0:08
so good afternoon everyone and welcome to today's cipd webinar on let's talk
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menopause marking international menopause awareness day earlier this week my name is daphne d de green i'm
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head of cipd northern england and delighted to be hosting this session for you today and it's great to see so many
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of you joining still joining now we've had over um 950 registrations today so
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this is obviously a topic of huge importance and really reflects um some
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of the the challenges and some of the opportunities that we have to to support women and in the workplace so and thank
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you very much for joining us today um so the aim of today's session is really to explore how uh people
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professionals and line managers can better support colleagues and going through the menopause and we have three
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great speakers with different perspectives who can share their insight and their advice with you today so i'm
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absolutely delighted to have a great panel of experts with us today we've got rachel suff who's the senior policy
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advisor at cipd we've got carolyn harris who's the mp for swansea east and also
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the chair of the appg on menopause and we've got janet trouse head of hr at
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network rail and so a really great panel and who will share as i've said share
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case studies and information with you today so thank you all to our speakers and for
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giving up your time and supporting this session today and before i get started there's some um
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housekeeping i need to go through with you so the session will be recorded and be available on demand and at the end of
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today and if you've gone to the cipd webinar page on our site you'll be able to access
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this session all the previous of the sessions and sign up for future ones too and we will keep you muted throughout
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the session this is a very big big session as you can imagine so um please use the chat function to share
2:02
observations and network with others and we won't be monitoring the chat function if you want to ask questions to our
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panel please use the q a function at the bottom of your screen so the chat function very much about that working
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and q a is where we will pick up your questions and i will try my best to get through as many as possible um on
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today's call so very quickly and before we get started i just want to remind our
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members of all the great um resources that we have available and as you as we
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always remind you the kronos coronavirus hub is still available for you you can also access um the
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individual legal line so you can call hr inform helpline 24 7 and
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a reminder to cipd members in the uk and ireland that you have access to the new well-being hub and so together with an
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award-winning um workplace provider health assured we're now providing all of our members and with some great um uh
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help um uh for for your own well-being so 24 7 helpline 365 days a year and you
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can access that by telephone and also access um qualified therapists as well through
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online consultation so um and then finally actually and and um
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related to today's session we are continuously updating our um hub um and
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uh resources on the cipd website and we have created a menopause topic page so
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dedicated menopause resource page hosting all the kind of practical guidance and support materials to really
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help you break the stigma around menopause at work so please take a look at that and included in that
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are some great tools and techniques for line managers as well so the line management toolkit um also um available
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okay so and we'll get started with a session just to kind of set some context the menopause is a natural stage
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of life experienced by most women yet it remains a taboo subject in many of our
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organizations and our recent research found that six and ten women age 45 to
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55 who are experiencing the menopause said it had a negative impact on them at work and further research and suggests
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almost a million women in the uk have left their jobs completely because of menopausal symptoms so this is a huge
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challenge and one that you know as a profession we absolutely have a gift to kind of navigate and support um our
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colleagues who are managing menopausal symptoms so that's really the purpose today is to give you as much information
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and insight and so that we can keep the conversation going and really help and and you may be aware and that we're also
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supporting and women through the transition um of menopause pause through
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um a manifesto that we we launched um this week um and we're at the houses of
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parliament so um a really important topic for us here at cipd
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so i'm going to quickly uh go through the running order and rachel stuff is going to speak first followed by um
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carolyn harris and then on to janet trails to end the session and we'll probably have
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presentations for about 40 minutes probably maximum 40 minutes and then the
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rest of the session will be dedicated to your questions so please and as i said before use the q a function and we will
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get as many of those answered as possible so i'm going to hand over to rachel to
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kick off the session thank you very much rachel thanks stephanie and hi everyone so so
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pleased to be here during awareness month talking about the menopause and i think the title of this
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session is so appropriate let's talk menopause because as daphne said there is still a lot of taboo around the
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menopause transition at work and that's really what we want to change and i
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think things are really starting to change so that's fantastic but that's
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why three years ago we embarked on this project um at the
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cipd and we worked with experts our members
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organizations like janet net network rail and
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experts as well to develop guidance around the menopause and we also
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launched the manifesto for the menopause at work in parliament and carolyn was with us in parliament that day so really
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delighted she's here too yes we developed a whole suite of guidance for hr employers and line
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managers and so on to provide better support there's so much happening at the
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moment around the menopause there's a real spotlight on the issue by mps which
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is fantastic we've just responded at the cipd 2 inquiries we really want to build on that momentum
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that is there and also we have just signed we helped to launch but also signed as
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an employer the menopause workplace pledge so some of you might have seen that
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now just moving on to the next slide to rewind just slightly
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what is the menopause because on one level of course we all know what it is i thought i did when i embarked on this
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project and i quickly realized that actually i didn't know very much at all about the
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menopause how much do we really know about the different symptoms how it can impact
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how it can impact on our interaction with work i realized when i started working on the project that i'd been
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pairing menopausal for years really but i just hadn't joined up all those dots like i just
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really hadn't realized and i think of myself as someone who's quite well informed so i think that's a reflection of the the
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real gap that has been in society generally about the menopause
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so that translates into the workplace as well now just briefly it is a very na it's a
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natural part of aging it typically happens between the age of 45 and 55 but
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not exclusively at all it's when women's hormone levels start to decline you stop
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having periods and it is best described as a transition because it can go on for
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many years the average is around four years but as i've said on the on the bottom the slide there it can last up to
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12 years and we also have the peri menopause which is what i realized i was
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experiencing and that that's the transition the phase leading up to the menopause
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and you can experience a very wide range of symptoms as a result of the menopause and
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perimenopause over 30 different symptoms and again i was very taken aback by the
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number that you can experience and as we uh can see on the next slide
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lots of different symptoms but when we carried out some research of working women experiencing menopause transition
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the three main ones were hot flushes sleep disturbances and night sweats
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now some women sail through the menopause a couple of my friends absolutely no
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impact i've hardly noticed it and and good luck to them fantastic but around
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three quarters of people do experience symptoms and around a quarter
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of those experience severe symptoms and these can really have such a big impact
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and be so debilitating and of course you don't leave those symptoms at home
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you take them into work as well and there can be psychological
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so anxiety depression memory loss panic attacks and then physical
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irregular periods heavy bleeding weight gain muscle and joint stiffness and so
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on and i think a key point about the symptoms is that they can change so i have one set of symptoms at one point
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and then another set and because they fluctuate so much they can be very unpredictable and you don't
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know how you're going to feel on any given day now if we move on i think daphne mentioned this but six
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and ten menopausal women told us that their symptoms did
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have a negative impact on them at work and on the next slide we look a bit more
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in detail in that at that so how have the particular symptoms have
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affected them and i have to say i've experienced most of these less able to concentrate feeling more
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stress less patience more pressure making mistakes at work and some
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women have to take time off sick so if we move on i want to now just
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focus briefly on why is the menopause a workplace issue i think what i've said
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already is compelling enough for employers to take the menopause transition seriously but
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also there's a really strong business case four million women
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in that typical age bracket for menopause transition in work
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really significant growing part of the labor market which makes it a key recruitment and retention
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issue so important that employers can tap into that female talent think of all the
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skill shortages that we've got at the moment very often we're at the peak of
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our skills our experience our careers with many many years to go at work so it
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just doesn't make sense to press pause and be disadvantaged because of
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something that is not a natural stage of our life of aging and then of course there's a strong
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compliance case the duty of care for people's health and well-being that employers have
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the um the equality act must discriminate of course um in terms
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of disability age sex so that's there we've seen more
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employment tribunal cases but aside from all that it's just the right thing to do to support people
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going through what is a natural stage of life and what is a health issue
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so if we move on i just wanted to flag this other finding from our research a couple of years ago
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because we found that of those women who were unable to go to work at some
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point because of their symptoms only a quarter of them felt able to discuss the real
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reason for their absence with their line manager and i think that does highlight
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the silence that still exists hopefully that figure will have improved now
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because i think there is more openness more awareness in a lot of
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uh parts of life including in the workplace but i think it's so important that that
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conversation between the individual between the line manager happens in a wider context of a culture that
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talks openly about the menopause calls out explicit support
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line managers as awareness for everybody in the organization because that will lay
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the right working environment for that conversation to happen so if we just move on i just
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want to talk very briefly now and highlight just the main areas that organizations
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can focus on to create that menopause friendly workplace and i think it does start with opening
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up the culture as i've just mentioned enabling those conversations to happen
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i didn't remember until i started working on this project at the cipd
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i didn't have a conversation about the menopause at work and there's a lot of
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women working in our organisation and a lot of my friends are women going
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through the menopause as well and it changed so quickly once we
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started to raise awareness and provide information that taboo i
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think you'll be really surprised at how quickly it starts to break down and how it's
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welcomed and not just by women by men as well because it isn't just a female
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issue our menopause champion at the cipd is a man our
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public affairs manager couldn't find someone who's more passionate and interested in the topic
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so then secondly as well as well as the culture and starting to talk about the menopause it really does mean having
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those making sure that your policies um and your support for health and
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well-being are explicit around the menopause whether that's specific policy or
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whether you embed it in guidance and all your existing health and well-being support
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it's up to your organization to develop the framework that works best for you
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but it is an occupational health issue it should be treated as an ongoing fluctuating health condition and so it's
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just meaning that you embed it right across your inclusion and diversity occupational
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health health and well-being policies as well and i do want to call out the importance
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of absence management policies as part of that framework making sure that they're fair and flexible that you don't
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have a kind of trigger system that really in practice can unfairly penalize
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somebody who's experiencing those fluctuating symptoms and might need to take time off
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unexpectedly as well and then finally educate and train line
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managers so that they can have that conversation so that people can
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disclose the real reason for their absence because managers play such an important role we
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know for all health and well-being conversations and support they're like the gateway they should know what
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policies and support could be helpful also the kind of relationship that
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somebody has with their land manager is it based on trust is your line manager empathetic does he or she listen
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the more confident a manager will feel and educated about the menopause the
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less embarrassed uh that line manager will be about having a conversation the more approachable
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uh that individual bit will be as well so that that really does lay the basis
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and then knowledge about the practical adjustments that can be helpful as well
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and i think that's key to supporting people with menopause at work the sort
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of changes that you can make our mantra when we were developing the guidance and
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it still is really that is that making small changes can make a huge
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difference and sometimes it can be as simple as a desk fan tweaking start
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and finish times and so on so um these kind of approaches have the
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potential to really transform the experience of so many women's work
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in life it just makes sense for organizations to embrace
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menopause friendly workplaces thank you
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thank you rachel um great insight and i can i can feel your passion coming through you know it's a hugely important
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topic and you know what you said about the line management role and the fundamental role of of supporting my
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manager managers through this is is really critical so um thank you so much and i'm sure there'll be questions
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coming through and just a reminder but you're all very quiet there we've got any questions do do remember to post
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your questions in the q a um box if you want to and so on to our next speaker and we've got carolyn
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harris so over to you carolyn thank you hi everyone and one absolute pleasure to
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be here and to um to chat to you about my um my thoughts
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on the menopause and actually i'm going to go a bit broader than rachel and talk about
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something that we've started over the last couple of months and that's actually called the menopause revolution with all revolutionaries around and
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we've got badges and we've got banners and we've got posters and the reason why we're doing this is that for i've been a
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member of parliament since 2015 and we've talked about the menopause in this
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place every international and global menopause day week month whatever it is
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we have a debate and actually we've got that debate this afternoon so i'm going to be talking in that well i'm leading
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on that debate this afternoon and we talk about it and everybody's really supportive and everybody's got really
19:23
interesting things to say and then we don't talk about it again until the following international or global
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menopause day week or month whatever and i've been quite frustrated by that
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because i felt that menopause doesn't just happen on one day of the year menopause is with women forever it's for
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life there's women before us and behind us and they've experienced the menopause it's 2021
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why have we not been talking about this more often and i'll tell you why because it's been
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a taboo subject and people have been afraid to talk about it if you think about periods it's not that long ago
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that we started using the word periods they happened they were always going to happen they're always going to happen so
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why have we not talked about them and my recollection of the menopause and some people may be late to this was watching
20:15
les dawson on his comedy show having a conversation with roy barracliffe over
20:21
the fake garden wall dressed as women where one of them pushed their
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fake breast up and said she's on the change making out like it was some well it was
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funny at the time it's less funny now but it's just
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a situation that we found ourselves in that we are terrified to talk about things we're embarrassed by them we are
20:48
ashamed of it to some extent are we terrified of offending people i'm sorry guys but vaginal dryness is a
20:56
real thing it happens when you have menopause it happens to the best of us
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but it happens why are we afraid to say these things and
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i can remember a conversation have it happening between my mother and her sisters when one of them was
21:13
obviously going through a menopause and they were terrified that i would over hear this conversation and they
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asked me to leave the room and i was 36 you know i was not so young and naive that i couldn't hear
21:25
it my mother never talked to me about periods so it's no surprise in 2010
21:31
when i had a big gynecological operation and then sunk into a depression that i
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ended up on antibiotic i studied antibiotics i wished antidepressants and i ended up on antidepressants for 11
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years because i told my doctor that i was having a nervous breakdown i'd had a tragedy in my life in 1989
21:50
when my son i lost my son in a road accident and hadn't taken anti-depressants then so i convinced
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myself that that was related to the way i was feeling you know 21 years later and that maybe now is the
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time for me to grieve so i ended up taking anti antidepressants and i'm still on anti-depressants and i'm on
22:10
them because when i took them in 2010 i ended up in a pink anorak with my hood
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up sitting in a chair unable to go even outside the front door and do any shopping so low did i go
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but i thought i was having a nervous breakdown and i realized probably about three years ago i've been talking having been
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made the decision that i was going to say to people this is what i'm experiencing what the hell is wrong with
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me why am i feeling this why am i feeling that and other people saying oh god i've got that oh god i've got that oh i can't believe
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that you're saying you're saying what i'm feeling i realized that i hadn't been depressed
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i was menopausal but i've been i diagnosed myself and identity that being
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dependent i suppose on antidepressants and
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part of the reason why we don't talk about it is because we don't understand it we don't know we don't know that when
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we are not linking this symptom with that system symptom with our system but it's not just us who
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don't recognize it doctors don't recognize it because 41 of
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medical schools don't even have training on menopause on the curriculum so if i'm
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not demonizing doctors what i'm saying is if you haven't given that doctor the tools the resources to understand
23:32
something that affects 51 percent of the population then there's something drastically wrong
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there so the situation you find is that a woman will present with one ailment and she'll get sent for consultant tests
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for one thing maybe fibromyalgia maybe you'll early onset dementia maybe osteoporosis all these different things
23:52
to them to discover well she's traveling on that it must be depression so we put it on
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antidepressants the truth is doctors haven't got the tools to link to
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join the dots if you like a b c and d therefore you have thousands and thousands of women out
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there who are either not got any support at all having medication for a symptom they haven't got
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or completely and utterly lost as to where they go next and when i start these conversations with women sometimes
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there's a little bit like a light bulb goes on in their eyes because i talk about the symptoms and they'll say
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god that happened to me i'm experiencing that it shouldn't be us telling each other
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this should be a better system that people are recognizing what the issue is i'm not saying it comes down to
24:40
the employers but i think if employers had more information if we as women had
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more information if people in schools actually learned something about it if the medical schools paid it the
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attention it was deserving what a much better world it would be that we all acknowledge the fact that menopause is
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not something we can brush under the carpet it happens to 51 of the population and we've got to stop
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pretending that it doesn't exist or if we don't talk about it it will go away we talk about puberty we talk about
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periods why aren't we talking about the menopause everybody will know someone who at some point in their life
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will be menopausal now where we are at the moment is um i
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wanted to set up a parliamentary group to specifically talk about menopause
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i wanted to get companies in which we did yesterday and cipd our network were both with us where we talked to good
25:37
companies who were doing good work and leave them share their experience and then with the hope that this will
25:44
filter down and other companies will get involved i mean nobody can fail to be absolutely over
25:50
the moon with what temperatures have done this week simpsons this week have said that they will pay for their
25:56
employees hrt um prescriptions that's massive
26:02
to talk about hrt very well and i'll see very few because i don't know exactly how many but the
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number of women who are actually getting prescriptions for hrt is
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nothing in compared to how many women need prescriptions for hrt and that's
26:19
because doctors are not recognizing that women are actually in need of hrt or are
26:24
reluctant to prescribe hrt because of myths previously which have since been
26:31
disproved but still are out in the ether that hrt is dangerous
26:38
from what i've seen those who are vulnerable to um the risk of hrt would have been
26:44
vulnerable to to cancers with or without the hrt but that message is not
26:50
filtering through so some doctors are reluctant to actually prescribe it then you have the situation where when
26:56
you do get prescribed it very often you will have two packets with two hormones in each packet those
27:03
hormones in each packet it's chargeable on a prescription per hormone so four
27:09
hormones cost you nearly 40 quid so i was having a conversation with a
27:14
with a colleague because i got drawn for what they call a private member's bill which means that once every
27:20
parliamentary year you get you you've got a fairly good chance of getting something through legislation and i
27:26
wanted to do something on the menopause and originally i wanted to do something about workplace practices i wanted to
27:32
make sure there was mandatory policies i wanted to make sure there was better education i've got a shopping list like
27:38
this hence why we call it the revolution but i realized that in the short space of time that you get to actually get a
27:44
private members bill through getting through all the things i'd like to have seen happening wasn't going to happen
27:49
and retrospectively i believe that the best policies are those that are grown
27:55
from within and they meet the needs of the works workforce rather than a blanket policy
28:01
that everybody adopts leaves in the drawer and doesn't actually look at again and doesn't really do anything for
28:07
the women who need it so we were looking at all the things that we could do and nothing was nothing hit me or something that was going to be
28:13
doable in the time frame i had until we started talking about hrt and a
28:19
colleague said it would have costed a 40 quid and it was a bit like a light bulb moment because i live in wales i don't
28:24
pay for prescriptions and i suddenly realized that the only women in this country will pay for prescriptions are
28:30
people living in england so people women in england are not a double disadvantage not only they struggling with the
28:36
menopause and getting a prescription when they do get them they've got to pay for something that we get for free and wills
28:44
so that's why i went for a private members bill on support services and resources for
28:51
women through the menopause and put as my number one ask free prescriptions for
28:56
women in england and that bill goes through next week but the real impact of doing that has
29:02
made the world and i mean the world look at the uk government and see that
29:09
there's actually a conversation going on here that the uk government is looking at
29:14
providing better services and resources for women women posing and that means
29:20
that they did they in the spotlight at the moment that if they don't do it then the
29:26
world will be quite disappointed but they won't be off as bloody disappointed that as a 13 million women in this
29:31
country or menopausal or those who are going to turn up outside um
29:37
put up parliament next friday brain further um
29:42
and actually be disappointed that we've not done the right thing so
29:47
the emphasis up until now and going forward has been we have to convince this government and we have to convince
29:54
medical schools and we have to convince employers and we have to convince schools and we have to give them all the tools and the resources to make sure
30:01
that they put menopause on an agenda and they put menopause high up on the agenda that we talk about
30:08
it we acknowledge it and we do something about it no longer are we going to pretend it
30:14
doesn't exist no longer are we going to be embarrassed to say vaginal dryness no
30:20
longer are we going to pretend this doesn't happen are we going to hope that it's going to go away no more women
30:26
should lose their job or be punished in the workplace for not being able to meet
30:32
a target because she's menopausal women deserve respect and i see it as our job
30:39
now as people with advice to make sure that we give women the support the resource and the respect
30:47
they deserve so i urge everybody out there join the revolution it's a lovely place
30:52
to be it's absolutely fantastic to know that you've got good people like davina mccall and penny lancaster and nadia ali
31:00
and louise newson and the list goes on and on and on and on and these people and there's men there as well who are
31:07
saying we want something done to make sure that we are providing women with what they
31:14
need we are fabulous we are fabulous all our lives let's be fabulous after the
31:20
menopause during the menopause and perimenopausal let's not be afraid to discuss it let's be open about it let's
31:28
embrace it let's work with it and let's come out the other end as stronger women
31:33
who are ready to take on the challenges that life throws as us if we don't do it for ourselves nobody else will do before
31:39
us so come and join my revolution be part of that movement is going to change
31:44
how the menopause is seen throughout not just the uk but throughout the world
31:49
because they're watching us and we know that we can do this and together we can do anything so come on
31:55
guys and girls join the revolution be a menopause warrior and join my gun thank you so much
32:03
thank you so much um uh carolyn i'm slightly in awe at the minute and i'm definitely joining the revolution so i'm
32:10
sure many of um the people on the call just looking at the chat while she was
32:15
speaking it's just taking off you know lots of people acknowledging your own personal um experience and thank you
32:21
very much for sharing that but also that kind of systemic issue with it within the kind of nhs and
32:27
prescriptions so you can have a read through that there's lots going on on the chat function but thanks again
32:33
and um yeah please everybody join this revolution and if not for us then certainly for for the next generation
32:41
okay i'm going to quickly go on um to to our last speaker uh janet uh trousers
32:48
i'm just going to pass um over to you now to to complete the session and then we'll get into q a thank you
32:59
so janet you're on newt sorry classic sin
33:05
um hello i'm janet trouse i'm head of hr at network rail um and i've been asked to
33:13
talk about our journey uh what we did how we did it and maybe some of the results that we've seen
33:18
um so but before i start on that i just wanted to echo my fellow speakers in
33:24
terms of the experiences they've had um like both carolyn and rachel i probably
33:31
didn't realize that i was perimenopausal and i've experienced all range of
33:36
symptoms and rachel is absolutely right you can suffer different symptoms at
33:41
different times and i think that's really key if there are any hr practitioners occupational health
33:47
practitioners in the room that's really key when you're actually managing this in the workplace
33:53
so um moving on i think probably the best place to start
33:59
is the why so if i wind back to 2017
34:04
there wasn't very much at all around people just weren't talking about menopause
34:10
and certainly uh there was only one other area that we found or one other organization that we found that was
34:15
doing anything on this and that was seven trent um you know every organization is different um if i
34:23
had stood up and spoken about my personal journey i don't think i would have had the traction
34:28
that i have now making it very business related is the way to go um and it just depends upon
34:36
your organization as to what matters so i work for network rail we are
34:42
responsible for for critical infrastructure so that's rails uh obviously uh bridges
34:50
roads tunnels uh and what we do really matters if it's
34:56
not safe so safety is one of our key themes and safety and well-being i think is really
35:02
important when we talk about menopause because if a woman is experiencing symptoms that are distracting her
35:09
or if a man is supporting um a woman going through those symptoms or if you're a lie manager of a colleague and
35:15
you don't quite know what's going on that can distract you away from a safe way of working
35:22
and and so that i think it's really important to stress that point whichever organization that you're in
35:28
performance goes hand in hand with selfie and well-being and most companies these days are measuring performance
35:35
whether it's a service sales uh for us we obviously uh uh
35:41
survive in public money um so we do need to be accountable for everything that we do
35:47
and then talent attraction and retention so in context for us and this is obviously going to vary for every other
35:54
organization at that point in time we were about 84 male
36:01
so what we were trying to do we have a gender matter strategy is attract
36:07
females into our industry and i think things that attract females into your
36:12
company are indicators that you are female friendly
36:17
it's very easy now to research a company on the internet look at their policies
36:22
look at the statements maybe their company reports and get a little bit more info about what it's
36:28
like to be on the inside glass door so our attraction and retention
36:34
strategies are important in as much as having good good uh menopause strategy is the same
36:40
as like a good maternity strategy so why i think anybody that's been in
36:47
sales as i started off uh my career uh is that we go gold the golden circle the
36:53
golden y simon cynic if you haven't looked at it it's a good way to start if you're
36:58
trying to sell something something to somebody who actually holds the purse strings or a senior team because senior
37:05
people in the organization really are important in terms of advocacy
37:11
so next slide please so the other uh thing that we did was we
37:17
made sure that we approached this as a serious project and so we did all of the things that you
37:24
would expect um for any project any other business project uh in in your organization
37:32
and so having a compelling vision robust plan for change and political
37:37
will all of those things for any of those project managers out there you will be familiar with that methodology
37:42
we did exactly the same for the menopause what we didn't do was make it too much of a personal journey because
37:49
we did need to catch the attention of a great many senior people in the organization and by default a great many
37:56
men we also decided to start delivering
38:01
things by drip feed i think it's tempting sometimes to just wait for the big bang
38:07
but if you start to drip feed and not be too curious about it you know
38:12
do that 80 20 it really does work so one of the first things that we did was we launched an article
38:18
on our intranet uh and a very brave lady um uh spoke about her journey and her
38:25
symptoms one of the things um that our communications people said oh
38:30
are you sure and we said yes yes we're sure and she had such positive response it
38:35
was really warming i think in terms of your team strengths this is a big project or it has lots of
38:43
different arms and legs you know very often is it health and safety do the health and safety team look after this
38:49
does it the hr team is the legal team doesn't really matter i think using the
38:54
combined skills around you is really great um and i think you know
39:00
i i was lucky that i had chief medical officer in the organization not every organization's going to have that but
39:07
equally i'm not comms person and having somebody to help us with that was really
39:14
really important and sponsor i can't emphasize too much about having somebody
39:19
who's on the leadership team to sponsor you and i think rachel spoke about you know that earlier
39:26
we also had a male sponsor uh at the beginning of the project and and that
39:31
was very very powerful and he was really curious about this subject um and
39:38
he he was an executive team lead team member and he i saw him in the office
39:45
challenge another colleague when she shrank away from this particular subject and that colleague
39:51
was quite senior herself so um it was very very powerful um and then in terms
39:57
of um delivery we we didn't have any budget so um i remember laminating stuff on my
40:04
kitchen table at the weekend uh they were flash cards uh for some
40:09
workshop sessions i was going to run um and i called it game of hormones um
40:16
i've never watched game of thrones but you know game of hormones and it was just just to kind of create a
40:22
little bit of fun but what it was was flash cards with um celebrity or media
40:28
people um who had spoken a little bit about their journeys
40:33
because i think the best proponents or some of the best proponents of people in the media
40:39
they've they've raised the game they've literally changed the landscape for this
40:45
particular subject so next slide
40:52
data um data all important um uh you don't
40:57
have to worry too much about what it says except for i i managed to change the females we went from 16
41:03
we're now almost 19 in the organization um and showing that actually there will
41:08
be quite a few of our females quite a large chunk of our females may be perimenopausal or menopausal and
41:15
actually most of our line managers by default are going to be male so that whole situation that's been spoken about
41:22
um about how men approach this i think is really critical but getting some sort
41:27
of data i think is really key making it you know why and the context of your
41:33
organization certainly i think a lot of females at this point of their career um and when
41:40
we're talking specifically about age-related menopause um you know they may wonder at that point in time i have
41:47
i experienced symptoms where i would never have usually experienced at all in my life i've never had anxiety but all
41:54
of a sudden bam it hits you it's when a mouse looks like a mammoth at night
42:00
but you know we do have um ladies or those colleagues born with a womb um
42:06
who you know experienced menopause a lot earlier um next slide please
42:13
so i spoke about zeitgeist so you know zeitgeist is
42:19
it you know 2018 i think was incredible in terms of what was going on there you
42:25
know the 100 years of the representation of the people act you know gender pay gap um
42:32
we've had to gender pay report uh equal pay claims were coming through the
42:37
millisecond force it statute for any of those people out there who are forcib members um you know we remember the the
42:45
prototype and then it was put up in parliament square that's a gratuitous picture of myself my colleague at the
42:51
time uh you know having a little photo next to it and i think you know the
42:58
whole kind of wave bow wave of lumpy feminism um coming down the line there
43:05
was also a white paper that was released um in 2017
43:11
and and i think it talked about the economic participation of women and then the little picture on the right hand
43:17
corner was um a poppy badge that my husband bought me which celebrated women
43:24
and in in the wars and uh this celebrated uh a nurse
43:29
uh emily gray who who lost her life and that was the first time um you know uh
43:36
the poppy fanta deadly sort of acknowledged the contribution of women
43:45
so quick wins we launched the event we made it part of our dni strategy which
43:51
is our everyone strategy lots of communications and launches of materials what you can see there is our everyone
43:59
guide to menopause and also um there's like a picture of the page on our safety
44:05
central site now what was really good about launching this on safety central is that besides the materials that are
44:12
on there and the film is the fact that you can access that page from any internet-enabled device
44:22
and you don't even have to work for network rail and we purposely did that because in our industry we work with a
44:29
lot of partners suppliers and contractors we wanted to get it out there we also wanted women to be able to
44:37
access this information in a safe space in a private space not everybody wants
44:42
to say it out loud not everybody wants to acknowledge this so we just need to be able to give ladies their privacy
44:51
the other great thing about this is that a lot of our male
44:56
colleagues have been able to take it home to their wives effectively um
45:02
you know they've come to some of our workshop sessions because we workshop this uh around around the estate in all
45:08
sorts of different groups well-being groups uh women's groups um
45:14
and just mixed groups across our organization um was oh do you know what
45:21
i think this is what my wife is going through and it's that kind of moment of realization and then they can
45:27
literally take home that information and run the film themselves
45:36
so this is the kind of feedback that we've had um you've changed my life was probably one
45:41
of the first pieces of feedback that i had a very very tearful lady came out of
45:49
workshop session and followed me down the corridor and stopped me and just was very very emotional about this
45:57
i took it home and shared the film with my wife i've already said booking an appointment with a gp is
46:04
really important because i think once people realize they've got all these symptoms just to be able to point them to their gp now look you know a lot of
46:12
gps aren't trained in this but that is the starting point um
46:17
and there was another lady who who emailed me not long after a session and
46:24
said you know i've actually been able to talk about this within my teams that they all know now why i come in a little
46:30
bit later we had 1200 hits with hits hits within the first few weeks and
46:38
i wrote to all of our executive leadership team and we had endorsement
46:44
from the chair and the ceo in network rail and that is absolutely critical the
46:50
tone of the organization carolyn spoke about timson the tone of the organization it is set from the top and
46:57
then we have colleagues sharing and networking so um there are sort of little colleague groups where they talk
47:03
to each other and they share things like i've seen somebody in the chat talk about louise newson you know all of
47:10
these um webinars i think you know meg matthews does one i mean there's so many of them now it's it's almost been an
47:18
explosion so
47:23
i would counsel not one size doesn't fit all because it is so
47:28
relevant to your organization um as much as you can do to engage with
47:33
other organizations as much as you can do to get advocacy
47:39
make the message memorable so last week i did a session to a group hr team
47:47
singing down my hairbrush down on on video to to a doris day song
47:53
just make it memorable everybody remembered it we have a safety moment and a passenger moment at every team
47:59
meeting um i think they think i'm a little bit bonkers but sometimes you have to be
48:04
but you know get the message across however you do it um and i think
48:10
embracing offers of help is a really key one because it's a really big subject uh
48:16
it's difficult just for one person to do it all so you know get get ambassadors of this
48:24
project as much as you can be inclusive with your language i think that hits us
48:30
quite early on in the project don't forget those colleagues who don't
48:35
identify as male or female but who are born with a wound
48:40
clarify the line manager's role that's really about saying no you don't actually have to ask a woman are you
48:45
going through the menopause then no that's probably not the way it's approaching
48:51
so you know managing difficult conversations training anything that you can do to coach i went up to leeds our
48:58
first line supplier of hr is based in leeds and i went up and gave them a training session as well they
49:05
didn't have any other companies that had a menopause policy at that time and
49:10
don't overlook male allies there are so powerful male allies and repeat and
49:16
refresh so it's a constantly moving dynamic uh environment at the moment i
49:23
think we uh spoke to caroline yesterday and said that you know i think with all
49:28
of the stuff in the media now we're probably not having to say so much about what menopause is although it's always
49:34
helpful to repeat and there's always really interesting statistics but i think it really does need to focus um
49:42
internally if you're in an organization online management capability
49:48
thank you and over back to daphne great thank you janet that that was packed full of great tips advice and and
49:56
lovely to hear your case study at network rail um lots of questions coming through we've got 10 minutes so i'm um
50:03
i'm going to try and get through them as quickly as possible and and there's some themes coming through you know people
50:09
interested in you know the networks are the support um alongside some very kind of um
50:15
specific questions about uh the menopause so um carol i'm going to start with you because the two very quick
50:21
questions about um the the revolution and so is is this is
50:27
the revolution something that that is just available in the uk we had i don't know what you saw in the chat we had somebody from sydney who's going to bed
50:33
now um but um i don't know whether that question was from her but is this when we talk about revolution are we talking
50:39
globally yeah i'd like the revolution to be global and um that's the aim is to to be global but i
50:46
think what the concept of the revolution is something that we've developed to accompany the private members built
50:53
until accompanied the work that we're doing on the appg but it's really picked up um momentum and i've actually done
50:58
some work with australia 60 minutes um canadia i'm i've got a meeting tomorrow
51:04
with a canadian legislator um i'm doing something with it with india i've had
51:09
emails from america and japan asking for some information so at this moment in
51:15
time it's a brand if you like that we've created to get people tweeting and to get the the the action
51:22
on social media and to get people to contact that mps to make sure they support the bill but there's no reason
51:28
why this could not be a global phenomenon because we've got the backing from so many people to take this forward
51:34
that yeah why not let's go global me on the global stage i'm picturing it now
51:39
great now that's that's good to hear i'm sure many on the call will be really pleased to hear that um so um i
51:45
think you've already addressed the kind of question around whether a hrt prescription would be
51:51
available in england and i guess that's part of you know what what you're trying to influence so i think we've answered that
51:57
question there were a few questions um around physical issues um
52:02
uh particularly you know related to to um menopause um
52:07
and this could go to anybody i'm not too sure i'm sure you all will all have an opinion but what is the difference between transition and the perimenopause
52:16
so i think somebody's interested in understanding that that the difference there i don't know who wants to take that
52:24
well it's a good question and because i got a bit tied up in knots i've got to be honest what's perimenopause when i
52:32
started on the project what's menopause or what's the trans what's the transition
52:37
and our guidance does go it go into it so do do have a look there but
52:42
as i understand it menopause transition is that it's the sort of overarching term that's used to describe the whole
52:50
process because it is typically a long process perimenopause that's where it all starts
52:55
their hormones change you start to have symptoms very possibly
53:00
and then it reaches when you haven't had a period for
53:06
12 months that is the menopause at that point that's the diagnosed
53:13
stage of the whole transition and then after that
53:19
you are post-menopausal now that's a that is how i understand it
53:25
but of course it can change because i know women who haven't had a period for
53:31
12 months so now they think they're post-menopausal and then they have one
53:37
so it's good to look at uh some of the there's some
53:42
really good advice out there to to help understand it because you know i
53:48
realized i was not very well informed at all yeah yeah and i think some of the questions definitely reflect that kind
53:55
of curiosity to understand it i think there was another reflection or observation from somebody around well
54:00
actually it's not necessarily 45 either you know we're talking quite early on i think i
54:05
think one of you made reference to that in your um in your presentations as well so there's
54:12
there's some questions you know lots of appetite to kind of network extend you know
54:17
education around this um and um janet you spoke about you know
54:22
your organization at network rail and what you've done and somebody's asked about you know what what can small to
54:28
medium-sized businesses do and i guess you've given a really good example with really limited budget around what you
54:33
can do but you know and there will be quite small businesses i guess on online today and who may maybe just not be able
54:42
to kind of um you know engage in in the way that you did do you have any tips but for those types of organizations
54:49
i'll come to you first janet so um i think it it sits alongside
54:55
anything else that you do in that dni space um you know this is about being inclusive
55:02
of everybody so you you know when we talk about um
55:09
menopause we very often point to reasonable adjustment um because
55:14
that's where a woman very often needs that consideration and that reasonable
55:20
adjustment may change um i mean it's doing it it's really
55:25
personal what what we need to remember is one size doesn't fit all you know we
55:30
could all of us be going through menopause but we have very very differing needs and i think that's
55:36
something to really keep in mind um making sure managers are able they are
55:42
told to have good conversations i think that's important little things
55:47
that we've done and i've got it in my hand is we've done like little tool kits this
55:52
is a little fan uh we've done little tool kits for those ladies who may not be in the office so
55:59
if you've got a small organization but you're i don't know a sales organization and you've got ladies who are out on the
56:06
road as i used to be uh dr you know my my car was my office then you might need
56:11
to think about the facilities and things that you provide then um but it is very individual and we spent to put it in
56:20
context um approximately two thousand pounds
56:25
um over you know to the launch which actually it became it began cost neutral
56:31
and that included getting a a short film as well which is relatively um
56:37
relatively small cost for a lot of organizations but you don't even have to spend any of that yeah that's great
56:43
great advice janet and i think um it may have been rachel you said earlier and it's the small changes you know so you
56:50
don't need to kind of look at this as is certainly at the beginning you know it's the small changes that can have the biggest impact
56:56
um so we're at 27 minutes past i'm going to try and squeeze um another
57:02
question um into um our call today so um
57:07
somebody sat apart from the revolution which obviously sounds amazing could the panel recommend um one thing that we
57:14
could do for the following position so they're very much looking at this from the different types of people within their business so for example
57:21
and i might give you one each that might be a nice way to finish the session but um as a male employee
57:28
um what do you think you know internally within an organization what's the one thing a male employee could do to kind
57:35
of start to to have the conversation or or educate themselves we've also got a
57:41
female employee and a hr professional so we we've had lots of um perspectives
57:46
from from janet but yeah and um carolyn do you want to give a view on
57:52
what a male employee could do internally well i mean i would say
57:57
regardless agenda it's about having those conversations it's about being open and receptive and listening and
58:04
asking a woman what she needs asking a woman what she wants not being embarrassed not laughing
58:11
not not diminishing the issue but being honest and open and having a policy that says you know
58:17
whatever it is that we can do to make sure that you feel that this is the place you want to be and that we can
58:23
keep you then we were prepared to do and that's not massively expensive it's not
58:28
onerous it's respectful and it's the right thing to do yeah no absolutely um
58:36
rachel janet do you want to add anything from you know and i i absolutely respect what carolyn said you know this is not
58:42
necessary about gender i guess the the person's probably thinking about you know there are dif there are different
58:48
angles or different ways of communicating this within an organization is there anything else you want to add on that question
58:54
yeah just quickly i mean really second everything that carolyn said um as i said at the cipd our most
59:02
passionate champion is a is male but i think
59:07
as well it's being mindful that not everybody will want to talk about
59:12
the menopause there can be cultural issues or just somebody might feel it is too private so it's not making
59:20
assumptions either about somebody supposedly of a certain age who will
59:25
want to talk about it i know some of the organizations we spoke to for the guidance from fact found that um but
59:33
even so if you are creating that culture and organization where you can say
59:38
menopause and hopefully men will feel comfortable saying menopause as well
59:44
then even if somebody who is experiencing menopause symptoms doesn't
59:49
want to talk about it you are still making things better for everybody including that person in
59:56
that organization yeah absolutely it's that conversation isn't it so we're at half past now and i know we're going to
1:00:02
close promptly so i just want to say a huge thank you to all of our speakers rachel carolyn janet janet it's been an
1:00:09
absolutely fantastic session you can see all of the conversation that's been going on in the
1:00:14
chat and so thank you all for joining and remember all of the guides and the
1:00:20
information that rachel's talked about is on the cipd website so there is more information you can find out about what
1:00:26
other organizations are doing um in this area as well so and thank you all for joining and have a lovely afternoon
1:00:33
thank you bye guys bye