Out in the Open

Jeremy Kraut-Ordover believes wholeheartedly in the mission of Phoenix Children’s Hospital, where he works soliciting wealthy donors to make big gifts. At 29, he has risen to that role at the hospital’s fund-raising foundation from jobs at universities in Maryland and California.

And at no point, he says, has his nonprofit career progress slowed because he is openly gay.

“On a day-to-day basis, it’s a nonissue for me,” he says. “If anything, it helps open doors.”

Because he is matter-of-fact and candid when asked about his personal life, he says, the donors he meets don’t feel like he is hiding anything — and that helps make them more comfortable in giving him their money.

“Donors want you to be stewards of their philanthropy, and they’re entrusting you,” he says, adding that he “was traveling with donors recently and they said they trusted me because they knew that everything that comes out of my mouth is authentic.”

‘A War for Talent’

Changes in society and the spread of broader legal protections in this country for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people have enabled more gays to be open about their sexual identity on the job — and, say social observers, young people are coming out at earlier ages than their elders did.

This out-and-proud younger generation is taking its share of jobs at charities and foundations, and a growing number of nonprofit employers are adopting policies to attract and keep more gay workers. For example, half of the nonprofit employers in The Chronicle’s forthcoming annual survey of executive compensation report that they offer domestic-partner health benefits.

Those nonprofit employers are keeping pace with the business world, where more than 50 percent of Fortune 500 companies offer their workers domestic-partnership health benefits — and nearly 90 percent include sexual orientation in their antidiscrimination policies, according to data compiled by the Human Rights Campaign, in Washington, which advocates for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people.

“There’s a war for talent out there,” says Eric Peterson, manager of diversity initiatives at the Society for Human Resource Management, an Alexandria, Va., association for personnel executives.

When baby boomers start retiring, he says, “what workplaces, nonprofit and for-profit alike, are going to find out is that for every two experienced workers that are leaving the work force, only one inexperienced worker is joining.”

To stay competitive, he adds, organizations “want to choose the best and most talented people they can, no matter what their social identity or what their background. What any good employer wants to do is be an employer of choice for just about anybody.”

But not every nonprofit employer welcomes gay men and lesbians. The nonprofit world contains a wide variety of organizations, notes Mr. Peterson. And, he says, “there are nonprofits whose mission is to make gay rights a nonreality.”

In addition to religious groups that may object to homosexuality on spiritual grounds, some organizations promote traditional or conservative values that may exclude gay men and lesbians.

Some large national charities have faced heat for their stands on issues related to gay men and lesbians. The Boy Scouts of America, in Irving, Tex., has drawn fire from donors, activists, and some corners of the nonprofit world in recent years due to its stand against including gay members in its scouting programs. In 2002, the Salvation Army’s Western division rescinded its plan to offer domestic partnership benefits, in response to criticism.

One reason why employer policies matter to gay people, say observers, is that they offer workplace protections that the law often doesn’t. Only 20 states, plus Washington, D.C., include sexual orientation in their antidiscrimination laws, and only 12 of those states, plus the District, protect transgender people in their antidiscrimination codes, according to the Human Rights Campaign.

‘Freedom Fighters’

Little information is available to show how many gay people work at nonprofit organizations, save for a 2002 study of 500 foundation employees by the Joint Affinity Groups, a coalition of grant makers, which found that nearly 22 percent of respondents identified themselves as gay men or lesbians.

Steve Gunderson, president of the Council on Foundations, in Arlington, Va., characterizes the nonprofit world’s inclusion of its gay and lesbian workers as “improving over time” but says more work needs to be done.

“Compared to other fields, I think it’s quite good,” says Mr. Gunderson, who is gay. “Business is probably the leader of the pack, in terms of diversity outreach. But I think in the nonprofit sector generally and philanthropy specifically, I’ve seen no signs of intentional barriers based on someone’s orientation.”

Other gay people who work for nonprofit organizations also say they see little discrimination. Working for a nonprofit organization, “one’s heart is as important as one’s skill,” says Lynn Bolton, 43, a lesbian who serves as individual and corporate-giving officer at the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, in Oakland, Calif. She adds, “We’re freedom fighters on some level. We’re trying to achieve equality across the board. We’re allowed to look however we are — we’re allowed to represent the communities we come from.”

Mission is paramount in any discussion about diversity, say charity leaders and employees. “Nonprofit organizations are very mission-driven, and they’re very values-driven,” says Marcia Brumit Kropf, chief operating officer of Girls Inc., a nationwide youth organization with headquarters in New York. “If you’re an organization that works around a mission that’s related to diversity and inclusion, then that’s the kind of culture you try to promote internally. It’s about walking the talk.”

Aiding Domestic Partners

Perhaps the most common way for charities to show they are welcoming of gay employees, say personnel experts and others, in addition to adopting an antidiscrimination policy that includes sexual orientation and gender identity, is to offer domestic partnership benefits. (However, in California and Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage is now legal, gay workers who marry may find themselves eligible for traditional spousal benefits.)

Thirty-six percent of human-resource managers at nonprofit organizations who responded to a survey this year by the Society for Human Resource Management reported that they offer health benefits to same-sex partners of their employees, a figure equal to the percentage of all employers who reported doing the same. About one in five respondents in a 2007 survey of benefits offered by 654 grant makers, conducted by the Council on Foundations, reported that they extend benefits to their employees’ unmarried partners.

Girls Inc. offers its employees domestic-partnership benefits — perks that the charity began providing in response to employee demand, says Ms. Kropf — and forbids “discrimination and harassment in any form” in its employee code of conduct.

“If you look at our mission, it’s ‘inspiring all girls to be strong, smart, and bold.’ And the word ‘all,’ in front of ‘girls,’ was a conscious decision,” says Ms. Kropf. Nearly half of the girls served by Girls Inc.’s 97 affiliates, she notes, live in single-parent homes; another 7 percent don’t live with either parent. As a result, she says, “We want to support families however that structure is defined. And we have that commitment to our employees as well.”

Likewise, Conservation International, an environmental group in Arlington, Va., offers domestic-partnership benefits and includes both sexual orientation and gender identity in its antidiscrimination policy. The group prides itself on spreading its message of inclusion to its 1,000 worldwide employees, no matter where they work, says Joy Gaddy, vice president for human resources.

“We know that in some countries, it’s acceptable to discriminate,” says Ms. Gaddy. The charity, she says, trains its managers to focus on employees’ work-related skills, “and not take into account other factors, even though it might be acceptable to do so in their country.”

Other groups see their mission as counter to efforts to accommodate gay men or lesbians. The Boy Scouts of America, in addition to excluding gay members from its scouting program, does not offer domestic-partnership benefits.

“Based on the BSA’s values, we believe it would be inconsistent to offer domestic-partner health benefits to employees,” writes Deron Smith, the charity’s national spokesman, in an e-mail message to The Chronicle, in which he declined an interview.

“The BSA prepares young Americans to become exceptional adults by cultivating in them a sense of community, family, ambition, and leadership so that they will make the world a better place,”Mr. Smith wrote. “Generally speaking, our employees are drawn to the organization because of that mission. As such, we do not believe the values we hold negatively impact employee recruitment and retention.”

Some charities find that their supporters play a role in making their organizations more inclusive. The Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland began offering domestic-partner benefits to its 130 employees two years ago, says Daniel Blain, a senior vice president of the group.

At the prodding of some of its gay and lesbian supporters, the federation assembled a committee of volunteers that focus on both helping the organization become more accessible to local gay men and lesbians and encouraging them to support the federation. Among its suggestions, says Mr. Blain, was that the federation begin offering domestic-partnership perks.

While some Jewish federations do not offer such benefits — and charities explicitly rooted in other faiths are unlikely to offer them — the Cleveland group sees it as part of its goal of inclusion, Mr. Blain says. “The Jewish community is extremely diverse, and our job as a federation is to connect with, engage, and serve the broadest cross section of the community that we can,” he says.

Offering benefits that include gay workers, says Mr. Blain, has had a favorable impact on recruitment and retention at the organization. He thinks more organizations will follow suit. “I certainly hope so, because nonprofit careers are extremely rewarding,” he says. “We need the most talented people, and we need to be competitive in the marketplace.”

Ideology vs. Budget

But not enough nonprofit employers are stepping up to the challenge of offering domestic-partner benefits, says Kim Diehl, 33, who left her job at the Women’s Fund of Miami-Dade County this past winter to take a position as communications director at Service Employees International Union Healthcare Florida, a union of health-care workers in Miami. At her previous job, she notes, she could not get health benefits for her female partner. The two women wound up being covered under her partner’s union benefits (the partner worked for an organization that was represented by the Teamsters).

“The Teamsters had a better policy around domestic partnerships benefits than the women’s fund,” Ms. Diehl says, incredulously. When she asked her employer about the prospect of the fund offering such benefits, she says, she received “sort of an apologetic shrug.”

She believes more charities and foundations need to offer the benefits to be fair to all their employees. “A lot of nonprofits haven’t put their ideology into their budgets,” she says.

Other gay nonprofit workers take the view of Charles Jensen, director of the nonprofit Writer’s Center, in Bethesda, Md. “We’re such a small organization,” says Mr. Jensen, “that I’m lucky I have benefits at all.”

Benefit Limits

Domestic-partnership benefits do not necessarily cost an organization significantly more than benefits paid to opposite-sex married couples, says Mr. Peterson — and, even when they are available, he says, many same-sex partners opt instead for coverage at each individual’s job.

But the very nature of charities, says Mr. Peterson, may play a role in why more gay men and lesbians who work for them don’t demand domestic-partner perks.

“When you work for a nonprofit, you go in assuming that, well, we’re a not-for-profit organization, we’re naturally going to struggle to get by,” he says. At an otherwise welcoming workplace, “where you don’t have to monitor your pronouns to talk about your weekend,” he says, a gay worker might be more inclined to accept an organization’s reasons for not offering domestic-partner benefits. But, he says, “If you’re working at a Booz Allen Hamilton or an IBM or a Citigroup, then you’re thinking, “Oh, please. You’ve got all the money in the world. You can afford domestic-partner benefits.’”

In addition to perks for domestic partners, some transgender nonprofit employees balk at the limited scope of individual health-care plans. Dee Derr-Daugherty, 31, director of programs at Older Adults Technology Services, in Brooklyn, N.Y., which helps multiple generations learn to use the Internet and other technology, is in the midst of transitioning from a female to a male identity, a process that requires psychological therapy, hormone treatments, and surgery — none of which, he says, his employer’s insurance plan will pay for. “There are insurance companies that offer that, but not at any nonprofit that I’ve heard of,” he says. As a result, he says, he may eventually need to leave the nonprofit world because his health-care needs are not covered.

Before Mr. Derr-Daugherty began his gender transition in 2007, he told his boss of nearly two years about his plans and received a supportive response. In his work, he says, he deals with about 30 organizations, including community centers, charities that serve the elderly, and government agencies. He identifies himself as transgender on an “as-needed” basis, he says, and thus far has encountered no problems. Working in the melting pot of New York, he acknowledges, has probably helped reduce the likelihood of conflict.

His charity’s elderly clients, he says, have been accepting. “The really cool thing about working with older adults is, they’ve seen it, and they’ve been there, and they know what’s important,” says Mr. Derr-Daugherty.

His assumptions, he says, about the older people he serves being judgmental or confused by his new identity have fallen away. Instead, he says, they take him at face value. “They’re like, ‘You’re looking really good,” he says. “That’s some nice facial hair you’ve got.”