Qantas is urging its staff to use non-gendered terms when talking to their customers.
Qantas is going the way of the London Underground and is encouraging its staff to lose terms like Ladies and Gentlemen, “honey”, “guys” and “love”.
Instead of using “husband and wife” a booklet given to cabin crew and other staff at the airline have suggested that they start using words like “partner”, “spouse”. Instead of “mum and dad”, they’ll be using a simple “parents” in a bid to use non-gendered language.
People and culture group executive Lesley Grant said, “We have a long and proud history of promoting inclusion among our people, our customers and society, including support of indigenous issues, gender parity in business and marriage equality”.
The company is also warning against “manterruptions” and “mainsplaining” to stop male workers from talking over their female counterparts.
The company is drawing a line under gendered terms like “Chairman”.
The booklet explains, “Language can make groups of people invisible,”
“For example, the use of the term ‘chairman’ can reinforce the idea that leaders are always men.”
A Qantas spokeswoman told Yahoo7 News the booklet was created by the Diversity Council of Australia and was supplied to around 150 other companies.
“We want Qantas to be an inclusive workplace and we shared some factsheets created by the Diversity Council of Australia with some suggestions on more inclusive language, particularly on gender, age and LGBTI issues.”
