Thomson Reuters has been celebrating pride month for 21 years

Head of diversity reveals how their Asian employees getting involved

BY Jodi Walters 30 Jun 2022

As pride month draws to a close in America, HRD talks to Pragashini Fox head of talent and diversity at leading business information services company, Thomson Reuters (TR) about how they celebrate pride month.

TR has been officially observing Pride Month for 21 years, Fox says proudly as she explains the Pride at Work Business Resource Group and its vision to drive greater inclusion, belonging and equity by bringing together all of Thomson Reuters LGBTQIA plus employees and allies.

Fox is a member of TR leadership team and is responsible for the organisation’s overall talent strategy, including areas of how to attract, develop, and retain the best talent while building diverse teams and an inclusive environment.

Over two decades, TR pride celebrations have grown significantly, the organisation now celebrates Pride Month across 15 countries. Last year they held over twenty virtual events that brought together employees and customers alike.

A selection of Pride initiatives TR has installed

Pride Quest – an internal online challenge called Pride Quest that introduced TRs workforce to key blogs and content written by their Pride at Work members.
Count Me in for Pride – a global social media campaign with a weekly theme the workforce could use to create social share cards which even garnered participation from the CEO and other senior leaders across the organisation.
Created a hashtag - #BeYouatTR – which TR uses for new hires. The company makes sure to feature their LGBTQIA plus employees in the employer branding campaign behind the hashtag.
Focused employer branding that features the companies LGBTQIA employee stories, identities and perspectives.
Roundtable discussions led by LGBTQIA+ allies on topics like allyship and resiliency which bring together small groups to have intimate conversation and open dialogue.
Learning sessions with guest speakers with a special focus on intersectional topics such as LGBTQIA identity.
TR has included the option to have your pronouns incorporated into standard email signature and employee profiles and actively encourage people to do so.

This year’s theme is #comingoutatTR, a platform for their global employee population to share stories and examples of how TR is actively showing up as a visible ally.

Fox says the participation and feedback from staff has been really great. “We have great engagement from our employees across the Pride Month events and activations, both from our employee population and from our leaders. This not only provided an opportunity to learn, to celebrate and embrace our colleagues who are being their authentic selves, but it was also important that we were honouring the courage of others who are reflecting and sharing as well,” said Fox.

Robert Head from TR Hong Kong shared alongside the hashtag #ComingOutAtTR through his LinkedIn page, “Coming out is a deeply personal, often extremely stressful experience. What a lot of people don’t realise is that many LGBT+ people have to ‘come out’ in some form, or actively try to avoid it by ‘covering’ several times a day. What can you do to make it easier? Thank you, Thomson Reuters, for making it much easier to just be me.

Satavisa Chaudhuri a project manager at TR in India shared alongside the hashtag #ComingOutAsAnAlly – As an ally, I strive my best to advocate inclusion at workplace and in the society. I am happy and blessed that Thomson Reuters has given me th opportunity to work in this field and make a difference. After all, this beautiful world belongs to everyone- EQUALLY!