“It’s all about celebrating diversity and inclusion"
We caught up with Megan Bingham, new co-chair for the LGBTQ+ network at Whipps Cross, about this new appointment, the difference she wants to make in this role and some of the things the network has been up to recently.
Hi Megan, how do you feel about your new role in the LGBTQ+ network?
I’ve been really wanting to get involved in other activities across the Trust’s wider networks and I’ve been wanting to do this for a while.
The LGBTQ+ network is so important to me and although I’m already part of the network , I wanted to be a representative for staff, patients and our local community.
It felt right and I’m really excited to be a part of it and very excited to represent our network and hopefully will make some good and positive changes.
What difference do you want to make with this new role or what would you like to achieve?
The main thing for me is celebrating diversity and inclusivity. The Trust has the WeBelong strategy that we’re trying to uphold as much as possible and also inclusivity across the trust, not only the LGBTQ+ community but also across other networks.
We are trying to bring everybody together and that’s something that I think no matter what network you belong to, that’s what we want to achieve as a trust, we want people to come to their workplace and feel that they belong here, that they are included and that there’s a space for everybody.
I think what/how this role can contribute is about cultural intelligence and bringing it back to the workplace leading by example and communicating to the rest of the hospital and the trust what we’ve been doing, what we can do and what we want to do and hopefully we can start some kind of ripple effect.
Another thing that I want to achieve is that people see me as very approachable, and that’s both for the LGBTQ+ community and allies, so for example anyone that just want to learn more or want to get to know who we are and what we can do for our people, is more than welcome to get in touch.
What are some of the things that the LGBTQ+ network has been working on recently?
There’s been some positives changes over the past few years and we want to keep these things happening and one of the things we want to keep working on is people feeling confident to identify themselves as an LGBTQ+ person and what we are working on with that by encouraging the use of pronouns, and helping people feel confident to wear them on their name badges or to identify themselves in staff surveys or ESR records.
We want to be able to create an open space where people can come to us with something that is troubling them or something that is going well or of they feel they need to express themselves and that’s something we are working towards.
We recently received a Silver Award from Stonewall who have scored us in the top 200 organisations according to the Workplace Equality Index and this year we plan on continuing that work to embed an inclusive and diverse place to work here at Whipps Cross and across the Trust.
How would you encourage other to join the network?
The LGBTQ+ network is for people within this community to this spectrum but it’s open to anybody, it’s open to allies, to people who want to learn more.
We want to encourage people to feel confident about who they are, to be themselves.
It’s all about celebrating diversity and we want to celebrate everybody who is different, everybody who can feel they belong here and have that space for people to feel that way.