Finding Belonging at Work: Andy Rubinson on Inclusion, Community, and Creating Safer Spaces
Key Takeaways
- Purpose often starts on the sidelines. The work that feels most meaningful doesn’t always begin as a career. For many nonprofit professionals, it starts as something they’re willing to do simply because it matters.
- Belonging creates better workplaces. When people feel safe enough to be themselves, they spend less energy hiding and more energy contributing their ideas, skills, and perspectives.
- Values can stay steady even when the landscape changes. Funding, language, and public conversations may evolve, but organizations can continue building inclusive cultures by staying grounded in their purpose.
- Real connection happens beyond networking. The most valuable professional relationships often come from honest, one-on-one conversations where people can share challenges, exchange ideas, and learn from one another.
For many nonprofit professionals, the path into the sector isn’t a straight line. It often begins with a volunteer role, a side project, or a cause that keeps pulling at you until it becomes impossible to ignore.
For Andy Rubinson, that path started inside a global software company and eventually led him to become Executive Director of Pride in Our Workplace, a Boston-based nonprofit dedicated to LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion.
What stands out about Andy isn’t just his commitment to inclusion. It’s his belief that community and belonging aren’t secondary outcomes of good work. They’re often the foundation that makes good work possible in the first place.
When Your Passion Becomes Your Profession
Before entering the nonprofit sector, Andy spent years working in product management at a large software company. Alongside his corporate role, he also led the organization’s Pride employee resource group, a global network of more than 8,000 members across 45 chapters.
It was there that he discovered the work that energized him most.
While product management paid the bills, leading the employee resource group gave him something different. It gave him purpose, connection, and the opportunity to help create spaces where people felt supported.
Over time, he realized he was spending more energy thinking about the inclusion work than the work listed in his job description.
“I made a conscious decision that I really wanted to see if I could find a way to make my day job and gay job the same thing.”
That decision eventually led him to Pride in Our Workplace, where he now works with employee resource groups, inclusion practitioners, and employers who are committed to creating workplaces where people can thrive.
It’s a journey many nonprofit professionals will recognize. Sometimes the work we’re most passionate about starts as the thing we do after hours before becoming the thing we’re meant to do full time.
Navigating Inclusion Work During Uncertain Times
Like many nonprofit leaders, Andy is leading through a period of significant change.
Organizations across North America are grappling with shifting conversations around diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. Funding landscapes are changing. Language is evolving. And many leaders are trying to determine how to stay true to their values while navigating increasing complexity.
Andy sees these realities firsthand through the employers and employee resource groups his organization supports.
There’s no denying the challenges.
But what gives him hope is that many organizations continue to recognize the tangible value of creating inclusive workplaces.
“I’m happy to say that we’ve been lucky that most of the folks that we’ve worked with have really been staying the course.”
For Andy, part of the work right now involves helping organizations adapt without abandoning their commitment to belonging.
Sometimes that means reframing conversations.
Sometimes it means using different language.
And sometimes it means broadening participation so that inclusion becomes a shared responsibility rather than something carried solely by marginalized communities.
“It’s really that highlights the importance of allyship and the need to have more than just the marginalized groups as part of the solution.”
In a moment when many nonprofit professionals are facing uncertainty in their own sectors, that perspective feels particularly relevant. Values don’t always change. Sometimes the approach simply needs to evolve.
The Hidden Cost of Not Feeling Safe
One of the most powerful parts of Andy’s work involves helping people feel safe enough to bring their full selves into the workplace.
That might sound simple, but for many LGBTQ+ professionals, it remains far from guaranteed.
During our conversation, Andy referenced a statistic suggesting that roughly half of LGBTQ+ employees are not out to their direct supervisor.
Behind that number is an enormous amount of emotional labour.
“Working in this environment where folks don’t even feel safe saying that they’re a part of the LGBTQ+ community … it takes up so much time and energy trying to either cover or pretend.”
When people are constantly evaluating what they can share, how they should present themselves, or whether it’s safe to be authentic, that energy has to come from somewhere.
As Andy puts it:
“It takes away from people being able to focus on the work at hand.”
The goal of inclusion isn’t simply representation. It’s creating environments where people can contribute fully without carrying the additional burden of hiding who they are.
“It basically gives them that peace of mind, that comfort of knowing that they can just be who they are, be appreciated in their workplace, and be valued for the skills and the things that they bring to the table.”
For nonprofit professionals, that lesson extends well beyond any single community. When people feel valued, trusted, and safe, organizations become stronger.
Why Meaningful Connection Matters
Throughout the conversation, Andy returned again and again to the importance of community.
Not networking for networking’s sake.
Not collecting contacts.
Real relationships.
The kind that allow people to share challenges honestly and learn from one another.
That belief was reinforced when Andy joined The Nonprofit Hive shortly before stepping into nonprofit leadership. Coming from the for-profit sector, he was looking for peers who could help him understand the nonprofit landscape.
What he found was something deeper than advice.
He found connection.
“Meeting folks that have the expertise that I didn’t have, and kind of this one-on-one networking, I found very valuable.”
In fact, the experience influenced how he approached community-building within his own organization.
Inspired by The Nonprofit Hive’s matching model, Andy created opportunities for workplace inclusion leaders to connect one-on-one based on the knowledge they wanted to share and the support they were seeking.
The goal wasn’t simply to introduce people.
It was to create space for conversations that could continue long after an event ended.
As he explained:
“Let’s connect folks that are doing this and give them a chance to have a deeper conversation, to make that connection and hopefully turn into a longer ongoing exchange of ideas and thoughts.”
For anyone who has ever left a conference with a pocket full of business cards but no real relationships, the value of that approach is easy to understand.
Building Places Where People Belong
At its heart, Andy’s work is about helping people feel like they belong.
It’s about creating workplaces where individuals don’t have to leave part of themselves at the door.
It’s about fostering communities where people can learn from one another, support one another, and navigate challenges together.
And it’s about recognizing that inclusion isn’t simply a policy or initiative. It’s something people experience every day through the relationships, environments, and communities that surround them.
In a sector that often talks about impact, Andy’s perspective offers a quieter reminder.
Sometimes the most important work begins with helping people feel seen.