- I can only speak for myself, but for me, being non-binary means that dividing people into male and female simply does not make sense. I do not see myself in either of the two. They are categories I do not understand. Why, for instance, does a haircut have to be male or female? Can't it just be a haircut?" says Nicola, who goes by Niki, when asked what being non-binary means to them.
For Niki, who is in their late thirties, the realization that they are indeed non-binary came fairly recently.
- Although I have never suffered from gender dysphoria or anything like that, I had felt uncomfortable with the label of woman for quite a while. Then there came a point where I started to realize that this had something to do with my identity and the core of who I am.
Coming out at work: Finding support and understanding
After finding their true gender identity, Niki started to come out to the people in their life, including at work. They initially told one person at a time but found that at work this was not the best approach.
- I got tired of having what was essentially the same conversation many times. Therefore, I reached out to my people manager, Cornelia Samec, and asked for help to come out to the entire office.
- When Niki first told me, I of course wanted to help them, but I also felt that I needed to understand more. Thankfully, Niki provided me with some resources I could use to educate myself," says Cornelia.
Together, they came up with a plan to inform all of Tieto Austria about Niki’s gender identity.
- I informed HR and the national management team. I told them about Niki and that we, among other things, wanted to do a Q&A session where anyone who wanted could ask questions.
The actual coming out was done in a Teams message to all employees, explains Niki.
- Saying that I was nervous when I pressed send on that message would be an understatement."
Why visibility matters for non‑binary employees
Some might think that coming out to everybody the way Niki decided to do is a bit much, but for them, being visible as a non-binary person was very important.
- It was important for me that everybody knew because it was becoming an increasingly bigger part of my identity. Also, when people don’t know that you are non-binary, they invariably use the wrong pronouns or address you as the gender you present as.
Niki uses the following analogy to explain why this matters to them:
- If someone addresses me as 'Ms.' or uses the wrong pronoun, it is like a paper cut. It hurts a little bit, but it is not a big deal. Now, imagine if this happens fifty times a day every day of the week. That is a lot of paper cuts, and taken together, it hurts a lot.
Positive reactions that reinforced inclusion
For Niki, coming out at work has been an unambiguously positive experience.
- I must say that it went surprisingly smoothly. I only received positive comments, and everybody that I talked to was very supportive.
Niki explains that they chose to work at Tieto partly because of the company’s commitment to diversity.
- For me, the way that my coming out was handled in the office goes hand-in-hand with the values we say we want in our company, and that was quite nice to experience.
As part of its continuous work to become even more inclusive, Tieto updated its official gender-balance target earlier this year to 49/49. The update was an effort to recognize the global presence of non-binary and other gender identities. For Niki, this was quite significant.
- As you can hear, I tear up when I talk about it. For a company like ours, it is basically mandatory to have some kind of gender target for women, but we non-binary people almost always remain invisible. The new gender target really made me feel seen, and it meant so much to me.
