Human resources - gay master of business administration degree students - Brief Article

Gay MBA students are changing the face of their schools and the future of the workplace

For five years Jason Stone worked for a chemical company in Alabama. Since neither the firm nor the state offered nondiscrimination protections, Stone kept his sexual orientation under wraps in the workplace. So when he came to Harvard Business School, he took a vow. "I decided to be totally out," says Stone, who will graduate with his MBA degree this spring. Now he even makes his sexual orientation clear on his resume, alerting potential employers as to exactly whom they would be getting.

Stone's openness is not an anomaly. More and more business students are open about being gay, in the process changing the once closeted atmosphere of business schools. In a sign of just how far business schools have come, gay student groups at 13 major business schools came together March 26-27 for the first Gay and Lesbian Business Conference, held at Harvard Business School.

"It's amazing what happened when we threw this idea out there about holding a conference," says Stone, an organizer for the gathering. "We saw how students were so ready to latch onto this idea because it provided them a forum to meet with many other business school students with similar passions, interests, and ideas."

The conference, titled "From the Closet to the Boardroom," was booked up in advance, with more than 150 registrants. Among its featured speakers were Julie Palen, founder of InterNoded Inc., a software firm catering to business needs, and Walter Schubert, founder of the Gay Financial Network, which offers financial advice and services tailored to gay men and lesbians.

But the fact that gay students from major business schools are getting together for the first time is perhaps as important as the conference's program. Business relies heavily on personal relationships people carry throughout their careers, and the event offers students the chance to make contact with other future business leaders.

"Probably the most important goal of the conference is to bring [people] together," says James Robertson, a student at the Yale School of Management and co-organizer of the conference. "The groups of gay and lesbian students at the schools are relatively small, but the network for gay and lesbian people can be very powerful. It can reach into many different corners of society. This is a way for people to get to know each other before they head out into the professional world. When they are in the professional world, those connections that they develop at school and the conference are most useful."

Robertson says the conference is particularly important since MBA programs have not always been the easiest places to be openly gay. "Business schools are relatively difficult places for gay and lesbian people," says Robertson, who worked at the Names Project Foundation, which sponsors the AIDS Memorial Quilt, before entering Yale. "There's still a lot of hesitancy for people about being openly gay." Like Stone, Robertson says he has never had problems being openly gay in his program: "I've found Yale to be a very supportive place."

Indeed, some gay business school alumni say their experience was enjoyable. "I never experienced any issue with being gay," says Elliot Matz, who graduated from Harvard Business School in 1981. "I'm sure there was a lot of homophobia that didn't get expressed, but I had a great time in business school."

Yet, for a variety of reasons, even now not everyone is as comfortable about being out. "We still have plenty of students at all the different schools who are not out," Stone says. In fact, Robertson says he tried to contact gay student representatives from the top 25 business schools listed in Business Week, only to meet with silence from many of them. "Interestingly, we couldn't get any of the schools in the South to be involved, which disappointed me," he says. "I can't necessarily say that it's because they don't have [gay] groups or don't care about these issues or that people are very closeted. But there's sort of an implication that it's very difficult to be openly gay."

Robertson says he understands the pressure to stay in the closet, even at a school as comfortable for gay students as Yale. "Even at places that are very supportive, even at Yale, I can sympathize with classmates who remain in the closet," he says. "Even at a place that's supportive, it can be difficult to find the strength and will to come out."

Perhaps the greatest concern is that being openly gay will narrow employment options. "One of the fears for those students is that if they do come out, a lot of job opportunities will disappear," Stone says. Indeed, he believes that by being open on his resume, he may well be weeding out potential employers uncomfortable with his gayness. Still, because the conference was sponsored by such major firms as McKinsey and Co. and Booz-Allen and Hamilton, the organizers hope to allay such concerns. As Robertson points out, "These are some of the best business firms, and they do a lot of outreach to business schools."

Stone says companies increasingly realize that they ignore gay MBA students at their own peril. "It's our hope to show companies that we're a pretty impressive, diverse, smart, rich group, and if they choose to ignore us, they are losing out on some pretty formidable talent."

Both Stone and Robertson are confident that the conference will continue to grow with time. The only question they get from other students and alumni is why the event didn't happen sooner. "God, I wish it had happened before," Robertson says. "I wish it was an institution that existed already." Now it does.

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