ARE YOU SUPPORTING MENOPAUSE?
There’s been a lot of discussion and even debate over the past few weeks on the topic of menopause in the workplace. Here in the UK in January, a proposal to change the legislation to protect the rights of women experiencing menopause was rejected by the government.
With a 44% increase in the number of menopause-related industrial tribunals (1) and almost 900,000 women citing as the reason for them leaving their job (2), it’s something every organisation and leadership team need to be including in their wellbeing strategy.
With the number of women in the workplace being slightly more than half of the total UK working population (3) and the age at which we’re all working up to rising, the number of people impacted by menopause is rapidly increasing. I wrote this last sentence with ‘people impacted’ because although it is women who experience menopause, everyone is impacted in some way - managers, leaders, colleagues, partners, and friends.
One of the big things we need to do to better support everyone on this is to normalise the conversation on menopause. For all of my life, until I came into this industry, I’ve heard menopause spoken about as being something that is to be dreaded, laughed at, feared, and spoken about only in hushed tones.
As a teenager seeing my own Mother experience pretty extreme menopausal symptoms, I was told to enjoy my adult life while I could because one day, the change would happen and life would never be the same again. Maybe you also had a similar story from the female adults in your life as you grew up.
No wonder then that when it comes to the workplace, menopause is a topic most want to avoid bringing to the table.
I know that we have to talk openly about this stage of a woman’s life. It’s not about being ‘more’ open, but just open. We need to create a safe and accepting environment inside and outside of the workplace where talk about menopause, its effects, its challenges, and the changes it delivers to many women at this stage of their life is completely normal.
How can we do this?
I believe that with everything health related we need to do more upstream than we do downstream. Having policies in place to support and protect women experiencing menopause is needed and very much key, however, I believe more importantly we should be looking at what we can do better before a woman gets to this stage of their life.
Let’s look at bringing in experts who can share more on menopause with your teams. Education about what exactly menopause is and how it affects both females and males is something that will add much value and help normalise the conversation on it, but what’s needed just as much are ways to minimise the effects of menopause when a team member is going through it.
There are many ways this can be done and this will depend very much on the individual workplace and the culture of that organisation. I recommend things like including it as an item in weekly and monthly leadership or other team meetings, not only if women are attending, but for everyone as a standard part of that agenda. Offer safe spaces where team members can meet to ask questions and talk about it, not just if they’re the one experiencing menopause, but for someone else who might be struggling with it in their life - their wife, their daughter, their mother, or a friend.
Training managers is a critical part of building a culture of awareness, support and acceptance. When managers are trained to understand exactly what menopause is and how it can affect someone in their team, they can be better prepared to offer the right support to that person and know how to respond in line with their company policy.
Employers have a duty of care and responsibility to ensure the safety and wellbeing of their team. Menopause is a natural part of every single female’s life, and with 75% of them experiencing significant changes to their health and wellbeing, it’s the time right now to ensure you’re taking the right steps to support everyone in your organisation with this important topic.
Sources:
(1) The trials of menopause report 2021
(2) BUPA (MEW0046). The period of time over which this took place is not specified.
(3) gov.uk Gender pay gap report 2022 reported that 52.7% of the UK workforce is female.
Ready to create an open and safe space for your team?
If you’d like to discuss how we can support your team with information and training on menopause as a part of your wellbeing strategy, reach out to book a free call. We have support businesses and individuals with all areas of health and wellbeing, including menopause.
