Carla Miller [00:00:00]:

Welcome to the Influence and Impact podcast for female leaders. My name's Carla Miller, and I'm a who helps female leaders to tackle self doubt, become brilliant at influencing, and make more impact at work. I've created this podcast to help you to become a more inspiring and impactful leader. And I want to become the leadership BFF you didn't know you were missing until now.

Carla Miller [00:00:29]:

In this episode, we're looking at the unique experiences of midlife women lead in the workplace. And it was inspired by hearing so much about this book, Revolting Women, lead Why Midlife Women Are Walking Out by doctor Lucy Ryan. It was all over LinkedIn. She was being interviewed by lots of people. And whilst we've touched on and had episodes on menopause within this podcast, we haven't really delved lead deep into the experience of midlife women in the workplace. And I know from a recent survey I've done that about half of you that are listening lead would fit within that category of midlife women. And indeed, we talk about what is that category within this episode. So I was really, really delighted to have doctor Lucy Ryan joined me on the podcast.

Carla Miller [00:01:22]:

Now Lucy is a leadership coach, consultant, author, and passionate advocate for women's professional development. Her doctoral research project explored the phenomenon. I can never say that word. Explored the phenomenon lead of midlife for professional women. There was a long standing data gap there, which she talks about. And now she works with companies to intentionally lead. Unlock the potential of this key talent pool. And we explore some really interesting themes within lead this episode.

Carla Miller [00:01:53]:

So we look at this concept of gendered ageism and how that plays out, and how even when we reach the top of organizations, we are lee still playing men's game, basically. Then we talk about the collision of experiences that happen to women in midlife, lead both in the workplace, but outside the workplace and within their bodies as well, and just how much is going on there. And then finally, we talk about lead The revolution, why women are work walking out, how they are empowered to do so, and how it's a real waste of talent. So we explore all of that together. And then as we finish up, we talk about how can organizations stop this happening? What can organizations lead to create an environment that midlife women are able to and want to stay in. And what I think is really interesting For me, that came through very strongly from the book and from my conversation with Lucy is that it's quite nuanced, lead The midlife experience. It's not the same for all of us, and and it's not even the same for any 1 person throughout it. So there's such a lot going on that Sometimes there's just this need to stop, to pause, to recalibrate and reflect on what's next.

Carla Miller [00:03:14]:

Lead And then from there, you decide on what do you want from your life and your working life, and and you have a new lead Energy and commitment to getting that. So there's a lot of hope in this episode as well. So If you are not yet a midlife woman, please, please listen to this because it will really help you understand lead What's going on? And maybe understand some of the assumptions that you might be making about women who are older than you. Certainly assumptions I know I have probably made in the past. And if you are a midlife woman, I hope that you're gonna find this lead Empowering and realize that you're not alone. And if you are in any way responsible for diversity, inclusion, HR, people, lead Please do listen right to the end because we talk about, well, what can you do to change this? And the need for putting policies in place that support lead Older women so that you don't lose them from the organization. It is a brilliant episode, and I don't always say that, but it is a brilliant episode. I hope you really enjoy it.

Carla Miller [00:04:18]:

Lead In the show notes, you will find the links to get in contact with doctor Lucy Ryan. But go out and buy the book If you are interested in this topic, the book is a fantastic read, and one that's very positive actually for midlife women. And then the other thing I wanted to let you know is that this is our last episode before Christmas. We're not gonna do 1, in 2 weeks' time in the run up to Christmas. I will be Taking some time off at that point. We are going to do an episode right at the start of the year, though, on either 31st December or 1st January to help you start your year right. So I'm recording this in mid November, but I am wishing you and your loved ones a wonderful Christmas. I hope that whatever you're doing, you're spending it how you want to.

Carla Miller [00:05:05]:

Take care of yourselves. Thank you so much for listening this year and being with me on The ups and downs of my journey. But, yeah, have a wonderful Christmas break, however you're spending that. And I really hope that you will rejoin me in 2024, and let's start that year right together. So welcome to the show, Lucy. It's fantastic to have you here. How's your day going? Oh, it's great.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:05:37]:

Thank you so much for inviting me.

Carla Miller [00:05:39]:

Lead We've got such an interesting background, so let's start with that. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to end up writing your book.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:05:48]:

So, you know, work wise, I, am a lead a leadership coach, trainer, and I, lead was, coaching a lot of, midlife women and realized that they were making really strange decisions just at the point where they were about lead to move into positions of power. I just when they were about to step up, they weren't. They were stepping out, Or they were stepping sideways or they were stepping down. And I really wanted to understand what was going on. So whenever I really want to understand a phenomenon, I I tend to look at research, and there really wasn't any around Carla. There really was so little research in this area. And I knew I wanted to do a PhD. So I'd left school with no qualifications, really, whatsoever, and educated myself from age 40 onwards.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:06:43]:

And I've done a master's in positive psychology, and I wanted to do a PhD. But I wanted a subject that would engage me enough to last working as I did nearly every weekend for 4 years. Wow. And so I decided to look at the, experience of female midlife professional women. And for sure, it engaged me for all that time. And that's how I started this whole journey. So I did PhD, And, as I say, that took me about 4 years, and the pandemic happened. And I wrote a different book during the pandemic.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:07:25]:

And then this one just wouldn't let me go. Lead and sorted it out, and that you know, it came out a couple of months ago.

Carla Miller [00:07:43]:

And it's been really popular. I keep seeing it lead Everywhere. Like, it's mentioned everywhere. I see you being interviewed. I've got author envy.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:07:53]:

Thank you so much. I've had author envy for so long. It's, it's very nice to experience publicity. And it has you're it has been thrilling. It's picked up by every broadsheet. It's been picked up, you know, in the US, Canada, Japan. So for lee sure this is a topic that resonates.

Carla Miller [00:08:12]:

And it doesn't surprise me at all that there hadn't been any research on it because it's being uncovered more and more now, isn't it? That lead Research is so much based on men. Even like medical research, they're only really now just starting to research the female brain, aren't they, and work out it's different from the male brain lead And how menopause impacts it. So Yeah.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:08:30]:

I mean, we really haven't dug in. You're right. We really haven't dug in to female research. And I don't think we've realized, just how little of the research was based on either the female body lead or the female brain. I think people took it for granted that we'd looked at all genders in our research, lead And it probably wasn't till Caroline Criado Perez kind of blew the whistle with how much lead Research was just done on men.

Carla Miller [00:09:03]:

Yeah. It's it's shocking. And when you say midlife, how are you defining lead Midlife. What what sort of age range are you looking at there?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:09:13]:

Yeah. I'm defining it, well, certainly, when I was researching it, I was defining it lead Strictly between 45 and 62. As as I edge towards 60 now, I'm kind of making midlife 45 to 65. Lead so probably in 5 years' time when I'm 65, I'll be calling midlife 70. But strictly speaking, It's 45 to 62 is what most scientists will agree on.

Carla Miller [00:09:42]:

Okay. Great. Well, we'll be living longer by then, so you'll be right. I think all you do Exactly. You. I like the logic.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:09:49]:

Yeah. Yeah. That that's what I'm expecting.

Carla Miller [00:09:52]:

I'm now 48, and I'm not sure at what point I started accepting that midlife label rather than rejecting lead I know certainly in my early forties, I was like, well, that's not talking to me even though technically, I'm sure it was. But it's only really Quite recently, the last couple of years. I think as I'm edging towards 50, so I'll be 50 in about 14 months, I'm psyching myself up for that. I'm thinking how I want to turn 50, like, as fit and healthy as possible. That it's really got me thinking about lead Kind of long term future and mortality and that side of things. And then it's really felt like that label is something where I like, oh, yeah. I totally associate with that now. Now.

Carla Miller [00:10:37]:

But there seems to be a tipping point where we sort of reject it for a little while because it doesn't feel like us. It feels like our moms.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:10:43]:

You're so right. And it was probably the 1st revolt in the women that I interviewed for my PhD was how much they rejected the term, lead Either older women, midlife, middle age, I I felt very lost as to lead how to term this age group because for sure no one wanted a term that made them feel lee Old or categorize them. But but, at some point, you have to. If you're gonna, research Cohort of women. You you have to find a category term.

Carla Miller [00:11:19]:

Exactly. And we are all getting older whether we like it or not. So the title, revolting women Yes. What inspired that? What made you go for that?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:11:30]:

Well, it was Part of, the research I was doing was looking at the two sides of older women. Lead For centuries in history, older women have been considered an object of disgust, Which is why they have had the term hags, croones, witches, frumps, lead All of those terms are centuries old, and, I was really interested in the whole historical aspect of the older woman. I still am. I'm really fascinated by that. And then there was the other side of it. It's such a great word, isn't it? There's the other side of revolt, lead Which is what I was seeing in these professional midlife women, which is they were all at some point of revolt. Lead Either against the status quo of the organisation, or against a life that had been prescribed for them, or against what career success meant in an organization. So there were all sorts of revolts going on, lead I'm I'm often against their marriages, so there was all sorts of different forms of revolt going on.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:12:52]:

Sometimes it was just lead a revolt to to just stop and just to pause before they changed. So it has all these lead Beautiful meanings to it in terms of rethinking revolution, but make no mistake. Historically, the older woman Has not been treated well in historical terms.

Carla Miller [00:13:16]:

And in the book, you talk about the 2 dominant narratives that lead exist at the moment, the decline and the freedom narratives, and how they place responsibility for this situation on women's shoulders. Can you talk to that a little bit?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:13:31]:

So exactly as you say that the predominant narrative about the the middle aged woman is one of decline. So if we take certainly, let's take our physical aspect, and and you'll see it in today's papers. You know, the middle aged woman is seen to sag and droop from her head to her toe. And I remember going to a talk at the Cheltenham Literature Festival. And all they talked about about the middle aged woman was how her body lead was just falling apart from head to toe. So there's that sense of decline of middle age. It's sad. It's saggy.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:14:12]:

It's droopy. Lead We also talk about mental decline and the middle age woman. So we talk about brain fog. We talk about forgetting everything, And we talk about emotional decline too. The middle aged woman has historically been seen as sadder. Lead so there's a a brilliant book called, you know, Mad, Sad, and Bad, which is the whole history of the middle aged woman. So the decline narrative is very strong, and it still is, Carla. You know, you read most things in papers about the older woman, And we are positioned as, a human being in decline.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:14:57]:

Lead The freedom narrative is still quite young. You know, it's probably only a decade old, and that's where people Started to write about the middle aged woman as Footloose and Fancy Free. It was a big academic piece called that Footloose and fancy free. And that's the sense that the middle aged woman has has shed her children, lead Shed her partner and is kind of off on holiday for the rest of her life, lead and it's kind of quite, you know, a lustful thing to to a very desirable, lead thing to have, but it's absolutely not true. Neither of those narratives lead the reality is what I found. Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:15:47]:

I find it there's a lot of assumptions about women and their child caring responsibilities. Like, lead So but they seem to forget that lots of women had children later. So I'm nearly 49, and I have a 5 year old. So it's gonna be a long time before I shed him and, Doing whatever I feel like doing.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:16:06]:

Yeah. You know, we keep talking about empty nesters. And, of course, that's becoming less and less of a reality. Even when our children leave home for college or for jobs, lead often we still care for their grandchildren, or they're coming home, or what's flying massively under the radar It's the mental health challenges of our older children, and most of my friends have some childcare responsibilities, whether that's for their older children, whether that's for their teenagers, whether that's for their grandchildren, and that's lee we've even started talking about parental care.

Carla Miller [00:16:49]:

And in the book, you've you've put it into 3 core parts. Could you give us a bit of an overview of how you've structured the book? What each of those parts is trying to communicate? And then we'll dive a bit deeper into some of them after that.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:17:05]:

Okay. So the the subhead of the book is why midlife women are walking out. Lead And so the book is structured in terms of what's the problem here. So firstly, is there even a problem? We see lots lead middle aged women on our TV screens now, and then why are they walking out, and the three reasons that they're walking out. Being a power and gendered ageism, so, you you know, still the glass ceiling lead Pretty much firmly in place and, you know, screwed on, the older you get and the closer you get to positions of power. We get the midlife collision, which is a term that I wrote and has been taken up by a lot of both broadsheets, magazines, podcasts, because it so true of what we experience at midlife women, this collision of events. And then thirdly, they leave for lead A revolt because they can, they want to, and they want to forge, a different life at this chapter of their lives. So those three reasons.

Carla Miller [00:18:14]:

Fantastic. So let's dive into that first one, this this idea of the maintenance of power. And in the book, you refer to the missing 919 lead Who are these women? What does that mean?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:18:27]:

What it means is if you take any data of organizations, lead Women are still, vastly lacking at the top of our organizations. Now we are fudging the data at the moment lead Because we have got something like 40% of, non executive directors on our boards of our companies, lead We are hailing this as a success of gender equality. Now it is a success, of course, a success. We've got women on our boards of our companies. What we haven't got though is full time employed female executives, and that data, that figure lead has stayed at about 14% for 9 years. And that's the missing 919 women, Which is if you take the data across our organizations, we are still missing so many women at the top. And the reason for that is there is a a triple whammy of ageism going on. They're not young, they're not male, And they commonly either don't or won't work full time or can't actually work full time.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:19:44]:

So they've got this gendered ages on going on, but there's also this problem of what I call full time foolishness, lee Wanting our leaders to work full time.

Carla Miller [00:19:56]:

And there's a lot to dive into in both of those. And I think there will be women listening to this Who will be glad to hear that called out because it's still quite unspoken, isn't it? That gendered ageism

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:20:08]:

It's very unspoken. Lead It's very unspoken. And and it's a bit like we now have a term for it. So we can call it gendered ageism, but no one really knows what it means. Lead And it is very quiet. You know, I call it it's a bit like the silent revolution. All these women are exiting, and no one's really lead Causing an outcry about it. They're just filling the gaps, either, you know, with more men or Sometimes fewer women, and we it keeps happening.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:20:42]:

So when we're not calling out.

Carla Miller [00:20:44]:

Lead And so for those who are listening to this who haven't yet reached midlife, and they're like, well, what does that look like? They've probably still got their blinkers on because they haven't lead what does that look like on a day to day basis, gender agism?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:20:58]:

Well, I reckon that most women who are lead. Listening to this, Carla, will understand sexism in the workplace, which will take many forms. It'll be physical. It'll be mental. It'll be emotional. It'll take many forms, and I reckon every woman will understand that in some way or another. Lead Gendered ageism is where you still have that, plus you have ageism on top. So, I can give you some examples.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:21:29]:

So, women I interviewed, you take someone like Rea who said, I never say I'm tired. All the young people say I'm they're tired, but I never say I'm tired because Every time I say I'm tired, everyone thinks that I'm just too old and that I can't do something. We also have it in terms of, our policies. So there are plenty of maternity policies. Lead There are plenty of policies for younger women. There are none really for older women other than a menopause policy. So if you've got to go and look after your parents, there are very few elder care policies. If you think about training, there are graduate training schemes, apprentice training schemes.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:22:20]:

There are plenty for our younger women. There are lead Virtually no training schemes for older women. It's like, well, you could do a retirement one or or or you could do a menopause, lead scheme or join become a menopause champion, but we don't talk about enabling our middle aged women to be Creative, energetic, and ambitious. That's seen as the preserve of the young. Lead So, you know, your listeners who are younger listening, it it's literally the sexism they might have experienced lead Double down with ageism, but I don't want to worry them. You know? It'll all be over by the time they get to my age.

Carla Miller [00:23:04]:

Well, there's no perfect age to be a woman, is there? Like, when you were young, you were not taken seriously in leadership roles. And then, oh, you might have a baby, and you're not really committed. And then when you're heading towards menopause, you're not gonna be able to perform at the same level.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:23:17]:

There is It's exactly right. Yeah. There is no great age. We did think that the older woman would have the great advantage because no longer would her reproductive body be held against her. So lead All women have their reproductive bodies held against them. Whether or not they have children, they have the potential to have a child. So what we thought with a middle aged woman or certainly what I thought looking to the research was, no longer reproductive. Lead So therefore, unbelievably productive and welcomed.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:23:54]:

And, of course, the reverse was true because suddenly we were menopausal lead and difficult. And only last week, I was at a women in business lunch, and someone was telling me that one of the older women in her lead team had got this nickname of menopause Mary. Oh. And every time she was the leader of the whole team, and every time she's lead She, had a difficult conversation or was asking people to step up or was being demanding. Behind her back, people were going, there goes menopause lead Mary. And I thought, oh my god. We cannot win. We cannot

Carla Miller [00:24:32]:

win. That is truly, truly terrible. That's a perfect example lead of it. And, yeah, it is the fastest growing demographic in the workplace. It's the fastest departing, but isn't it also now one of the most substantial demographics in the workplace?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:24:45]:

Certainly is. It is. And with the aging demographics, it's only going to get bigger. But, of course, in the pandemic, more women came back into the workplace And have found it hard sorry. Came back into the home, and have found it hard to get back into the workplace. But it is the largest, lead single demographic within our workplace and deserves to be taken seriously.

Carla Miller [00:25:09]:

We need more power. And one of the things that lead In the book, it is is where the power sits at the moment. And there was a wonderful quote, from Kristen, who's a 53 year old ex human resources director, leader, but I wanted to read out because she just nailed it in a way that I really wish I had nailed it long ago. So she said, One of the phrases that always drives me nuts is when men talk about equality, they say, yes, we need to level the playing field. But what they're really talking about is football. Lead That is, we've got to make sure you girls can play football. But I don't wanna play football. It's not my game.

Carla Miller [00:25:44]:

It's never gonna play to my strengths. And for me, that's the fundamental bit that we're missing. This is the male paradigm that exists when we talk about diversity. What we're really trying to do in organizations is to squeeze everyone into a square box. And you go, yes. But I'm round. So, essentially, what we're being asked to do is alter our shape to fit into that box. And that's what equality and diversity means to me as an older woman.

Carla Miller [00:26:08]:

It's trying to homogenize everyone to still fit the male system. Lead Our processes have all been constructed by predominantly middle class white men. And therefore, when you try and look at it from a different perspective, It doesn't work. So I think for me, an inclusive paradigm would be recognizing that not everyone wants to play football, and not everyone wants to fit in a square box. It's really powerful, I think.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:26:33]:

It's great, isn't it? It's great. Kristen was just so, articulate about, what what the problem was that was facing her. And, of course, she left a very senior role and went to do a PhD, because she just couldn't fit anymore.

Carla Miller [00:26:55]:

And it's so frustrating because we're finally getting a bit more of a pipeline of women coming up. There's still that broken rung at the bottom, but we there there is such a lot of lead And I think the thinking had always been, well, at some point, they're gonna get to the top, and organizations are gonna change. And then that glass ceiling, like you say, still there for exactly the reasons that you've outlined in the book. And it's like, well, when when does the revolution come? How do we make this happen?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:27:21]:

Yeah. Precisely the question, obviously, I've been asking. When does the revolution come? And I've had so many, messages going, please start the revolution. It's like, I'm trying. I've written the book.

Carla Miller [00:27:33]:

Forget it. It's like, right. Work out what's next. Now it's also not

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:27:38]:

So that is the power structure.

Carla Miller [00:27:40]:

Exactly. And it's also not as simple as that either, is it? Because in in part 2 of the book, you talk about a collision. Why have you described it like that?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:27:50]:

I didn't know another word to describe it, and it was the most meaningful, Probably parts of the interview. I expected, Carla, the conversations about power structure, About gendered ageism, I hadn't expected that to be quite as visceral as it was. I hadn't expected the language lead That women were called throwbacks, fuddy duddies, old biddies. The language women were called was so lead Vivid and awful, but but I had expected a degree of sexism and ageism. What I hadn't anticipated was the degree of what I call the collision. And that is is that it seems that at midlife, lead Middle aged women face a collision of events. So think menopause mixed with, lead Parental care mixed with so often childcare as you've described, or our older children's mental health challenges, Often mixed with redundancy, financial pressures, divorce. So they have physical, lead.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:29:02]:

Emotional, mental challenges, but it all comes at once. So when people say that 1 in 10 women leave the workforce because of the menopause, I would still say yes, but usually menopause is just one of the triggers. It's not the reason women are are leaving usually. Lead usually they're at the center of a storm, and they don't know what else to do other than leave, and leave quietly because They're busy coping, and everyone lets them go. And the worst thing about it all is that this is temporary. All the issues that we face at Midlife are temporary. And once we've dealt with it all, caught our breath, lead We're ready to step back in. We can't get back in.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:29:53]:

To offer very strongly about it, I I really want this midlife collision to be recognized because we've got to take a longer term look lead At midlife, we cannot go oh, well, you can't take time off because your parents have got dementia, or your kid's in trouble. We've gotta go. Of course, you can. We cope with you taking time off for maternity. We we've gotta cope with time off at this stage as well because you're so valuable.

Carla Miller [00:30:25]:

Mhmm. It's also frustrating because the gender bias is in there, isn't it? In terms of caregiving, for example, the expectation is much greater upon women to care for their elderly parents, other relatives as well, if your parents have already passed away. Yeah. There's so much of that happening, and you don't lead You don't see it so much on the men. It comes back to that, like, equality in

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:30:49]:

the home piece, doesn't it? Yeah. It's 91% of women pick up The caring challenge. And, you know, in my research, the challenges were alarming. I'll just read these out to you. Of the women I researched, half of them had 1 or more parent with a form of dementia for whom they were actively involved with caring. 1 in 10 were caring for their seriously ill husband or a sibling. 1 in 5 were helping their older children, cope with a mental illness. Lead 1 respondent was actively caring for her mum, her aunt, and her mother-in-law at the same time, and another was juggling Seven grandchildren and a mother with locked in syndrome.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:31:28]:

And, you know, the impact with ex was extraordinary. A third We're taking we're taking a break. And many of those will never return to the workplace.

Carla Miller [00:31:39]:

Alex, The impact on your nervous system is huge at that point. I mean, I'm now just realizing that just caring for a child with additional needs. Like, my nervous system just never gets to come off high

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:31:49]:

lead Yes.

Carla Miller [00:31:50]:

Alert. I'm starting to

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:31:51]:

Yeah. I really I really understand that, you know, and I'm sorry you're going through it. I really understand it. And I, you know, my my 95 year old mom is downstairs. I'm caring for her this week. And so that means I'm on, I'm off, But I certainly couldn't do a full time job and be around for her that I want to be in a way that I want to be.

Carla Miller [00:32:14]:

And this is the thing is, I've got friends who are who are carers, and and it's a privilege as well as a burden, isn't it? Like, to to spend that time, to be able to give back that love that they gave to you lead As you grew up, it's a it's a complex thing.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:32:29]:

I'm so glad you said it. I'm so glad you said it because Every time we talk about parental care, Carla, we talk about the burden. And that word is constantly used. And, you know, my mom is always saying, I don't want to be a burden. I don't want to be a burden. And practically every woman I spoke to said I want to do this. I want to be there for my parents. And although it's tricky, because when we have younger children, We're so used to sharing, aren't we, the care? Certainly, I I was very used to it.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:33:01]:

You know, neighbors, friends, you know, quid pro quos going on the whole time. You can't do that with your older parents. You look after them and there isn't anyone else particularly there to help you. So it's both lonely, but it's also a privilege. And so often, all women are asking for I know. In I one of the women I interviewed, all she needed was 5 weeks. Both her parents died within 2 weeks of each other, and she just wanted 5 weeks off. And she wasn't given it.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:33:35]:

And, the book is littered with examples, particularly of women stepping out to look after their parents.

Carla Miller [00:33:44]:

Mhmm. And so it seems like that's where that revolution starts, isn't it? The the move away from full time to part time for those that lead that want to keep going, but being able to create that pause. And what I really found interesting within the book is the nuances that you talk about in those Three phases of midlife. So in my head, it was kind of all 1 phase, but you talked about the the stop, the pause, of change. Can you talk us through those phases?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:34:09]:

Yeah. Of course. Yeah. It it's because it was articulated so many times Throughout, the interviews in that because of this collision, there is a moment lead where we have to stop. You know? And it often is just a have to. Too much going on. And And so we we call a halt to everything. And and very often, the only thing we can call a halt to is work.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:34:40]:

Mhmm. Then there is a lee pause phase where we breathe. We look around. We catch our breath. You know you just said that lead Caring for your son, you you kind of have a a constant high adrenaline. What's going on? How do I care for him? How do I look out for him? Is he okay? Lead So you have when you stop, you have a high adrenaline, high cortisol going on. You then have to pause lead And look around. What what's going on? What do I want this next phase of my life to be? Lead.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:35:15]:

And then comes the revolution where we change. And that change might be stepping up, stepping back in, which is What most of the women I interviewed wanted to do, bizarrely, they didn't want to retire. Their motivation was completely different. They wanted to change, lead. But they wanted ambition, written in in their way, so they fed all areas of their life. Lead So it is a sense of to stop, to pause, to change. All I see is the 3 phases of midlife.

Carla Miller [00:35:49]:

I love it. And this idea that that we can start to come into our own after midlife. And I I've heard others say to me before, there is a point you reach where you stop caring so much about what other people think. I have not yet reached that point, and I'm like, That sounds really, really empowering. I have to point if I want to do things on my own terms, and it sounds like that's what it sounds like. It sounds like, Yes. We want to do things, but, actually, we want to do things on our terms now. We don't want it to be all work or all caring.

Carla Miller [00:36:19]:

And I you talked about the

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:36:21]:

female sparkle as well. Yeah. Tell us a

Carla Miller [00:36:24]:

bit about that. What do we have to look forward to?

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:36:28]:

Oh, we have loads to look forward to. The the the sparkle of female genius came from a, lead philosopher called Julia Kristeva, who I studied a lot for, you you know, my PhD. And lead She had the description of women as a sparkle of female genius. And it was like, yes. That's exactly how I would describe older women. So this is a sense of revolt, which is I can change, I'll do it on my terms if you don't want to do it with me. And what I see in midlife women is this enormous resilience, energy, lead a beautiful sparkle and all sorts of wisdom that gives them this sparkle of female genius. I love it.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:37:17]:

You know, you look at any midlife woman, and they've got so much knowledge and creativity and desire. It's, lead Just so interesting. Where it where it's often difficult is, not every woman, older woman, has choice lead financial choice. So those who have financial choice have much more opportunity to live that phase of their life lead in exactly the way they want to. Some women, though, don't have that financial choice, and they're forced either to work, lead full time on a corporate's terms and to fit everything else in, or I find more commonly, they leave and they're doing, like, five lead Portfolio jobs.

Carla Miller [00:38:03]:

It's interesting. And so I hope that the women who have lead Listen to this who aren't yet at midlife have had their eyes open a little bit about what's going on. And also that there are women probably wanting to come back into the work place with a huge amount of talent and drive and ambition that could be huge assets for organizations. I feel like those experiencing with some of this, whether it's the start or whether they've been experiencing it for a while, will hopefully feel a bit more lead Understood. But I love that there's this message of hope that it's not it's not a decline forever.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:38:37]:

No. No. You might you might lead Experience, you might experience a sense of decline in terms of, Loss is the best way I can describe it. So you'll find that midlife women experience considerable loss And that's in many ways. Often, the loss of our children from the family home, loss of our parents, Loss of our fertility, sometimes loss of our jobs, friends. So We experience considerable loss. But, but, but, that loss gives us what's called a stealth motivator, Which gives us this huge sense of right. I'll live the next chapter in a way That is really fulfilling, really meaningful, and we galvanize ourselves lead To live this next chapter in a way that is purposeful.

Carla Miller [00:39:48]:

I love that. That is inspiring. Now I also know that listening to this podcast are a lot of people who work in people teams, HR teams, that side of things. What What would you really I think this will have been really enlightening for them, but what would you love them to either understand, or what would you love them to start doing to make workplaces A place where it's not a talent drain for midlife women, but in in instead, somewhere where midlife women can lee or take a pause and come back and really make the impact that they have the potential to make.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:40:20]:

Yeah. It's a it's a great question, and I've got several ideas. Lead I would love for any of the listeners to this who have responsibility for, lead Diversity, equity, inclusion. To firstly add, gendered ageism to their diversity agenda. You will commonly see on any diversity agenda all sorts of intersections, But you rarely see age. So I firstly like age added to that diversity agenda. Once you've done that, you need to find your data, track your data, find out where are the broken runs. We we kinda know where the broken runs are, Except we're not tracking those broken runs further up the ladder.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:41:08]:

So where are those broken runs, and where are the leaks out of your succession planning? So just do some tracking. Do some data. Do some searching. Secondly, do a listening exercise. Lead Find out what it's like to be an older woman in your organization. You'll probably find that many of the HR women listening are in, that cohort and know exactly what it's like to be a midlife woman in their organization. So listen to their own experience And build that community. Do a listening exercise and build that community.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:41:47]:

Thirdly, I would love Every organization to conduct what I call midlife check ins. You know, what we're doing is exiting interviews. So we are lead Finding out the problem, when the horse has bolted. Mhmm. And I think if we actually did lead Proper midlife check ins, male and female, and found out what is going on in that person's life properly, lead Then we would resolve quite a lot of the issues before they happen. And then I think there's an lead size in ending this full time foolishness for senior leadership roles. I don't know what it is that every organization thinks lead That leadership, senior leadership has to be 5 days a week, 247. Lead so there's 4 things for starters.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:42:42]:

Is that is that a good enough starter?

Carla Miller [00:42:44]:

That's a brilliant starter. Thank you. And I was reading something on LinkedIn the other day saying co leading is a feminist principle, lead and the idea that we don't need just 1 person in charge of everything. In fact, co leading is a great idea. And job shares, I think, traditionally, we've always thought lead shares as, women coming back having had children and not wanting to come back all the time. But it's it's not lead Just it's men as well. And it's people of different ages. Like Yeah.

Carla Miller [00:43:12]:

I completely agree that the part time working, it should work for everybody. It's Not even just something we should just do at the moment.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:43:19]:

Agree. I'm starting to see some amazing job shares, but hardly any. Mhmm. And yet they're awesome. 2 people for the price of 1. And And I'm starting to see people, you know, go for job interviews as as one entity. You know? You want me for this job, but we come as a job share. How incredible is that? So coleading, I talk about coleading in the book just because someone had started to talk about co headship lead And we're studying co headship.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:43:44]:

You know, the idea that we should be isolated in leading our organizations lead It's crazy. So job shares right from the top would be incredible. And so

Carla Miller [00:43:54]:

for those listening, we have actually interviewed the job share pair before, about job shares and how to set them up and how to support each other when you're running them. So do go and check out that episode. Lead So Amazing. It has been a real delight, Lucy, talking to you. I absolutely love the book. I think it needs to be on everybody's

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:44:12]:

Thank you.

Carla Miller [00:44:13]:

Reading list. I am right behind you when you start this revolution. Let me know what I can do. We're all here now

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:44:19]:

Thank you, Carla.

Carla Miller [00:44:20]:

Behind you on this revolution, lead Because there is so much talent and ability out there that is not being recognized and valued, and that doesn't serve Anyone in organizations. So thank you for writing the book, and thanks for coming on and sharing your insights with us today. I really appreciate it.

Dr Lucy Ryan [00:44:37]:

It's been my lead Pleasure. Thank you for having me, Carla.

Carla Miller [00:44:41]:

Thanks for listening to today's episode. If you're not already subscribing, please do so so that you don't miss lead Any future episodes. And if you want to go deeper on the topics that we talk about here on the podcast, on confidence, lead Self doubt, imposter feelings, increasing your influence, being better at leading, then there are a few avenues that you can take. Lead The simplest is to get yourself a copy of my book, Closing the Influence Gap. If you love this podcast, it is crazy if you don't already own that book because It's got so much of the content from the podcast in a really accessible way and so many practical tools and strategist. It's basically a practical guide for women leaders who want to be heard in the workplace. You can grab a copy in any bookstore. Now we also run a couple of open programs.

Carla Miller [00:45:31]:

We run them once or twice a year each. There is Be Boulder, our 4 week confidence and assertiveness course, which is suitable for women at any level. And then there's also influence and impact, which is our women's leadership development program. That's a 3 month small group cohort working closely with me. And then my team and I also work in house in organizations. Sometimes that's working with women leaders, whether that's Running a whole women's leadership program or running one of our really popular master classes for women leaders. Sometimes it's working with early to mid career women Where we're often sharing our Be Boulder confidence and assertiveness program. We also offer gender neutral versions of that, which are becoming increasingly popular because Women aren't the only people experiencing confidence challenges.

Carla Miller [00:46:21]:

And then finally, we do work lead with Allyship and supporting men to help bring about gender equity in the workplace as well. So if you are heading up a team lead or a department within your organization, you're responsible for the people function or l and d, and would like to have a chat about how we can work together, I would Absolutely love that. And you can go to my website and book a call. Or if it's simpler, head on over to LinkedIn. Let's connect, and let's chat there. I would love to take working with you to the next level and help you to become an organization that lead retains and develops and supports the talented women that work for you.