Celebrating Pride Month 2024

Pride Month was a vibrant and inspiring time at Travel Chapter. The whole month was a celebration of diversity, inclusivity, and the LGBTQIA+ community. Pride flags and bunting adorned offices across the country and there was a fascinating guest talk from Keegan Hirst, Britain’s first openly gay rugby player.

While June’s Pride celebrations were both meaningful and memorable, this commitment to supporting and celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community continues year-round at Travel Chapter. As well as Pride Month itself, this blog will take a look at the ongoing work to ensure everyone feels welcomed, respected, and valued.

Guest speaker Keegan Hirst

Keegan gave a candid and moving talk on his journey from successful sportsman to working as a passionate advocate for diversity and inclusivity. He spoke about how, as a young man, he’d adopted the traditional roles of husband and father, and how he’d tried to suppress his conflicting feelings around his sexuality for years. His success within the macho world of rugby only added to this self-belief that he simply couldn’t be gay.

But this couldn’t go on, and in 2015, he came out to his family and team mates – and the world. This self-acceptance, and the respect he earned as a result of his announcement, empowered Keegan to build the life he has today, carrying out speaking engagements and online coaching, encouraging others within the community to embrace their identities proudly.

Taking Pride in our workspaces

Staff at TC headquarters in Bideford and in regional offices across the country, decorated their spaces as part of the Pride celebrations. Flags, bunting, and sweet treats helped spread the word that everyone is welcome.

Key milestones

Education and raising awareness were a key part of Pride Month at Travel Chapter. This included sharing some of the major milestones reached by the LGBTQIA+ community in the UK.

From the decriminalisation of homosexuality in England and Wales in 1967 to the UK census being updated to include questions on gender identity and sexual orientation for the first time in 2021, these steps symbolise the significant progress that has been made in equality across the UK. We hope that these are the starting blocks for a lot more important milestones to come.

Staff could also get involved with Pride Month modules within the TC Learning Hub, including a course called ‘Power and Pride’, focusing on the origins of Pride.

Personal stories

LGBTQIA+ colleagues used Pride Month to reflect on and share their personal journeys via TC’s Workvivo network. They emphasised how authenticity and acceptance are vital to mental health and wellbeing, spreading a message of support to anyone struggling with their identity.

Our journey towards inclusivity

We think that actions speak louder than words – and that's why, in the last year, we've taken several significant steps to make Travel Chapter a more inclusive place to work. Here's a look at what we've accomplished so far:

Improvements to our recruitment processes

We anonymise all candidate CVs when they apply for any role with us – and all our roles are now advertised on LGBTjobs.co.uk, the UK's biggest LGBTQIA+ job platform.  

Roll out of inclusivity training and resources on the TC Learning Hub

As mentioned above, the TC Learning Hub is a very useful resource in raising awareness and educating people regarding diversity and inclusivity. Since launching the hub earlier this year, we have been working to ensure continuous resources are available to help support our LGBTQIA+ community and allies across the company.  

Delivery of diversity and inclusion training

We have partnered with Diversity Pride to roll out comprehensive diversity and inclusion training across TC.  

LGBTQIA+ Circle

Circles are spaces within Workvivo where people can go to chat, share and access resources shared by other members. The LGBTQIA+ Circle is a confidential and welcoming space where staff can go to discuss all things LGBTQIA+ all year round.

Everyone is equal and everyone is welcome

This has given just a flavour of the work going on at TC to ensure everyone feels safe, supported and included. Recognising and celebrating Pride Month is a major part of this every year, but the work continues day in, day out.