Menopause in the Workplace- Morgan Massie

[00:00:00] Hey guys, Corey Poirier here. Welcome to BluTalks and I hope you enjoy this video.

[00:00:29] You don't know it by now. You will never, never, never know it. If you were here this morning, you remember that one, right? Land that talk! Land that talk! All right, again, a little tip from whoever was here this morning. But in all seriousness, I'm here to talk about a very different topic than what I talked about this morning. And again, coincidences I believe happen

[00:00:54] for a reason. And today I'm standing in Longfellow Hall, originally built for the historic Radcliffe College, a prestigious women's college founded in 1879 to expand educational opportunities for women before becoming a part of Harvard University in 1999. And so what an incredible place to stand and reflect

[00:01:16] on the generations of women who came before us. And that brings me to a very personal story. The room is going black. I'm talking full-on tunnel vision. I'm talking getting those prickly feelings up and down your arm where all of a sudden your arms go numb and I can't feel my pinky fingers

[00:01:43] and my heart is starting to skip a beat. And I'm getting little beads of sweat around my hairline along the top of my head. And I can feel my face going pale. And I can feel my heart doing weird things. And if you zoom out for a minute, you have to understand that I was standing in a room with 50 other people, my colleagues, my employees, my boss, his upline boss, in an all-hands meeting in the middle

[00:02:12] of the day. I had no idea what was going on with me. I had never experienced this before. And I thought the worst. Now, mind you, my turn to talk to my staff was coming up soon. And I was feeling shaky at the knees. I've never passed out in my life, knock on wood. But I feel like that was the closest I ever got to it. And so I did what any human probably would have done in that moment. I sat down

[00:02:43] amongst those 50 people standing around me. I sat down cross-legged with my hands holding up my head. And I tried my hardest to pay attention because what do you do when you're a high-performing, driven individual who happens to be the leader of half the people in the room? You charge forward. Hey, I'm just sitting here. I'm still paying attention. I can't see anything out of my left eye, but I'm going to smile and nod and wait for my turn to go on that stage and address my people.

[00:03:14] If only there was an environment in the workplace with which we felt more comfortable, more open, more psychologically safe to address what was going on inside. Fast forward two months later, multiple doctor's visits, wearing that halter monitor, thinking there was something awful going on with my heart. Knowing in my mind it was something much more than anxiety, but that was the only

[00:03:42] answer that I was getting back from my doctors. Oh, you're working too hard. It's anxiety creeping up. You need to give yourself a break. Take a spa day. There is something more going on. I ordered more labs against the direction of my primary care physician and started to see a trend that I wasn't aware of. Long story short, perimenopause. Who knew? I certainly didn't. I didn't feel educated.

[00:04:10] I still feel like I have a lot of questions in my mind around what could I have been told by a mentor, by my mother, by other women who have gone through this change to better have educated me so I knew what to plan for. Because menopause isn't just a workplace issue. If you've experienced it or know of anyone that's going through this type of change, it impacts you. It doesn't matter what time of day it is, where you are, what you're doing. These symptoms are going to show up.

[00:04:40] All right. So I knew what I wanted to say and suddenly I couldn't find the words to say it to people that I worked with, that we need to bring more education and awareness to this because this is a natural phase of life that if you're a woman, if you're a woman, you will probably go through. Not every woman does, but most of us do. And so why are we not having more conversations about it?

[00:05:05] And so I believe menopause in the workplace isn't just a personal experience. It's actually a leadership issue if you think about it. Because what I experienced is happening to millions of women at the peak of their careers, if you think about it. Menopause starts to impact women in their lives around mid-30s, give or take, upwards into their mid to late career path.

[00:05:33] And what are these women doing at that point in their career? They have gained the education, the experience, the skill. They're maybe in leadership positions, or maybe they have unofficial lead positions over special projects. Anyway, they have influence in their career at this point in their lives. And all of a sudden they feel like they're less than, they're getting their brain fog. They're feeling like they're not performing at their peak and no one is providing any sort of

[00:05:59] support to them. And we're just supposed to silently march forward while we're feeling and navigating all of this. Leaders, executives, high performers. In fact, one in four women in a study that I recently read have mentioned that they have considered leaving their jobs completely because of their menopause symptoms. Not because they're less capable, but because they're unsupported.

[00:06:28] And so this is what it looks like. Second guessing yourself in moments where you used to feel sharp, trying to track a conversation, but then you suddenly, it feels harder than it should. Quietly wondering if something is wrong with you instead of understanding what's truly happening. And most of the time, no one says anything to you. When I was sitting cross-legged on the floor, I would have thought that at least one person would have come up to me afterward and said,

[00:06:57] Morgan, are you doing okay? None of that happened. None of that happened. I eventually went over to my boss later on that afternoon and said, I just have to leave early today. Mind you, I didn't leave in that moment. I still hung in there like a champ as best as I could. And I left maybe an hour and a half early. Went home, laid down. The whole room was spinning like you've had a night of drinking. Like there was something definitely wrong with me. And then I

[00:07:23] was able to make my appointment the next day with my doctor and start to get some answers. All right. So most of the time, no one says anything. And let me ask you a question. Who here has ever worked with or led or supported or mentored someone who seemed off? Woman or man. Doesn't matter, right? Without, you know, they just weren't quite themselves,

[00:07:50] but you couldn't quite put your finger on why. And who here has ever felt that way yourself at some point during your career, right? We're all human. So this is already happening. It's not just a menopause issue. What I'm talking about here is bigger. It's a conversation to be more open in the workplace around things that are happening to create language around health and wellness in

[00:08:16] the workplace. Because when we don't name it, we're creating workplaces where people just feel like they have to hide. And when people have to hide, we don't just lose transparency. We lose trust. We lose confidence. We lose performance. And sometimes we lose organizational knowledge right out the door and people decide to self-select out. And I know when working with business owners, leaders, entrepreneurs,

[00:08:39] entrepreneurs, that we want to try to control as much as that voluntary turnover is possible for our organizations. And so even though this is a broader issue around health and wellness, I'm going to zoom it back into menopause because that's what we're talking about today. It's not a hormone issue. Leaders don't have to be doctors and assess an address and say, Morgan, you're looking a little sweaty. Are you having a

[00:09:04] hot flash today? No, there are appropriate ways to address it in the workplace, right? It's a leadership issue. Organizations like Bank of America and other Fortune 500 and larger organizations are already starting to recognize this. It's not a wellness trend, but it's a performance and a retention issue that we have to address from the top down. Around 50 states in the United States at this point are pushing

[00:09:30] forth legislature and bills around to support menopause education and awareness in the workplace. How is your organization tracking with that? Are you ready for this coming wave? Do you have things in place to put in education, awareness, and accommodation for your mid to late career life women? My thinking is probably not. Probably not. So what are you willing to do to help prepare?

[00:09:59] So what does this type of leadership look like? I think it looks like this. It looks like awareness. So first we have to acknowledge menopause in the workplace. We name it. And then we have to have a certain level of understanding. We educate ourselves because you can't support what we don't understand. And then we have to look at our environments. We need to create environments where people don't feel

[00:10:24] like they have to hide symptoms. Where if they're not feeling well, if they're feeling off, they have a safe place to go to discuss it and there are accommodations around them to help support their performance. Now I'm not saying that some woman that's going through menopause in your workplace, you give them a week off to go to a spa so they can get out of their work and go do something else. That would be lovely, but that's kind of stretching it, right? That's not what we're asking for.

[00:10:50] It's just having the conversation and seeing what we can do to enable that continued performance and focus at work. And so here's one simple thing that you can start doing starting today. The next time someone on your team seems off, instead of jumping to, oh, their performance is going to be off for now, forevermore, or just sweeping under the rug and ignoring it. Start with curiosity. Hey, how are you

[00:11:17] doing? Is there anything that you need right now? That one shift from assumption or ignorance to curiosity. That's where the conversation, that's where the leadership begins. And that moment is where that moment, excuse me, that moment when that room went black didn't mean that I was less capable. It meant that I was navigating something that I didn't yet have a language for until months later.

[00:11:47] And it happened in a workplace that didn't yet have a space for that type of conversation. When leaders understand that, they don't just lower, they don't lower expectations. They actually elevate the level of support that we can provide. And so menopause in the workplace isn't just a hormone issue. It's a leadership issue. And workforce readiness overall begins with leadership readiness because when leaders understand how to better support their employees through every stage

[00:12:16] of their careers, man, woman, every stage, organizations are better positioned to retain their experienced talent, strengthen workplace culture, and build more resilient teams. Thank you.

[00:12:30] This podcast is a part of the C-Suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c-suiteradio.com.