FRESH FEED

On the 14th October, we celebrate Ada Lovelace, who in 1843 wrote the first ever computer algorithm. While working on Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine, she imagined a machine that could make art, music, and patterns, not just calculate 1. It’s a fitting starting point for industries built on imagination. The modern games and creative sectors owe as much to artistry as to engineering, and yet, the balance of who gets to shape those worlds is still uneven.

Menopause is still a word that makes some people shift uneasily in their seats, and it’s a topic that we’ve been avoiding for too long. But menopause isn’t a “women’s issue” in the sense of being sidelined — it’s a leadership issue, and it’s time we started treating it as such.

Every October, the pink ribbons return, and for a few weeks, we all rally behind the message. Then November arrives, and men start growing moustaches for Movember, and we start talking about men’s health (which is equally important), but the noise about breast cancer drops off a cliff.

Let’s talk about something a lot of founders, leaders and hiring managers do (sometimes unknowingly): hiring their double. But here’s the problem - if your team is made up of people just like you, who’s filling the gaps and doing the stuff you can’t do? 

New stats show that disability discrimination claims have jumped a whopping 40% in the last year. That’s nearly 12,000 cases going through Acas’s early conciliation process - up from around 8,500 the year before. And guess what’s behind a big chunk of that rise? Mental health.

In July, the Government published its official Implementation Roadmap for the Employment Rights Bill, providing employers with the most detailed timeline yet for when the wide-ranging reforms are likely to take effect. For those of you already familiar with the broad proposals, this document is less about what is changing and more about when.

If there's one thing the pandemic taught us about work, it’s that we don't have to sit in an office from 9 to 5 to get the job done. We've learned that when workers are trusted to work in the manner that works best for them, they tend to deliver more. A strong culture isn’t about tracking hours; it's about trusting individuals to deliver results. When people feel trusted, they engage more deeply, collaborate more openly, and stick around for longer. 

When people talk about building a strong culture, they often reach for the obvious things: engagement surveys, benefits packages, flexible working, socials, ping pong tables with matching branded paddles. But the really good stuff - the stuff that actually builds a culture people want to stay in, contribute to, and grow with? That stuff is often a bit less shiny. And a bit more uncomfortable.

The government began a thorough examination of the parental leave and compensation scheme in July.