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The gesture — imperceptible to some — took a minute. Yet this slight but nerve-racking act was hugely symbolic.
For Martin Root put a photograph of his new partner, David, on his desk at work last year. It replaced the picture he had kept for many years of his ex-wife. With that sleight of hand he disclosed his sexuality to his colleagues.
“It was a way of coming out [as gay] to a wider audience. It felt like a test to see who would notice and who would comment,” Mr Root says.
The 44-year-old father of two has been surprised by its significance. “Here is a picture that shows I am an openly gay man. By not having a picture it felt like I was denying a real part of myself.”
It has helped him relax at work. The photograph is “shorthand”, he says. “It means I do not have to come out at work all the time; it is a way of introducing my sexuality without doing it again and again.”
A picture of your wife, boyfriend, toddler, dog or yourself skiing down the black runs may seem inconsequential or even perhaps cringeworthy.
Yet the display of such personal mementoes in the office can speak volumes about our jobs, changes in the workplace and shifting social attitudes. Mr Root may not have felt comfortable putting a picture of his male partner on display a generation ago. Of course, many still do not: buttoned-up offices can demand buttoned-up workers.
The significance of office minutiae was well described in Joshua Ferris’s novel Then We Came to the End: “The photos of our loved ones taped to our computer monitors for uplift and support turned to cloying reminders of time served.”
Such things matter. One person’s clutter is another’s attempt to infuse the anonymity and even sterility of the workplace with colour and character. They also mark the employee’s territory. There are numerous accounts of workers rebelling against hot desks, which themselves cycle in and out of fashion, by setting out their stall with photographs of their children at a preferred workstation.
Offices that try to eradicate personal effects have been shown to be highly demotivating for employees. A study in the 1990s of three large British organisations that tried to banish office personalisation had the effect of making employees apathetic and diminished productivity.
By contrast, according to Kimberly Elsbach, professor of organisational behaviour at UC Davis Graduate School of Management, teams that can display “personal artefacts, equipment, furniture and decor” form successful work groups that are productive, content and able to work together.
Personalisation helps people overcome feeling like just another office drone. Something as simple as being able to put out a picture on a desk, or personalising a computer desktop with a snap of their baby, can also help employees feel they have some kind of control over their workplace as well as a personal stake. Photos can be conversational icebreakers. Identifying a fellow parent might help establish commonalities and build relationships, for example. Although pictures of children could conversely repel a colleague with no interest in the little darlings.
What we choose to conceal may also be revealing. The last thing a female banker might want to show is a picture of her offspring, preferring to cover her maternal identity so as not to detract from her professional one. A report by WFD Consulting, which specialises in work-life balance, uncovered bias against those with caring responsibilities.
Despite espousing family-friendly values, more than 40 per cent of business leaders stated that the best workers “are those without a lot of personal commitments”. Women were treated more harshly than men. Employers are generally seen as rewarding fathers more than mothers, something academics describe as the “motherhood penalty” versus the “fatherhood bonus”.
Nonetheless, women tend to personalise their workplaces more than men, according to Meredith Wells-Lepley, director of research at the Institute for Workplace Innovation, at the University of Kentucky.
Men often put out pictures and objects relating to their sports and personal accomplishments, such as certificates and trophies. She also finds that women personalise to express their identity and to improve the aesthetics of the office, whereas men are more likely to use photographs to demonstrate their status.
Elizabeth Briody, a business anthropologist, recalls one supervisor at a US manufacturing plant, who kept a large framed photo on his desk of his wife and himself dressed in evening gown and black tie. “The impact for his employees was that it distanced him from them. All emphasis was on his status and wealth.”
Martin Kilduff, professor of organisational behaviour at UCL school of management, notes that as you work your way up the corporate ladder you gain more leeway over how much you reveal of your personality.
“You get the impression that people lower down are functionaries — actually, they have as much personality as those higher up but they don’t feel able to show it.” Perversely, of course, the more senior you are, the greater the chances that you are out of the office, at meetings and travelling.
A recent paper in the Academy of Management Journal found employees were more likely to put a photo out when they felt comfortable in an organisation. Yet there was also a difference, the study showed, between a photograph for personal enjoyment and one that was intended to communicate something about your identity to colleagues, as Dr Briody’s story demonstrates.
However, what people choose to show — to themselves or others — also depends on how they see work fitting into their life. Some people prefer to keep the personal entirely separate from the private. One participant told the Academy of Management Journal researchers that he used to have a “very homey office [pictures of his wife and kids] and I never spent any time at home”. Later he decided to separate the two worlds, removing photographs. This, he said, helped change his mindset. “When I’m at work I want to feel like I’m at work . . . So if I’m thinking about my wife or my kids I need to either pick up the phone or go home. I don’t want to have anything that is going to make me feel better, because it’s fake.”
Others prefer to integrate the two worlds. For Mr Root, putting a photograph of his partner on display in the office has been transformative. It has helped boost his confidence. So much so that he has started an LGBT network for his workplace. “I am so glad I made this small step,” he says.
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