Members of Balance, our women's network, shared their personal stories, including their International Women’s Day traditions and female icons, and we heard a story of a female customer who'd overcome domestic abuse with our support.

Representatives from the business attended external virtual events organised by Inclusive Companies and The Fawcett Society to celebrate the achievements of women, and we held three virtual events ourselves.

Henpicked delivered two sessions on supporting colleagues experiencing the menopause and we had some great feedback. One colleague told us: “This is the only organisation I've ever worked for that has actively discussed this issue which eventually normalises it.” Another commented: “This has been such an informative course. I feel so much more informed now and more confident to manage staff going through this stage.”

As well as this, Gemma Stow held two career development workshops for female colleagues.

What’s next?

International Women’s Day might be over for another year, but we're committed to making real changes that affect our female colleagues throughout the year.

As well as supporting with our gender pay gap action plan, network members have been working with our HR team on our family friendly offer and, as a result, two recommendations have been made to improve the policy.

We're also looking at ways in which we can support high performing females to develop within the business and look forward to seeing more colleagues join our women's network.