Less than Ideal: Menopause at Work
It seems a benign concept at first blush. As we navigate our To Do lists, a background assumption holds steady that we are, broadly, attempting to be a good worker - sometimes even an Ideal version. Normally when going through a hiring process or vying for a promotion, we try to explain how wonderfully competent and qualified we are. Or, maybe when it’s ‘End of Year Performance Review’ season and we’re asked to present ourselves in the best light possible.
However, sometimes what seems benign can grow into something harmful. Sometimes it’s useful to challenge our assumptions by asking questions.
I’ve got some questions.
What is the Ideal Worker?
In academia, the Ideal Worker is a construct found in research focussed on work practices that are detrimental in some way. While definitions vary, all include the requirement of being devoted to work by way of giving up time. Indeed, time seems to play a fundamental role in the central themes of prioritisation, presenteeism and connectivity.[1] The Ideal Worker is the employee who works long hours, works late, and is perpetually available at short notice. While the demand on one’s time is overt in this description, let’s consider the demand on one’s body here, as well. Among other things, a body needs rest, recovery, varied human interactions, sunlight, foliage, and fuel. Buried in the expectations of the Ideal Worker is, at best, a desire to ignore the body and its neediness. At worst, there’s a requirement to decimate the body. Come to think of it, industry has been keen on ‘severely reducing’ the body for improved production efficiently for a very long time now.
But why?
The Ideal Body
If the Ideal is an employee who can devote much of their time to work activity and is constantly available, what does it require of that employee’s body? It requires consistency, predictability, and denial. The Ideal produces a consistent trajectory of output that can be measured against a neat set of quantitative variables - hours logged, tasks completed, emails answered, meetings attended, reports filed, etc.[2] Likewise, this construct harbors latent assumptions in an oversimplified career trajectory that is linear and neat - one that, particularly in mid to late stages, is occupied by someone who is a leader, is confident and in control, and is agentic.[3] There is no space in the Ideal for disruption or unpredictability found in menopause symptoms. Rather, those are treated as an impairment or obstacle to productivity and employees who experience the symptoms attempt to manage them away.
The build-up
From a very young age, girls are taught to discipline their bodies - to hide, control, and subdue them. Girls grow up to become women in professional work places and so, the discipline apparatus evolves in response to the environment. In this space, women learn that: 1) a professional body is a ‘fit’ body; 2) a professional body purposefully gives off signs and messages through behaviour (including nonverbal) and performance; 3) a professional woman's body is positioned as excessively sexual. [5]
Layered atop the demands of prioritisation, presenteeism and connectivity is yet another requiring control. The Ideal, as a menopausal woman at work, is one who individually takes control of her symptoms, making sure to keep the shame and embarrassment to herself so as not to inconvenience others.[6] Indeed, most organisations respond to menopause like society does - as though it’s something to be subdued or coped with individually by the ‘sufferer’. In a study looking at Menopause as “one of the most distinctive and individualised aspects of health-related gendered ageing at work”, researchers found:
“Through a narrative of resilience, menopause symptoms were described as something to be endured, put up with, something women had to learn to live with. Women felt that the onus was on them personally to cope with menopause symptoms, without drawing attention to themselves at work.” [7]
I have another question: Is anyone else getting tired of all this individualised, body-in-need-of-discipline talk?
What’s there to be done?
This is an important question to ask for a couple of reasons. First of all, the notion that menopause at work as an individual experience eventually results in deliberate obfuscation. It hides structural inequalities while simultaneously allowing them to continue by claiming to promote equal opportunities.[8] It’s important to ask about change because, quite clearly, change is desperately needed when it comes to menopausal bodies at work.
Second, across the globe people are working much later in life compared to previous generations. Improved global health, more work in ‘knowledge industry’ jobs, dwindling pensions, and a better understanding of potential positives from being employed have changed the shape of careers immensely. This is not your grandma’s career.
The Demand
Top-down tick list:
[_] Start by asking what needs to be done (e.g., surveys, focus groups, etc.) while analysing existing turnover data to get a better picture
[_] Continue the evolution by assuming women are a vital part of the workforce and necessary to the organisation’s success. Task the correct department with securing resources that will equip supervisory roles with what’s needed to facilitate better support.
[_] Operationalise successful aging in the organisation. Rethink the challenge of all employees not fitting into a neat success rubric by considering the opportunities of having several. Older employees tend to have extensive experience making them an opportune mentor, as an example.
[_] Identify and remove obstacles and penalties to flexible work options.
Bottom-up tick list:
[_] Seek support from informal workplace support systems. Strengthen these by putting more structure around them (e.g., scheduling time/place/agenda, requesting supervisor support, requesting workshops, etc.)
[_] Seek out what’s available through your organisation (or even national legislation) in relation to flexible work patterns.
[_] Refuse to be disembodied. Our bodies are not the problem. The Ideal is the problem.
Final thoughts
Much of the space in Future of Work talk is devoted to digital changes to roles and industries, but we need to think more human. The demographics of work are changing rapidly and drastically across Europe and North America. Bodies will continue to show up for work in all their forms and functions. When my peri-menopausal body tells me it's time to take a break and catch the breeze, it’s right.
Sounds pretty Ideal to me.
“But seriously, I mean it’s almost as if employers want people, but without the bodies they’ve got,” - quote from Focus Group 1 in Butler’s study [6]
Works cited
[1] Howcroft, D., Banister, E., Jarvis-King, L., Rubery, J., & Távora, I. (2024). Digitalisation and the remaking of the ideal worker. Work Employment and Society, 39(3), 703–726. https://doi.org/10.1177/09500170241301015
[2] Müller, J., & Chung, H. (2025). From the ideal worker to the inclusive worker: Measuring norm shifts within occupational contexts. Gender Work and Organization, 33(1), 261–276. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.70038
[3] Steffan, B., & Potočnik, K. (2022). Thinking outside Pandora’s box: Revealing differential effects of coping with physical and psychological menopause symptoms at work. Human Relations, 76(8), 1191–1225. https://doi.org/10.1177/00187267221089469
[4] Gray, D., De Haan, E., & Bonneywell, S. (2019). Coaching the ‘ideal worker’: female leaders and the gendered self in a global corporation. European Journal of Training and Development, 43(7/8), 661–681. https://doi.org/10.1108/ejtd-01-2019-0011
[5] Trethewey, A. (1999). Disciplined Bodies: Women’s Embodied Identities at work. Organization Studies, 20(3), 423–450. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840699203003
[6] Butler, C. (2019). Managing the Menopause through ‘Abjection Work’: When Boobs Can Become Embarrassingly Useful, Again. Work Employment and Society, 34(4), 696–712. https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017019875936
[7] Steffan, B., & Potočnik, K. (2022). Results section: Coping with menopause symptoms at work.
[8] Voß, J., & Ettl, K. (2025). Shadows and spotlights: A postfeminist analysis of women innovators’ experiences with (in)visibility. Organization. https://doi.org/10.1177/13505084251384778