"Employment Equity: The CNSC is committed to building a skilled and diverse workforce reflective of Canadian society. As a result, it promotes employment equity and encourages candidates to voluntarily indicate on their application if they are members of a designated group (i.e. a woman, an Aboriginal person, a person with a disability or a visible minority). Preference may be given to candidates who are members of a designated group to address identified underrepresentation, if applicable." This is from a job application I am thinking of applying to; does this mean I should specify that I am gay in my cover letter? Or would that be inappropriate in this situation? Thanks in advance! :icon_bigg mike6557
Hi there! Under which 'designated group' would you group yourself under? If it would say "and/or sexual orientation" then I would say include it in your cover letter and make sure to elaborate as to how it could increase the company's diversity.
It's tough to say, but I would probably include it in the cover letter since they did ask you to indicate if you are part of a minority group. No, it doesn't specify that they are asking about sexual orientation, but ie means for example, not that they only want those specific examples.
Thanks for your responses I was asking because I don't consider myself to belong to any other minorities, and it did say visible (I don't know whether being LGBT is considered visible). I think I will then! Thanks again!
FYI: In the Canadian context LGBT isn't considered a visible minority. The term 'visible minority' refers to people with cultural backgrounds, other than the majority. If you can't group yourself in any of the 'categories' listed, I wouldn't include your sexual orientation in your cover letter then. Mentioning your sexual orientation on your cover letter, you are actually making yourself vulnerable to hidden discrimination. As a rule of thumb you never ever want to give any piece of information about yourself that someone can use to discriminate against you, while reviewing your application. It is a whole different matter, if they explicitly list 'sexual orientation' under that same list or separately. You can list your sexual orientation or mention it, if you feel that is appropriate. If you are not sure, don't mention it.
Might not help (as per what Mirko said) but sexual orientation is covered in Section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. (Wikipedia Link) Though discrimination could be hard to prove.