This is common sense approach to life in a civilized society and a common sense approach to knowing who we are calling or setting up an appointment with and who we are investigating before making the call. If it’s a female, we know the characteristics to look for in a female when we meet up with them at a designated location. If it is a male, we know the characteristics to look for in a male. Male and female are completely unique and different from each other in physical appearance.
It does make a difference when initiating contact with our Subjects to know the gender of the person being investigated.
I have described to neighbors on several occasions a brief and simple description of what my Subjects look like when conducting residence verifications.
If the neighbor doesn’t recall the name of the Subject, I provide a brief description of the Subject such as “the person is a 5’10” male and weighs approximately 185 lbs with brown hair.” I have been able to conduct many interviews with neighbors by providing a simple and brief description of the Subject. If I didn’t provide the description of the person, I would likely not get the interview with a neighbor after canvassing the neighborhood on several occasions. Once the neighbor can think back to that person’s description and recollect their memory, more often than not, I’ll be able to identify a neighbor and obtain an interview even if they don’t actually remember the name of the person but they can still verify the Subject’s residency, character, conduct, etc.. Without a gender, height, weight, etc., you won’t be able to help a neighbor recollect the Subject by providing their description.
So there are a couple of good reasons why it is helpful to know someone’s gender for the purpose of a federal background investigation.