‘Help me be myself’—How identity-specific support promotes LGBTQ+ employees’ authenticity via basic need satisfaction

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer/questioning (LGBTQ+) individuals continue to struggle to be their true selves at work. Therefore, effective workplace support is required to enable LGBTQ+ employees to feel authentic—both for their own good and to unlock their full potential for organizations. While research has amply demonstrated the benefits of general workplace support, we lack an understanding of identity-specific support (e.g. related to ‘coming out’). To advance social support theory with an identity lens, we examine the associations of LGBTQ+ support from supervisors, colleagues, and LGBTQ+ employee resource group (ERG) members as well as LGBTQ+-supportive organizational practices with authenticity. Additionally, we investigate basic need satisfaction as a mechanism proposed by self-determination theory. Based on 952 responses from 47 countries, we find that LGBTQ+ support from colleagues and supervisors is more strongly associated with authenticity than organizational practices and support from ERG members. Further, basic need satisfaction mediates these relationships. We extend social support theory toward identity specificity by tailoring social support to LGBTQ+ employees and delineating how strongly such support from identity-specific and -agnostic support sources is associated with authenticity. Our findings are a call to action for human resource management to encourage LGBTQ+ support across the workforce.