What Allyship Means to Me
By Steven Connell, National Sales Manager at Enterprise
Throughout my career at Enterprise Rent-A-Car, I've always aimed to be involved in as many things as possible. Whether it’s community events or getting involved with the various partnerships that we as a company are proud to be a part of.
When I moved to Kent from Northern Ireland in 2017, I had heard that the London and Brighton Pride events were something I should try to get involved with as they are great days out, so I got involved with our Brighton Pride event and it was an absolute blast. I also brought along my fiancée too and I think she loved it just as much!
A recent promotion led me to our head office in Egham and I was keen to get involved with one of our various diversity-related employee resource groups that we have. Having met great people at the Pride events, I decided to join our EnterPride committee and I have been a proud member for 18 months now.
So, being an ally. I think first of all, as a white, heterosexual, able-bodied, male, I needed to understand the many privileges I have in my life. Small things such as not feeling nervous walking home alone at night, not feeling awkward about holding the hands of my fiancée walking down a busy street or being called derogatory names because of the color of my skin. Once you are aware of that, then you’re onto something.
The next stage is to understand your blind spots. By that I mean, ultimately, is to educate yourself. I think for a long time in my life I was blissfully ignorant to a lot of things because arguably it didn't affect me personally. A great example from my life is that I come from a part of the United Kingdom where for decades a section of the Northern Ireland society was treated as second-class citizens simply because they believed in a different form of Christianity.
Once you educate yourself on what challenges underrepresented and marginalized sections of society are facing then you have to listen as well. Listen to their stories and understand what it’s like to experience microaggressions to more extremes such as verbal and physical abuse.
Finally, it's being visible in your support and how your actions will be more impactful than words. It’s easy to show performative allyship i.e. wearing your rainbow pin or agreeing that more people of color should be in your management team. But there’s more that you can do. If you have a mentoring scheme in your workplace, then are you pro-actively asking to have an LGBTQ+ employee or an employee with a disability to be your mentee? Use your own privileges to make a positive change
And you know what, if that all sounds like hard work then keep it simple: Be Nice to People 😊
