Valuing and empowering our LGBTI+ colleagues

PwC Brazil’s Out and Shine programme encourages our LGBTI+ professionals to bring their whole selves authentically to work. How? By helping them feel valued and comfortable being who they truly are – and thereby empowering them to reach their full potential.

Out and Shine Programme

Across the world, PwC is committed to fostering a workplace where lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and broader members of the rainbow community (LGBTI+) can be themselves and shine. PwC Brazil’s Out and Shine programme is just one of the ways we are seeing our network firms across the world turn our commitment to LGBT+ inclusion into reality, enabling our LGBTI+ talent to feel the full support of their PwC family.

Out and Shine arose in response to the need to close the gap in LGBTI+ representation in leadership positions, a widely-recognised challenge in Brazilian society. The results of a significant self-disclosure campaign driven by the Brazilian Inclusion & Diversity team during 2023 showed an increase of more than 20% of their people disclosing their gender identity and sexual orientation. It also revealed that LGBTI+ talents were predominantly represented at more junior levels, such as Associate and Senior Associate – underlining the need to provide more support to help this community thrive and fulfil their career potential.

That’s why PwC Brazil created Out and Shine – an innovative and immersive programme designed to help develop the careers of our LGBTI+ staff by encouraging them to be authentic in the workplace.

The programme includes four key elements:

1. A focus on tailored soft and hard skills learning paths to help participants build the social-emotional and technical skills they need to thrive. The soft skills learning path focuses on elements such as building authenticity, resilience and assertiveness by learning more about LGBTI+ rights and social-historical context. Meanwhile, the hard skills learning path covers topics such as data, AI and blockchain, decision-making and developing a financial mindset. The workshops are hosted by renowned external market specialists who share their extensive insights.
2. Networking with role models with lived experience. The programme provides connections between its participants and three external LGBTI+ executives. Also, to further raise visibility and role model the experiences of this community the external specialists hired to deliver the soft learning path are all LGBTI+ professionals with lived experience.
3. Mentoring with PwC partners. A group of 40 PwC partners were carefully selected to support the programme by providing mentoring for the LGBTI+ professionals. Each mentor shared their professional skills and experiences to encourage the mentees to embrace their identity and be protagonists for their own career development, while also enhancing and diversifying the participants’ exposure to senior leaders.
4. Individual Career Development Plan (ICDP). ICDPs were co-created by each participant in collaboration with a career specialist to bring a future-orientated focus to the programme, and support participants in identifying and realising their career goals. Each participant took part in three meetings with the career specialist, consisting of two one-on-one, and one in a group setting. The purpose of the ICDP is to complement and guide the mentoring with PwC partners.

It wasn’t just the Out and Shine programme participants who were on a learning journey. The selected mentor partners – along with the participants’ team leaders and career coaches – also undertake specific learning paths to raise their own awareness and increase their sense of accountability for promoting a psychologically safe working environment with equitable opportunities for the LGBTI+ community.

Once the programme was underway, it was clear that the effects of the mentoring sessions and the development of the personalised ICDPs were especially powerful components. The pairing of each participant with one partner as a mentor from the start of the programme proved hugely energising and provided reverse learning experiences that were valuable for both parties. And the creation of the ICDP provided each participant a clearer view of their own path forward to achieve their career goals while remaining true to themselves. Overall, the four key elements proved successful both in supporting the programme participants today, but also – more importantly – in empowering them for the future.

The results

The PwC Brazil Out and Shine programme for 2024 closed with an inspiring and highly interactive group event featuring a renowned author and activist for LGBTI+ inclusion. Following completion of the programme, participants’ career progression is monitored in terms of both evolution and promotion. And their experiences, perceptions and suggestions are being used to shape improvements and innovations to make the next Out and Shine programme even better and more impactful.

Key numbers from Out and Shine 2024 include:

• Strong intersectionality in the selection of the 40 LGBTI+ participants:
  • 55% are women
  • 45% are Black
  • 10% have a disability
  • 5% are transgender
• 13 workshops with 20 hours of training for the 40 participants
• 5 workshops with 10 hours of training for the 40 partner mentors
• 1 workshop with 2 hours of training for the 52 career coaches and team leaders
• 130 hours of mentoring between LGBTI+ participants and partner mentors
• 80 hours of check-ins with the career specialist for the creation of the ICDP

…And the most telling statistic of all? Of the 40 Out and Shine participants in 2024, 52% have achieved further career progression within months of graduating from the programme!

Participant and mentor testimonials

"It was great to be able to ... hear stories from people I can relate to, because they are similar to me and have gone through similar challenges to me. Mentoring was important to understanding the firm’s leadership’s openness to accepting diversity.”
Out and Shine participant

“I think the biggest impact is seeing real cases of LGBTI+ people who are in the market and are successful, as it brings that feeling of 'I can do it too”
Out and Shine participant

“In addition to the better understanding of my personality characteristics that I gained through the tests and mentoring initiatives, the possibility of meeting executives and prominent people in the community was excellent for inspiring me in both my professional and personal relationships.”
Out and Shine participant

“It opened my mind to understand my role within leadership ... I matured in my vision of the impact of life, which impacts work. Even though I was already an ally, I learned a lot.”
Out and Shine partner mentor