Employment Rights Act 2025 – will women in the workplace benefit?

Robert Shore: Hello, and welcome to the Brightmine podcast, formerly known as the XpertHR podcast. Brightmine is a leading provider of people data, analytics and insight, offering employment law expertise, comprehensive HR resources and reward data to meet every HR and organisational challenge and opportunity. You can find us any time of the day or night at www.brightmine.com.

Hello everyone. My name is Robert Shore, and today we’re going to be talking about the Employment Rights Act 2025 – what else? – but here specifically in relation to its impact on women in the workplace. And I’m delighted to be joined to do that by Caroline Green, who is a regular contributor to the Brightmine website, among other things. Hello Caroline.

Caroline Green: Hello Robert.

Robert Shore: And I think probably you’re about to publish a book on an associated subject so can I begin by just sort of asking you to tell us a little bit about your experience to this point and sort of research that you’ve been doing for the book and on the ERA?

Caroline Green: Absolutely. Thank you. Yes, and it’s like you say, I’m a regular contributor so it’s lovely to be here on our podcast as well.

So my name’s Caroline Green. I am the CEO and founder of a business called The Talent Cycle. I have worked in careers and learning development for about 20 years. It makes me feel old when I say that! But I have been working in the sector for quite a long time and running the business for sort of just over six years. And within that business I do a lot of one-to-one career coaching, a lot of training of line managers. We do retreat days for women and have a real passion for supporting women in the workplace, and all women in the workplace – and I’ll come onto that; no doubt we’ll kind of talk about that a little bit more shortly.

But I also do a lot of writing. So as you mentioned, I’ve written some articles for you previously and continue to do so.

Robert Shore: Well I mean, just to sort of jump in on that, you’ve been tracking for us a lot of the responses to people in your network to the Employment Rights Bill, as it was at that point, and what people were thinking about in relation to it. So this sort of follows on from that, doesn’t it?

Caroline Green: Yeah, absolutely. No, no, thank you. And thank you to those fantastic women and men who’ve contributed to those articles as well because as you say, it’s about network and hearing lots of different people about actually how the ERB, as it was…you know, how everybody’s been feeling as we’ve been sort of going through that. So it’s been really important to get those voices.

And hearing other people’s voices is very important to me and that’s been a huge part of my book as well, as you mentioned. So I have a book. It’s called The Career Confidence Toolkit for Women. It’s specifically aimed at careers and HR professionals, to help them. It’s based on data and research but also lots of practical, lived experience as well, including my own. And I interviewed 23 amazing women as part of that, who’ve all sort of shaped the book, to talk about, ‘Actually what can we do? Why is it women struggle with their confidence, both in work and in life generally?’ And what we can do as well to support them. So that book’s out on the…so the official publication day is 12th February, so really looking forward to launching that very soon.

Robert Shore: Caroline, that’s fantastic. So I think let’s begin then with how women struggle in the workplace. What are the areas that you’ve identified there? What do we need to be thinking about?

Caroline Green: So I think there’s lots of areas, unfortunately, that women can struggle, both in the workplace and in life generally. And some of this is internal things and some of it’s coming from external. So if we sort of start with the internal stuff, one of the big things obviously is hormones, the joy that is hormones, and the struggles that women face particularly in certain points in their life. So, you know, perimenopause, menopause. I think a lot of people talk about it as if there’s one or two symptoms, you know. Things like hot flushes, for example. In actual fact, in my book I interview a menopause coach who talks about the fact that there are 34 different symptoms that women can face. And obviously, you know, they may be facing some of those or all of those in the workplace itself.

Help is obviously at hand with that because with the Employee Rights Act there are changes afoot with that. So with larger employers who will be required to publish equality action plans that explicitly include how they support employees going through the menopause, as well as addressing the gender pay gap. So that’s a really good, positive thing that’s coming forward that may well help women sort of struggling with perimenopause and menopause. But there are sort of other suggestions and other things that employers, that individual line managers, that HR can do and think about in order to support women with this particular struggle. So thinking about, you know, flexible working. Never underestimate the value of that. You know, it’s a good example of sometimes relatively small changes can make a huge difference.

So I’ve previously written an article about this topic, and an employer picked that up and talked to me about it afterwards. They do deliver a very much a client-facing delivery model. They can’t just have everyone working from home all the time. But what they did sort of pick up from my article and from talking to the women in their company was that a lot of those women had really bad fatigue. And so actually, going out and being client-facing every single day, you know, from noon ‘til dusk was just too much for them. So what they’ve done is changed their model, so rather than being kind of client-facing all day they’re client-facing more often but they are sort of not doing that all day. And that really, really helps the women. It still supports the customer. They are still happy because they’ve still got the right amount of client-facing time. But it’s simple changes like that, that actually if we just think outside the box a little bit, that can help with something that is a massive struggle for women.

Robert Shore: So there you’re saying that an employer actually found they were able to modify their own working model in order to accommodate this, because obviously, you know, you’ve got a very valuable workforce and you also…which is one of the issues with menopause, isn’t it, the sort of historical loss of women in the workplace to that and, you know, employers benefit by making these adjustments so that they manage to retain talent. I mean, that’s the point, isn’t it?

Caroline Green: Absolutely. And it’s a win-win situation. This isn’t just about supporting those women, although there is, you know, that kind of moral argument for that. But there’s actually a business case for this as well, absolutely. And like you say, it’s about support that talent. Now, if you think about the sort of average age of someone who’s going through perimenopause and menopause, they’re likely to be a really valuable resource in your workplace. They will have, you know, a huge amount of career experience behind them. And as you say, you don’t want to be losing that talent. So if there are adjustments that you can make, you know, like…why wouldn’t you, to support those women and, as I say, still meeting the needs of your organisation, still meeting the needs of your clients.

Robert Shore: Yeah. Now, you’ve mentioned flexible working and there is a part of the Employment Rights Act that addresses that. I think that comes in in 2027, or it’s supposed to (at the moment I don’t think there’s a precise date attached to it), and it’s quite a modest adjustment, isn’t it? Which is just it creates greater need for an employer to be really explicit in their reasons for refusing a request to work flexibly, and that it has to be reasonable.

Caroline Green: Exactly. And you know, sort of, as I mentioned at the start of this, I’m an advocate for all women in the workplace, so often we will hear about different things that are put in place to support mothers in the workplace. Really, really important, absolutely. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t do that. It’s completely crucial that employers do that. However, there are one in five women in the workplace who are without children. So there is actually a much bigger group than people realise, and actually it’s thinking about how to support them as well. Now I’ve worked with and interviewed – and again, one of the women I’ve interviewed in my book talks about her experiences of having asked for flexible work not because of childcare reasons and having been rejected because it wasn’t for a childcare reason – so I’m absolutely fully in support of anything that reinforces this message that there’s lots of reasons why lots of us want to work flexible, you know, whether that’s about, you know, shift patterns or place of work etc. There’s lots of different reasons. So it could be because of menopause. It could be because of childcare. It could be because of, you know, looking after elderly parents who need that support or a million and one…it might just be because you want to potter about in your garden. You know, all of these things, they’re okay. It’s about that helping women with their wellbeing and supporting them. And you know, it goes back to the point that we were just saying about. It’s great talent; you don’t want to lose it. So it’s thinking about bringing that act it, it’s just kind of reinforcing that message. And as you say, it’s not huge changes from what we’ve got already. It’s just about reminding people, you know, why it’s there and why it needs to be there, and to just support employees in any way that you can.

Robert Shore: Yeah, ‘cause I think again with the menopause and gender pay gap action plan requirement, which is also a 2027 measure at this stage, at the moment it’s not clear that it’s going to make a vast sort of requirement of employers beyond a sort of tick-box exercise. But obviously it continues to nudge employers towards thinking creatively about both the human case, the purely human case, and also the business case, which is, you know, you want to retain talent.

Caroline Green: Absolutely.

Robert Shore: And your own business, of course, is called The Talent Cycle.

Caroline Green: Mm-hmm.

Robert Shore: What’s the…is there a story behind the name?

Caroline Green Yeah, absolutely, and that is exactly why. It’s all about supporting that cycle of the talent if you’re an individual. So thinking about, you know, career development. And career management isn’t a one-time thing. We don’t go into schools and talk to, you know, teenagers and that’s it. You know, I’ve talked to a lot of teenagers over the years and said, ‘You don’t have to have your whole life planned out by the end Year 9, despite what our education system might, you know, have you think.’

Robert Shore: No, but by Year 11!

Caroline Green: By Year 11! Have your whole life sorted by then. No! You know, I sort of spend a lot of time talking to teenagers about that. But also, you know, we’re growing and developing. You know, the modern workplace is changing. You know, lots of us aren’t staying in roles so long. There’s lot of sort of development, you know, personally that you could be doing, and thinking about your career and how that’s changing. So there’s a real cycle of talent for yourself.

But also I do a lot, as I mentioned, I do a lot of work with employers thinking about their cycle of talent, absolutely, and how to kind of keep that moving. You don’t want a stagnant workforce but you want to retain talent. You don’t want to lose talent unnecessarily. And there’s lots of ways that employers are doing that. And like you say, with the ERA hopefully it will bring a bit more clarity, a little bit more understanding, a little bit more, you know, of those legal requirements. However, you know, as you mentioned about the sort of reporting, you know, gender pay reporting has been around for a while for different organisations. Some, you know, do that. Some care about it. Some do it as that kind of just ticking a box side of things. But it’s really about I would encourage HR professionals at the moment to think about, ‘Okay, how can we use this as a tool to support women and, you know, and to support everyone in our workforce? And how can we, you know, bring this to life so that we can live and breathe it within our organisation?’

And a lot of this…and again, you know, one of the problems for women is culturally, across society, we’ve had to, and continue to have to battle a lot of things. And you know, anyone who works in HR who’s tried to change a culture within an organisation knows that that doesn’t happen overnight. When we’re doing it on a much bigger sort of societal platform it’s even more challenging. So we have that that’s all coming into the workplace.

So anything that you can do to support, whether that is talking to the senior leaders in your organisation about the ERA and actually what that really looks like and distilling that to them, you know, in practical terms, but also thinking then about the other side of things.

So for example, with your line managers, how you support them, how you train them to embed these things. You know, I’ve mentioned already some of the things, you know, such as sort of supporting women without children or women who are going through fertility treatments and things like that. I mentioned hormones before. That’s, you know, that’s another big area. There are a lot of women in the workplace who are currently dealing with fertility treatments and may or may not want to talk about that at work. That’s entirely up to them. But the women that I’ve interviewed and talked to for the book, you know, who’ve been through that process, talk about the value and the importance of having that line manager who’s just a bit sensitive, who’s just a bit caring, who creates that psychological safety. You know, as you mentioned before, I’ve done lots of work with Brightmine. I’ve done a podcast before on that topic of psychological safety ‘cause that’s just so important, to create those environments where women feel safe that they can talk about things, where you can then just have those conversations and bring, you know, bring the act to life, ‘cause otherwise it’s just a bit of paper. It’s, you know, it’s about really bringing it to life and supporting all employees.

Robert Shore: Can you offer a few tips on that, really, actually? How do you create psychological safety? What are the sort of beginning points when talking to line managers that sort of help to…’cause obviously it’s going to vary a great deal according to, you know, particularly scenarios and also personalities. How should you be thinking?

Caroline Green: I think, you know, to me it’s all about inclusivity. You know, psychological safety is all about, ‘I feel safe at work, I feel heard, I feel listened to. I’m not afraid to speak my mind or share ideas or thoughts, or share about who I am,’ you know, and we haven’t talked about those intersectionalities of women struggling with, you know, lots of sort of other areas. It’s about being not afraid to be you at work.

So the way that line managers can help support that is through that inclusivity. It is about giving everyone a voice. It is about listening to everybody. It is about treating everyone with fairness and respect. It’s really basic things but it’s surprising how often this doesn’t happen. So again, you know, sort of examples of, you know, with the women that I talked to, who will talk about, you know, the inequalities with…actually, I mean, you look at where men are in the organisation, for example, versus you know, where women sit in terms of, you know, promotions and things like that, and why does that happen? I talked to lots of women without children who sort of say, you know, ‘I’m not allowed to take time off during the school holidays ‘cause I don’t have children.’ That’s, you know, that is not fair and that’s pitting people off against each other and that doesn’t help.

It’s all of these really sort of basic ways of just listening to people and understanding, and treating everyone with fairness, really.

Robert Shore: Yeah. And I guess, you know, you just begin always with the assumption that other people are not exactly like you.

Caroline Green: Yeah. And I think, you know, in coaching we talk a lot about that, you know, being curious. So you know, approaching things with a sense of curiosity rather than, you know, ‘I know everything.’ And I think actually, I’ve worked with a lot of line managers who are terrified because once you become a line manager you think you have to know everything. You don’t. It’s okay. That’s not what the job is. You know, you’ve got specialists there to know all the things. But it’s about approaching that sort of with curiosity.

Robert Shore: And so in terms of being curious, if I can ask this question, obviously one has to be slightly careful about questions that one asks. How can one be curious in the best possible way?

Caroline Green: I think it’s…do you know what? It’s asking questions like that. It’s about having those kind of open questions and not just assuming that you know the answers. It’s not about badgering people when, you know, they then sort of answer to something. And I think, you know, lots of people are okay with being asked different questions as long as it’s not coming from an assumption, if that makes sense. You know, like we’ve talked about menopause. You know, talking to a group about, you know, with curiosity to me would be about, you know, just sort of saying, ‘Look, I want to create an environment that is suitable for everybody in this organisation, and I’m aware that there are certain things that women, for example, will find challenging, menopause being one of them. Can you tell me a bit about what that’s like? Are you able to share? Do you feel comfortable to share?’

That’s a very different conversation to just badgering someone about, you know, ‘Do you have menopause? Are you going through menopause? Tell me about that.’ Or you know, I’m child-free by choice. I experience lots of people harassing me once I sort of say that I don’t want children. Then it’s like, ‘Well tell me why. Why, why, why?’ And that’s not approaching it with curiosity. So I think it’s really about those sort of open-ended questions and coming from a genuine place of wanting to understand. And I think sometimes it’s looking at yourself but looking at your organisation as well. You
know, we’ve talked about, you know, gender pay reporting, for example, and some organisations will just do that as a tick-box. But actually thinking about, ‘Well what does that…you know, let’s look at our organisation. Have we done that? Why have we done that? How can we be better?’ You know, it’s asking those questions of yourself as much as it is about asking others, I think.

Robert Shore: Yeah. And with the gender pay issue, the sort of dial hasn’t shifted that far, has it, in the years that it’s been operating? And I don’t know that it’s always because people are cynical about sort of just posting figures. There may be some truth in that, but it is also one of the things addressed in the Employment Rights Act, is creating an action plan and also an action plan that works.

Caroline Green: Yes, an action plan that works.

Robert Shore: And also different ways of understanding data because it’s actually quite a tricky thing often, or you need people who are extremely good at reading numbers and stats and understanding what it might be that you have to do in order to make a change. And obviously with the pay gap and menopause action plan requirement, which as I say is due to come in next year, it is really…obviously that seems to be a step forward in terms of saying, ‘Okay, so you have some data. Now what’s your plan on the back of that?’ And then of course there’s the question of, ‘Is it a good plan and does it work?’

Caroline Green: Yeah.

Robert Shore: But I suppose, you know, we progress little by little.

Caroline Green: And I think there’s different stages to it, isn’t there? There’s, like you say, there’s that gathering data, how do we gather data. I would encourage, you know, HR teams to be thinking about that right now, as I know lots of them are, but thinking about that in practical terms for them. Do they need to be budgeting for more tools, more resources, whatever it is that they need in order to be able to, you know, gather that data. But I think, you know, our HR colleagues are brilliant at actually doing that and saying, ‘Okay, here we’ve got the data. Now let’s turn this into the story that the organisation needs.’ And I don’t mean make that up! I mean, you know, how do you… how do you then sort of sell this data to your organisation, whether it’s talking to senior leaders, whether it’s talking to colleagues etc.? Thinking about, ‘Actually, what’s the message here that we want to get across, that we need to get across, and how do we talk about this?’ How do we sell, for example, the fact that if we are underpaying our female colleagues, you know, how do we sell the message that that’s not okay? That goes back to our kind of, you know, our arguments around retaining talent and things like that. Or it’s about benchmarking and so on. There’s lots of different ways that you can frame it and phrase it. That’s definitely sort of part of it. And then as you say, it’s then sort of how do you sort of take that to the next step of actually kind of bringing that in, and what does that look like?

Robert Shore: So when you’ve been working with organisations across the period since pay gap reporting has come in, can you sort of give us a couple of good examples of where you think that’s been done well, where you know, you’ve sort of seen a fairly inspiring example of actually taking data and managing to make a case that’s actually worked?

Caroline Green: So this is an interesting question ‘cause I can probably give you way more examples of those that haven’t, worryingly. That probably says a lot.

I think those who’ve done it well have…it’s about the organisation. It’s like any bit of data. It’s about the organisation and what is that organisation going to listen to. Some want that kind of numerical data. Some want to hear the sort of personal stories behind it. You know, and I’ve worked with organisations who’ve done that very well on the whole, not just about gender pay reporting but, you know, a lot of different areas. And a lot of it is about them framing that in terms of, ‘What’s the business case for this, and how can we then, you know, move forward?’

I’ve worked, and you know again lots of my interviews with the women for the book, we’ve talked about different ways that businesses have supported women, ‘cause it’s not actually just about the pay; it’s about lots of other things, just all the things that we’ve talked about. I think the organisations who do it well do it in a holistic way and support women in all of these different ways as well as the pay side of things as well.

You know, one of the women I interviewed for the book talks a lot about, she wants to kind of make salary history, is what she calls…she sort of refers to. And does a lot of working with women…and you know, I’ve seen this in organisations as well where it’s like, ‘Stop asking women. Stop asking any employee what they used to earn, you now, in a previous role.’ Because actually that then, you know, can impact what you then offer them. You could end up low-balling them when actually you don’t need to be doing that. So I think organisations that I’ve worked with who don’t do that, who do it based on, ‘Actually, you know, what’s our budget? What do we think this role is worth? We’ve done our benchmarking. We’ve met this person. This is what we think they’re worth.’ Gender is irrelevant, collecting that data is irrelevant. It’s actually thinking about those individuals in front of them and the talent that they’ve got already and the talent that they want. I think that’s kind of how organisations do it really well.

Robert Shore: Another element in the Employment Rights Act concerns harassment. Also big changes came in in 2024, in autumn 2024, and now we have another couple of major ones due to be introduced in October of this year, 2026. So just really what you think that might do, and what issues that address. I should say what those are. I
mean, first of all there’s the introduction of employer liability for third-party harassment, which is quite a significant one. What have they been saying about this?

Caroline Green: I think, you know, everyone is all for it, for one thing. It’s definitely not a sort of area that anyone is kind of debating should be happening. And obviously we should say as well with harassment, it could be, you know, any gender. This isn’t just women. But you know, it often happens to women.

I think one of the big things that I’m hearing from people, as with a lot of the act at the moment, it is still actually…there’s still lots to be clarified and confirmed and decided. And one of the big things is, I think some of the wording is around ‘all reasonable steps’ being taken, and there’s still a bit of a question mark over, ‘Okay, well what does that actually mean?’

Robert Shore: So there are two strands. So there’s the introduction of the word ‘all’ in front of ‘reasonable steps’ that is there. And as you say, there’s a question over how much further…or that it to say if people are already taking reasonable steps then what does ‘all’ mean? And we look for further guidance on that, which is probably going to come out of the employment tribunal above all else ‘cause, well, people will bring cases and then we’ll see. And that applies specifically to sexual harassment whereas, as you were saying, with third-party liability, which is one that’s got a lot of headlines, that applies to harassment generally. Well, to all of it.

And I suppose there have been a few questions asked around that with employers who, you know, run pubs, for instance, or spaces where it’s hard to control, harder to define who your customers, clients are, and the people your employees speak to. So I think it’s one thing that’s caused a bit of anxiety, which has possibly been overreported. I don’t know how that will actually work in practice. And as you say, you quote in your article people saying this makes complete sense. But there is a monitoring sort of question about how it’s going to work.

And I think one thing that came up at a round table we did was about…I mean, obviously employers carry out risk assessments all the time, and if you do a good risk assessment then you’re doing your duty to take reasonable steps. That’s a key part of it, isn’t it? But then beyond that, being able to lay down your expectations to customers and clients, and this is often quite a sort of a tender are because they’re often…well, they’re the people who spend money with you as an employer. You can see how it raises certain issues that need to be tackled but again it’s quite subtle, psychologically, sometimes to persuade people to make the right decisions.

Caroline Green: I think you’re right, and I think it’s…to me some of this goes back to culture and, you know, and again sort of people that I’ve interviewed for various things and even the book, is we talk a lot about allyship and about getting that kind of male allyship of building that right culture, because actually as a society if we had the right culture we wouldn’t even need this in the act.

So it’s about actually, how do you take those reasonable steps? And like with a lot of the act, it’s a case of actually, if you’re doing things right anyway you’re probably not going to be making huge changes with this act. It’s for those who aren’t doing, you know, even the bare minimum of things that they should be for employees, including this area. So there’s a bit of an evaluation of that.

But then also laying on top of that there is that side of, ‘Actually, what other things can we do?’ And again it goes back to that question, ‘What can we do to be better?’ You know, is it, ‘Do we need to do better training and briefing of staff themselves?’ Because actually, like you say, we don’t have any control over our customers as such, but we definitely have more sort of control and weight with our staff. So what can we do to support staff to make sure that there isn’t anything, you know, any harassment happening within staff, and that staff really, truly understand what is not okay?

Some of those environments you’ve talked about, I would say, are quite kind of hotbeds for, you know, banter that actually isn’t okay. So it’s about learning about, you know, for staff to learn actually what is and isn’t okay. And you know, perhaps getting in some sort of specialist training. There are specialist providers out there who sort of explain about a lot of this stuff.

And then it’s once you’ve got your staff better equipped, they also can then be better equipped of how to deal with it in the right way because sometimes actually it’s, like you say, it’s about getting that balance right ‘cause they are still customers, but actually it’s about being really clear on kind of those boundaries and what is okay and
what’s not okay. And I think, you know, 99% of your customers, if they see that other customer who is acting in an inappropriate way and you’re dealing with that in a firm but, you know, let’s say polite but…firm, customer-focused way but supporting your staff and other customers, you know, that’s not going to create any issues for you with, you know, your broadest customer base, if that makes sense.

Robert Shore: Yes. So we’ve done a tour of the Employment Rights Act and its impact. Beyond that, can I just ask in your book, The Career Confidence Toolkit, tell us a bit about the toolkit.

Caroline Green: So the toolkit…the book, the approach of the book is I look at, you know, again in more depth than we’ve perhaps had chance to talk about today, but talk about some of the challenges that women face, both internally and externally. And then I look at actually how do you then sort of solve some of those challenges, or how do you support women to overcome some of those challenges. Either how do you support them or how do you support them to support themselves and learn how amazing and brilliant they are. So that’s sort of the structure, if you like, of the book. And then within that book, for every chapter there are tools at the end of every single chapter that can help you do that, that can help you have some of those conversations, that can help you first of all understand that context and then, like I say, use those tools to help.

So in terms of tools, there’s a whole range of different things that you can use from, you know, there’s some really good coaching questions. There’s some other activities where you can support women to sort of self-reflect, for example, thinking about what their values are, what their strengths and things like that. So lots of kind of practical things – practical activities, I suppose, is another way of putting it – that you can use to support women. Or women can pick that book up themselves and use that. Or you know, I mentioned before about allyship. Absolutely. The more men that read this book as well, the better. They can then sort of understand a bit about actually what are some of the challenges women face. And then again those tools, which are just practical things, practical activities that women can use, or can be used with women, to support them thrive as the amazing, brilliant women that they are.

Robert Shore: Finally, just to put you on the spot…

Caroline Green: Okay!

Robert Shore: …give us three tips to take away today.

Caroline Green: Three tips to take away. I think one is – and we haven’t actually talked about this too much – but one is listen to women’s voices. Don’t just make assumptions. Don’t just sort of think, ‘Oh okay, I’ve got the Employment Rights Act, I need to make all these changes. I know what’s right for women so let’s just make it.’ Make sure you include women in the conversation. That’s definitely one of my tips.

My second tip is think long and hard, and look long and hard, at yourself and your organisation and think, ‘Are we actually really doing the best for…not just for women but all employees within our organisation?’ But do think about that through the lens of, you know, particularly for women, ‘Actually are we doing all the things that we can to support them?’

And then step three, obviously, is, ‘If we’re not, it’s time to act on it.’ Obviously with the act, it’s being brought in in a phased approach. You don’t have to wait until that comes along. You know, there’s been…obviously it’s been in the pipeline for a long time. There’s been a lot of research and data and conversations already about this act and why it has come into being in the first place. So there is a reason for it. And so, you know, you don’t have to wait ‘til it becomes law and it’s really being pushed. Think now. Think about, you know, it’s a really good opportunity to kind of get your house in order. That’s sort of…one of the HR professionals that I interviewed for one of the articles that I’ve written for you, we talked about that a lot, is about getting your house in order now. There is never any harm in doing that. You know, there may be changes with the act as we go forward. There may be further details that we don’t know yet. But if you can get those kind of baseline things in place now, you can just build on that more and more.

Robert Shore: Wonderful. Caroline, thank you so much for joining us today. I think there were some really interesting points there for people to consider. And also thank you for underlining the fact that although we have the act, we are waiting for lots of details ‘cause there are consultations and then regulations to be published, and so actually it’s not always clear precisely what everything entails, even though it’s now the Employment Rights Act 2025.

We’ll put a link to the book in the show notes, and also to your articles and other supporting materials that we have on the Brightmine website. So again, Caroline, thank you very much for joining us.