest beliefs and more about dismissing a category of people, that’s revenue we’re willing to walk away from.
My values, my standards, my call. Inclusion is ongoing work, and I’m glad to do it. If you’re a transgender person considering joining our team or trusting us with your family, I hope this gives you a sense of who we are. I want you to know that this is not only an open door, it’s a supportive structure.
