By Anam Raheel
LA&PS Professors received more than $2 million in 2020 Insight Grants from SSHRC. Keep reading the #LAPSInsightOut series to learn more about the amazing research happening in our Faculty.
Liberal Arts & Professional Studies Professor Jing Wang has been awarded an Insight Grant of $53,234 by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). An associate professor with the School of Human Resource Management, Wang will examine the existing data relating to LGBT persons in the workplace. She will investigate issues such as social support, interaction, job commitment, job satisfaction, and work-life balance as experienced by this community in her project titled “LGBT Employees’ Work Experiences in Canada: A Comparison with Heterosexual Counterparts.”
The aim is to provide interdisciplinary evidence on the impact of social support on LGBT employees’ experiences in Canadian workplaces. Using data collected from Statistic Canada’s “General Social Survey,” Wang will look at management practices, workplace experience and social support, and the impact of sexual orientation on employee workplace outcomes.
The proposed research strives to answer questions such as whether the household responsibilities of sexual minorities differ from heterosexual people. The study will also adopt social support theory to explore how coworker and manager support interacts with sexual orientation to impact work-life balance, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction.
The research has the potential to make substantial contributions to the academic community, as the project will contribute to knowledge within both industrial relations and human resource management. It will provide a model of social support interactions with various sexual orientations that will help alter the work and life experiences of sexual minorities.
Outside of the academic frame, the work will help business leaders optimize the attraction, retention, engagement, and analysis of performance strategies for talent. This knowledge will also lead to more focused and effective public policies, beyond anti-discrimination laws, to protect and promote sexual minorities’ rights and equity.
The broader picture here is of extreme significance. It builds on inclusive, equal opportunities for the LGBT community to provide creativity and innovation to thrive in a supportive work environment. It is also for employers to rethink their engagement programs in order to develop subsequent policies which cultivate a social support structure.