Your Jewish Employees and Co-Workers Aren't OK Right Now. Will You Help?

As any gay person will tell you, coming out is more of a journey than a destination. Sure, there’s a big flurry of activity during the main debutante phase. In my case, this meant frosted tips, pride rings, a soundtrack by Bronski Beat and dozens of poignant conversations. If you’ve ever wanted to cause intergenerational trauma, tell a dear friend you’re gay and hear her say:

“Oh my parents are going to be devastated. They really thought we’d get married.”

They’re still holding out hope, as I understand it.

Though we think of coming out as primarily an LGBTQ thing, it’s actually pretty common for anyone with a minority identity; especially those who are white and something else. Obviously, it’s easier to imagine when you don’t “look Jewish” (be sure to say it in your best Rashida Tlaib for full effect), but even people of color and others have to come out on the regular. You might be obviously Black or disabled, but the nuances of that (Congolese vs Cape Verdean, Paraplegic vs Parkinsons) are not obvious until you make them known. Heck, even your views on key social issues - especially when they diverge from the expected norm - might necessitate coming out at work or in social situations.?

“Yes, Nikki…we know…you’re not one of those Indians.”

DEI (Diversity Equity and Inclusion) initiatives at most companies have lumped all non-white-male identities together under one big umbrella. This thinking has always been faulty and problematic, but no more so than when it flattens everyone into this-or-that. Just as a union vs management dynamic creates immediate conflict and adversarial energy, so too does a DEI model without nuance.?

The biggest losers in this oversight are Jewish Americans, who, for our part, have also been among the biggest supporters of progressive movements like DEI. In the last 40 years, we’ve been mostly OK with being overlooked as a “protected class” in the workplace because we felt secure of our stature in American society. Our outsized contributions in the arts, sciences, startups, culture and justice were intended to foster a better, more inclusive world that benefited us and all other aspiring minorities. DEI was a logical extension of our fights in the courts and public opinion, and we believed it would help protect us as well, if needed.?

Though it’s hard to imagine, it wasn’t that long ago that Jews faced significant issues in the American workplace and culture. In the 1940s, the majority of Americans polled said Jews should not be treated like everyone else in society. The Ivy Leagues maintained quotas against Jewish enrollment until the 1960s. As late as 1993, State Farm settled a lawsuit where they had been keeping a “list of Jewish lawyers” and treating them differently in insurance claims.??

But in the DEI model, Jews are “white” and therefore an “oppressor” who don’t need or deserve the additional support/protection these programs are meant to deliver. It turns out we don’t have a seat at the table we helped build.?

You know how anxiety can make you crave a salty/sweet snack? Well we are stress eating, fam.?

Since the horrific attacks of October 7th committed by Palestinian Hamas against both Jews and Non-Jews in Israel, us Jews in America have been anxious. How could we not - as antisemitic incidents have skyrocketed over 300% in the US since then. Our synagogues, day care centers, businesses, celebrities, neighborhoods and culture are being attacked daily.?

Even as we hear pro-Hamas voices claim “anti-zionism isn’t antisemitism,” we know this distinction isn’t meaningful. The conflation of the two has existed since the dawn of time, and Jews are always the losers in any anti-zionist attack. This separation fallacy is perfectly summed up by a dear friend’s comment to me earlier this year. There was an anti-Israel protest planned through an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, scheduled for a major religious holiday. This timing would ensure maximum disruption and discomfort to the community. When I objected, he said:

“Protests aren’t made to make people comfortable.”? Distinctions, I suppose, aren’t either.?

Jewish mental health has been severely impacted by these events, and the subsequent explosion in anti-Jewish hate. 78% of us feel less safe in the US right now, 63% think our situation is getting worse here, and 46% have altered their behavior out of fear of antisemitism. Heck, even Jewish psychotherapists are being doxxed, attacked and made to disavow their beliefs in their practices.?

To summarize, your Jewish colleagues and employees are scared, stressed and hurting. If intergenerational trauma is a real thing (ask Jewish Stan Lee’s characters), we live it every day. And for folks like me, a child of immigrants, refugees and holocaust survivors, it’s triggering our PTSD in major ways. Some of us are no more than 2 generations from major pogroms, genocide, repression and displacement. In my family, it happened several times in the space of 50 years, and I heard many of the stories first hand from the survivors.

We are not OK.?

Organizations with healthy DEI practices would step up their support of Jewish colleagues right about now. More mental health resources, conversations, reassurance, displays of support and empathy would all go a long way.?

But odds are you’re not doing that in your company. DEI isn’t for us. And probably any mention of support for your Jewish employees right now will result in an immediate and vocal response that Arab-Americans need support too, that Islamophobia is a real problem, and that Jews are genocidal white people and don’t actually need the help. Or maybe, the 24% of Americans with serious antisemitic views will just use this moment to torpedo any support for Jews, cloaking their opinions in trendy anti-zionist vibes.?

Of course, immediately pivoting to (justified) support for Arab American causes is the “all lives matter” response to our pain and suffering. You know it’s wrong, but those folks are so vocal, and so angry, that the only plausible corporate response is to do nothing, or to provide the resourcing to everyone. Some workplaces, especially in Academia, still haven’t figured out what they’re doing wrong, and just kowtow to the mob. Almost all organizations I’ve seen have been deeply afraid to express any support for Jewish employees, let alone Israelis.?

So instead of coming out, asking for help, being our authentic selves, expressing what we need - many of us are back in the closet. We share our stress and fear with only trusted friends, keep things to ourselves, hide our identities and bear the productivity/outcomes burden of this situation (mostly) internally.?

And thus DEI slowly strangled itself with a noose of its own making. If companies can’t find a Diversity, Equity or Inclusion justification to provide support for - literally - the religious minority group that has been most publicly persecuted since the dawn of human history, what good is it? If misguided, racist activists can hold a company’s diversity efforts hostage to their demands (as is their style), it’s no wonder that companies and activist shareholders want nothing to do with DEI. It’s clearly not worth the Powerpoint it's projected on. And reasonable people - Jews and non-Jews alike - are right to withdraw their support.?

There are many possibilities for making true diversity work in organizations, even if DEI as currently conceived is dead. Friend Forward companies have more strong, personal connections between individuals and better resilience to deal with difficult, challenging, and threatening situations. If your organization was Friend Forward, you’d probably already know what your Jewish teammates were feeling, and you’d be more likely to have both programmatic and grass roots efforts deployed to help them. Even if your company didn’t want to take “a position” on an anodyne thing like “Jews should live free from fear of persecution in America,” your culture would bring forward enough true moral support to make that an obvious outcome.?

There’s a famous line in Stephen Sondheim’s (a decorated Jewish lion of Broadway, natch) musical Company that always gets a laugh:

“I telephoned my analyst about it, but he said to see him Monday, but by Monday I’ll be floating in the Hudson with the other garbage…I’m not well. And I’m not getting married today.”

We’re not well. Will you take our call??

Gabe Zichermann is the leading expert on Friendship in the Workplace. His forthcoming book, Friend Forward: How to Leverage the Superpower of Friendship to Transform Our Lives & Workplaces (2025, CES), looks closely at how organizations, individuals and societies can foster friendship to improve our world. Gabe is a CEO, speaker and author who popularized the concept of Gamification, and has helped leaders in Fortune 500, government and startups create a more fun, engaged, equitable and successful world.

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Image Credit National Museum of American History