GORDON LIGHTFOOT | Culture
HE MEANS BUSINESS
Wellington-based senior comms advisor Gareth Bowman is showing his Ministry of Health colleagues exactly what he’s made of this week.
The 29 year old will be hoping senior managers were watching, as he debuted his hyper-professional new “he/him pronouns” in his email signature this Monday morning.
“I send a comms update around to all the managers every second Monday of the month, so they definitely would have seen it,” Bowman said confidently.
“I went with ‘he/him’ because when people are talking about me while I’m not present, they would say ‘he’ or ‘him’,” he explained.
“It’s just an easy way to let my colleagues know I’m a good person. Let them know I’m safe.”
Bowman simultaneously updated his LinkedIn profile with the same thing, and is naturally expecting lucrative job offers to come flooding in from recruiters.
“I think this could be the thing that’s been holding me back professionally the last couple of years, so I’m really pleased I’ve made this change,” said the man who is regularly difficult to get hold of during his “work from home” days.
“Look, adding your pronouns to your email signature isn’t for everyone. Not everyone is as brave as I am, and that’s fine, we’re all at different points on our journeys” he said reassuringly.
“But it is important that people getting emails from me know that I get it, okay? I’m on the right side of history.”
More to come.
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