Claire Stuart, Gender at Work Manager, GenderTick & DIE Advocate

GenderTick is a YWCA initiative designed to show employees that your organisation is committed to gender equality. The GenderTick independent accreditation:

• Provides assurance around gender policies and practices
• Increases attraction and retention of women employees
• Improves workplace culture
• Mitigates future legal risk; and
• Demonstrates your commitment to gender equity to employees, customers, investors, and shareholders.

In 2021 GenderTick got itself a new manager (Claire Stuart) and with her a major overall of their accreditation criteria including the creation of ‘Advanced Criteria’ with specific menopause requirements for employers.

Joining GenderTick from Diversity Works New Zealand, Claire has worked as a leader and influencer in many roles which have had diversity and inclusion at their heart, being a driver for change in implementing inclusion initiatives.

Diversity, equity and inclusion are something that Claire has always had a passion for throughout her life. She has understanding and empathy on a personal level, being one of five daughters, she is a keen advocate for gender equality, she also has a neurodivergent son and a transgender family member, and proudly advocates for these communities as well.

In our one hour conversation Claire and I discuss:

• How and why GenderTick accreditation is changing
• Claire’s personal motivation for elevating peri/menopause within these changes
• Understanding women’s reproductive health through life as part of the human context within which their work experience takes place
• Why organisations need to get on board from a DE&I and wellbeing perspective
• The challenges for midlife women and through them workplaces and society
• The menopause specific GenderTick accreditation criteria
• Entry points into the peri/menopause conversation and how you can make a start; and
• Watching the labels and stories we create around peri/menopause and its outdated stereotypes as we do the work to educate, support, and train people about it in our organisations, communities, and society.