Niche Recruitment

Posted by Niche Recruitment
17th March 2023

Championing Women’s Health at Work

Have Your Say…

In light of this month’s International Women’s Day, we want to open the conversation surrounding women’s health in the workplace. 

Take our Women’s Health at Work survey…

Our team celebrated International Women’s Day last week by attending a variety of events and workshops which got us thinking about our internal policies. We want to ensure that we are embracing equity here at Niche, but are also curious about what other businesses are doing to truly support women’s health in the workplace.  

The female employment rate in the UK was 72.3% in December 2022, with 15.66 million women (aged 16 and over) in employment that same year. UK government data, suggests that women now make up 52.7% of the workforce. With more women working in the UK than ever before and the recent news that the government will be offering childcare support to parents of 1 and 2 year olds, we hope to see these figures grow.

However, these promising numbers of women in work are under threat. Recent statistics suggest that women are having to leave their jobs due to lack of support regarding women’s health within the workplace.  

Data from Hertility Health

• 1 million women in the UK have left their jobs because of menopause symptoms. 
•  1 in 3 employees leave their jobs when they are undergoing fertility treatment. 
•  70% of employees surveyed were willing to change jobs for fertility benefits.  

These figures are large enough to cause concern for many employers. Neglecting women’s health in the workplace doesn’t just risk reduced productivity from female staff (when struggling with a female-related health issue) but, in a worst-case scenario, risks valued team members leaving. 

Championing Wellbeing at Work

‘It’s important that we provide the right support to our team to ensure they feel seen and supported.’

Niche Recruitment’s Co-Director Michelle Graham attended Hertility and Yu Life’s ‘Her Health Matters’ webinar last week to find out more about the future of women’s health at work.  

‘The ‘Her Health Matters’ webinar was incredibly insightful and really resonated with me on many levels. As a female business owner with a predominantly female workforce and having gone through fertility treatment myself, oh and now peri-menopausal, I understand the struggles first-hand.

This makes it all the more important to me to ensure that we provide the right support to our team to ensure that they feel seen and supported to be the best version of themselves. Here at Niche Recruitment, we have a maternity policy and the beginnings of a menopause support policy, but it was clear during the webinar we need to be thinking about women’s health more widely.

Not only am I keen to further explore the education that we need as a responsible and caring employer, but also to ensure that the conversation extends beyond the female staff and onto the male staff also so that they can support their partners, families and co-workers. The thought of supporting conversations, testing and diagnosis and encouraging true wellness in the workplace is a step in the right direction.’