Linda W. Ross

Gender effects on customer satisfaction with employment services

This study examined gender differences of the customer expectations and satisfaction of job seekers with employment and training services by a state government in the USA. A customer satisfaction survey was administered yielding 1,393 responses from individuals who applied for employment and training services from the New Jersey Employment Service. It was found that women generally have higher expectations regarding the importance of service delivery issues than their male counterparts. However, no differences were found between men and women reporting their actual satisfaction of the service received. This research created a baseline and further research is necessary to delve into reasons for the differences.

Hostile territory: employers’ unwillingness to accommodate transgender employees

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to enhance the understanding of employers’ responses to the restroom requests of transgender employees, and to assess the ability as educators to reduce transphobia in the students. Design/methodology/approach – Subjects were 194 undergraduate business students at a medium-sized public university in the northeastern USA who were enrolled in an undergraduate course in organizational behavior. During class, they read a brief case which asked the students to play the role of a CEO in Little Rock, Arkansas, receiving a complaint from a female employee about using the same restroom as a coworker who is transitioning from male to female. Findings – The most inclusive response was also the rarest, with only 27 percent of students recommending unisex bathrooms. Hostile actions, forcing the transitioning employee to use the mens restroom, were recommended by 38 percent of those who correctly realized that an employee would be unprotected by sexual orientation discrimination ...

Transforming Attitudes about Transgender Employee Rights.

Transgender employees may suffer from discrimination due to transphobia. This article evaluates a pedagogical intervention designed to reduce the transphobia of North American undergraduate business students. Participants were enrolled in an organizational behavior course. They resolved a simulated dispute between coworkers over accommodating the bathroom choices of a transgender employee. Answers were classified as demonstrating inclusion, compliance, or hostility with the inclusive response being the establishment of gender-neutral restrooms and the hostile response being refusal to accept the transgender employee’s bathroom choice. In the first year, 194 students completed the exercise with no advance preparation, while in the second year, 221 students performed the same task after reading a brief article about transgender employees. Results suggest that the intervention was effective as the inclusive response was most popular in the second year even though it had been least popular in the first year. Complete success was not attained, as one sixth of the students in the second year chose hostile responses. Implications for research, teaching, and practice are discussed.