Cycles of Success

Ever wished you could harness your hormonal cycle as a productivity superpower? Our special guest, Danielle Howell, a hormonal cycle optimisation coach, is here to show you how! Danielle's fascinating journey, from the high-paced city life to unraveling the secrets of hormonal cycles, is truly inspiring. She unveils how understanding and managing these cycles can lead to enhanced productivity and well-being. This conversation is not just for women - everyone can benefit from understanding how hormonal cycles impact daily life, and it's a must-listen for anyone seeking to better understand and support the women in their lives.

If you've ever considered a career leap but felt paralyzed by self-doubt Danielle has some bold insights to share too. Her story is a testament to embracing change and shattering the shackles of imposter syndrome as well as being a powerful reminder that seizing opportunities and having the courage to make drastic career shifts can lead to unforeseen successes and personal growth.

From the TEDx stage to corporate talks and working with clients one to one Danielle is on a mission to share the life changing impact that tracking hormonal cycles can have on boosting self-confidence and self-belief.  Brace yourself for an enlightening discussion that might revolutionise your approach to work and life.

You can find Danielle's website here https://thehcocoach.com/

To get your hands on a really simple one page guide to Hormonal Cycle Optimisation go to  https://thehcocoach.com/free-stuff/

If you want to learn more then a great place to start is to watch Danielle's TEDx Talk which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xfg5SMSWd_k

The JobsWorth website is here www.jobs-worth.com

Follow me on LinkedIn; https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnhawker/

Follow me on Instagram; https://www.instagram.com/jobsworthpodcast/

Follow me on TikTok; https://www.tiktok.com/@globaltechcollective

Subscribe to my newsletter 'The Job Journal from GTC'; https://tinyurl.com/TheJobJournalFromGTC

Learn more about my proper job; https://www.globaltechcollective.com/

Contact me using hello@jobs-worth.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Hormonal Cycle Optimization and Productivity
• 11:24 Bold Career Moves, Embracing Change
• 23:41 TED Talk and Hormonal Cycle Journey
• 30:15 The HCO Coach - Optimising Performance and Energy Levels
• 42:44 How businesses can better support their staff

Transcript

John Hawker: 0:00

Jobsworth, season one, episode 10, cycles of success. Welcome to episode 10 of Jobsworth. Yep, we've just hit double figures. My guest for this episode is Danielle Howell, a hormonal cycle optimization coach. There's a tongue twister for you right there who's empowering not just women but entire organizations to harness the power of hormonal cycles for better productivity, mental health and overall well-being.

John Hawker: 0:37

From our own life-changing experiences to our eye-opening TEDx talk, danielle brings a wealth of knowledge and personal insight into a topic that's often overlooked, on too many occasions swept under the carpet. I do mention it in the episode, but I approach our conversation from a position of nigh-on complete ignorance, one which many listeners might be able to relate to. A big thank you to Danielle for not rolling her eyes once during this chat and for leaving me with so much insight and advice that I've been able to use to support and better understand the women in my life. Whether you're a man or a woman, an employer or an employee, this conversation could change your life. So, without further ado, let me introduce you to a woman on a mission to show people, both those with and without periods, how hormonal cycles can go from being a pain to being a superpower Danielle Howell. Danielle, thank you so much for coming on.

Danielle Howell: 1:30

Thank you, what an introduction.

John Hawker: 1:32

Well, it's all true. I mean, I'm mindful that I needed to do a fair amount of research before going into this, danielle, because I am going to caveat everything with the fact that this is all a little bit out of my comfort zone, the conversation we're about to have, but I think that's the whole reason. I wanted to have it, because, for so many people, this topic especially as a man talking about this with you I think it is going to test those barriers and those boundaries of comfort. So I'm willing to dive right into it and hopefully the listeners will be too. I think it's such an important topic to be discussing. So, before we kick off and go into what it is you do and talk about your journey as well. I do have an opening tradition on this podcast, and it's a question I ask everyone when they come on. The question is when you were younger so school age what did you want to be when you grew up?

Danielle Howell: 2:18

Oh, I love that question. If I'm honest, I never had a real passion for anything specific. There's probably two things that come into my mind, with the first being I remember a conversation when someone I think probably very young someone's saying what do you want to be when you grow older? The typical question of a child, isn't it? And I think the answer I gave was something along the lines of I want to be a taxi driver so that I can drive all the old people around to where they need to be.

John Hawker: 2:45

Oh, wow, okay, that isn't where I thought the end part of that was going to go, but that's a really lovely sentiment behind that, okay.

Danielle Howell: 2:52

It actually kind of works with what I'm doing now, because obviously I had a desire to help people get from where they are to where they want to be, which is ultimately what I do along a slightly different line.

John Hawker: 3:03

It's the journey. Yeah, I like it, I like it.

Danielle Howell: 3:05

And the second thing, I do have memories of sitting in school, and do you remember the old stencils that you used to get?

Danielle Howell: 3:13

that had all of the letters of the alphabet and some other little symbols on there as well. I remember setting that up on my school desk, on the desk pretending it was a typewriter or a keyboard, as we have now, and sitting there and just typing away, pretending to be sitting in an office and doing work. So it wasn't necessarily a specific job, but definitely had a desire to be, I guess, feeling productive and that I was, you know, in control of something that I was doing there.

John Hawker: 3:40

Yeah, interesting. Well, they're both great answers and you're always allowed to, so that's absolutely fine. And actually the taxi driver kind of analogy is really nice. You are helping people on that journey from A to B in a very different way. You're not physically driving them in the back of a car. But yeah, I kind of like that one.

John Hawker: 3:57

When we were talking about career guidance at college or secondary school, I think back when we were going through that process, there were very. There were two routes primarily weren't there and it probably was. You know, at the time I was going through college and it was banking finance. It's basically get to the city, find a job in finance or find a job as a PA and EA in a support capacity, and they were kind of your roots in, weren't they as well? And the world has changed dramatically since then. But it's interesting to just see what routes we were inspired to follow and I think at that time going to the city and getting a job was probably that box is checked, you're on the ladder and that's a good thing to do, absolutely.

Danielle Howell: 4:39

And I honestly thought you know I'd won the lottery. I felt I'd hit the big time by getting that first job in the city. That was a huge step for me.

John Hawker: 4:48

Yeah, and it was, I think, from all the social markers that we would have been judging success by at that time as well. It really was, and I have to say, looking back at your career and we'll go into that a little bit more now it was the start of something successful because you had a varied career, but really interesting career. But we'll talk through that.

Danielle Howell: 5:04

How long is this podcast? How long do we have?

John Hawker: 5:07

Well, as long as it takes, as long as we both have this morning. So we're going to go on to your background and let's sort of touch upon your career journey. Can you share a bit more about your personal journey that leads to you becoming a hormonal psych optimization coach, and it's going to take me a little while to get my mouth around saying that a few times. But then maybe let's backtrack slightly and start with your earlier career. So you go to London and you get your job in a legal firm. Talk us, give us a potted history of what happens over the next few years to bring you up to where you are now.

Danielle Howell: 5:40

Always test my brain a little bit to go back that far, giving away my age now as well, aren't I? I went in as a receptionist and I think it was about six months in when the law firm actually approached me to then go in and be a secretary in the law firm, and again, I was absolutely stoked with that. I didn't have a plan as such, but obviously I had shown the skills that were needed to actually transfer into that firm and I learned a huge amount in those first years of just learning about business generally. But I was very specific in property law and I learned just so much about even moving house. You know, at that age I hadn't even bought my own first house, so to learn that whole process was actually just a really good life skill as well as a job that I was doing. So I went in and did that and then I think again, maybe it was a year, something like that and I'd started to see I don't know if you remember this actually when I used to get the train up to the city and you'd get off for the train at Liverpool Street and there would be these magazines that were always shoved in your face as you were trying to walk through the platform with hundreds of other people and these magazines had all these different jobs. It was literally what's the equivalent of now an online newsletter of different vacancies. It was full of vacancies and full of PA jobs and legal secretaries, law firm jobs, and I remember seeing a few of these and seeing the salary and thinking, wow, okay, that's quite a significant amount more than I'm earning. And these were big city law firms.

Danielle Howell: 7:15

Where I was was a smaller law firm, more of a family run type business, and so, yeah, I went from that law firm and I went and put myself up for an interview at one of these big top 10 law firms and just thought, wow, you know, will I get that? That's a real bold move. And I did and it was, I think at that time, a 10,000 pound increase, which was huge in one move. And I stayed there for a few years and in fact, that was actually Herbert Smith. Where I have been, I've returned, I've left and returned.

Danielle Howell: 7:53

It's a company that I'm. It's quite close to my heart. I have to say. They've always treated me very well and I've had some great experiences with them. But I think after about a few years in that particular role I started getting, I felt like I wanted to do more, but I couldn't really understand what more meant, and I actually then decided to take a job locally as a conveyancer. So, going back into the whole property, I wanted to progress but I couldn't because I didn't have a university degree at that time. I couldn't become a trainee at Herbert Smith or any other big law firm because that just wasn't how it worked. So I took a conveyancing job in a local, local law firm and quickly realized that just wasn't for me. It was a lot of pressure for someone who really didn't have that much experience and I felt very out of my comfort zone.

John Hawker: 8:49

Can I just interject and ask how old were you at that time? Daniel, I probably was around 20.

Danielle Howell: 8:54

Okay, so that's still very early on in your career, isn't it? 2020, something like that. Yeah, Maybe actually 22,. Let's go 22. Trying to work out when did I have the big 21st birthday party?

John Hawker: 9:06

Yeah, that feels like it's less of a thing now, the big 21st birthday party, but I remember having exactly the same thing. But yeah, go and carry on. Just trying to kind of get an idea of the chronology.

Danielle Howell: 9:18

So I left there and decided you know what, let's go and get that degree. But I didn't do law. I did something that I thought I would just find really interesting, which was tourism and leisure management, and I went to a local university in Chelmsford. I went to Anglia, ruskin, and I just drove there every day. I didn't have the full university experience of living on campus or anything like that, but I loved it. I love learning and I have realized that over the years.

Danielle Howell: 9:42

Although it was something I'd never worked in, I really just found it super interesting, again from a personal perspective, not just education or focusing on what the career would look like. And from there I ended up going a little bit left wing and going into wedding industry. So I was doing a bit of wedding planning, wedding events, so I would actually go and set up all the tables and I'd actually be sort of a manager for the day to help things run smoothly, which then led me into a golf club where I was actually selling the venue as a wedding venue and again running events there, which also coincided with this role of selling golf membership which I literally knew nothing about and gym membership as well.

John Hawker: 10:31

Wow, that is a varied. That's a lot of hats that you're having to wear in that golf club for sure.

Danielle Howell: 10:35

It was, but again, I loved it and that's probably, if I'm being honest, one of the jobs that I've loved the most in terms of actually doing the job.

John Hawker: 10:45

Did the team around you, the people around you, play part of that? Because I used to be in the fitness industry for eight years and actually some of the best jobs I had were working in gyms with a good bunch of people. It's like the people support network and just it's having a laugh. So was that down to the people around you as well?

Danielle Howell: 11:01

I think so a little bit. I could probably say that about a lot of jobs that I have had actually, but I think in terms of my skills and my just, I loved the weddings. I mean just seeing all of these different types of weddings and meeting different people, and it's something people come in really excited to talk about and it's just a real positive experience as a job and that was what I loved about it, I think.

John Hawker: 11:24

Yeah, okay, so post golf club. Where do we go beyond that?

Danielle Howell: 11:28

Well, so after a couple of years of doing that as much as I loved it, I'm gonna be honest here and say money because you're working locally. I was on a commission. Well, I had a basic salary but plus commission. I think I just felt, compared to what I was doing back in the city prior to this whole phase, I was earning a lot more money and I had that internal battle of do you go money or do you go something you're really loving?

Danielle Howell: 11:58

And there was probably another element to it, where it was a local kind of family business and things weren't maybe quite as structured as I had had in the law firm.

Danielle Howell: 12:09

And that's not a criticism, it's just a different way of working and for me I missed that structure of the law firm and some people might go in there and say it's far too structured. But it's regulated, it has to be to a degree. So I had this calling to go back and again. So I reached out to people from Herbert Smith that I knew and there was a demand for a role which I was told would suit me quite well and I went for it. And this is probably a theme that you'll see with the conversations we're having here. I just went for it because that's the kind of thing I will do. I will just see an opportunity and say let's go for it, and if it's meant to be, it will be, and if it's not, then something else will come that will take me in a different direction, and I do tend to live a little bit like that.

John Hawker: 12:58

Yeah, which will sit and resonate with a lot of people and for some people will make them feel incredibly uncomfortable, because it is just a subjective approach to how you feel about work and how you kind of dive into those opportunities. I've been similar. I mean, I took a job in recruitment because I went for a beer, I was scaffolding at the time, it was freezing cold and I was working outside. I went for a beer and someone offered me a job in a nice warm office in the middle of December and I said yes to it because I thought it can't be any worse than what I'm doing now. Let's give it a go and just dive straight into it. And 12 years on I'm still doing it.

Danielle Howell: 13:32

But Look at you now, yeah.

John Hawker: 13:34

That approach resonates with me, what is kind of an archaic view now of how your approach work having to work with a company until you retire just doesn't exist anymore, so talk to us about that. So it was a return into a more structured, let's say, more traditional work environment, going back into the city, back into a law firm. So what was the role that they've said you'd be good at?

Danielle Howell: 13:53

So this was another legal PA role.

Danielle Howell: 13:56

And it was for a group of partners, a specific group within the law firm, and yeah, I started. I think I was there doing that role a good couple of years. I actually got on really well with the team. We had a very good work in relationship and to move away from that was quite an interesting one. So an internal opportunity came up and I remember feeling really bad to have to go to my boss's the partners, and say I was actually wanting to move and I remember one of the partners said, well, you won't get the job and I kind of stood back.

John Hawker: 14:33

Oh, okay.

Danielle Howell: 14:34

Why is that? He said well, I simply won't let them take you.

John Hawker: 14:39

Well, that's a nice way of saying you won't get the job, so okay, so they're just going to sabotage your opportunity more than anything else.

Danielle Howell: 14:45

Which of course he didn't do. That was him all over and exactly how he would approach things and I took it and understood exactly what he was getting at and I took it as a compliment, you know, for him to not want me to go, it was a huge compliment. Yeah, I didn't need us to say I did get the job.

John Hawker: 15:01

I can imagine you did, yeah, but it's nice, isn't it? You make impressions on people along the way and they don't want to let you go, and that's the testament to, obviously, the work that you were doing at the time, going back to your childhood aspiration of being a taxi driver taking people on a journey from A to B again, I mean that metaphor for change management, isn't it?

Danielle Howell: 15:19

ultimately, isn't it just?

John Hawker: 15:20

on that journey. Yeah, I mean great, it's brilliant that it's spun round to connect again. So change and systems change kind of ties in with that and they drive within you to try and help people as well. So there, those boxes ticked, and again it's a great example of your comfort, of diving in and grabbing an opportunity with both hands.

John Hawker: 15:40

I mean if anyone's looking for some advice when they're thinking about career opportunities. If you can do it, if you can just force yourself to kind of put your toes over the edge and just take that leap, sometimes it can really really pay off.

Danielle Howell: 15:52

This is one of the reasons why I got into coaching in the first place. I remember being at a Christmas lunch and someone I was working with asking me about things I was doing in my life and different jobs I'd had, and he actually said to me my goodness, you need to go and do this as a job to help people, to take that leap, to have the confidence to make those decisions, because you've clearly done things and it's worked for you and you've got an opportunity to help people. And I did sit and think, yeah, whatever, but it's interesting how that's actually come to fruition in a number of years later yeah, I think there's an element of imposter syndrome as well, isn't there?

John Hawker: 16:28

or feeling like why would anyone want to listen to what I'm saying when you're first told? Maybe you've got an aptitude to help people, because half the time and I don't know what your internal monologue is like I can't help myself. I need to get my shit together, my own shit together, before I can ever hope to try and Help other people, whatever they're going through. So did you get any of that? Was that kind of the narrative going in your head to a degree at that time?

Danielle Howell: 16:53

yeah, don't get me wrong. Although I make bold decisions, I definitely have those phases where I think what the hell am I doing and can I actually do this? Yeah, I say yes to things, but on the day I'll rock up and be literally crapping my pants. But you know this whole thing of glass ceiling and pushing through. If you really want to achieve things, you just have to go through that. There's no easy route. So you have to take those, take those leaves it's really good advice.

John Hawker: 17:21

It's really good advice. Nothing happens, or what is the cliche? Nothing grows in the comfort zone. I think that is it. Maybe it is, but it is that there is an element of truth. It's a horrible, cheesy cliche, but I'm going to stick with it. And so connect the dots for me, because it's so change management and, looking back through what you did, it was a successful running in change as well, and I think we've got a few mutual connections from the work that I do in change management from a recruitment perspective. But connect the dots for me now from how do you go into that change space and then to the job that you're doing now, which is and I'm going to try and get better at pronouncing it hormonal cycle eight, hco coach. Can I say that? Can we just Right?

Danielle Howell: 18:02

so connect the dots for me and I just to make a point on that so I came up with this name. I mean, coming up with a business name is one of the hardest things, right? Oh, I came up with this and then started using it and practically was like this is impossible to say, even from my, my efforts. So that's why I decided let's shorten this to the HCO coach. And yeah, if I ever did that again, I would definitely rethink that. So anyone thinking about setting up a business really important, keep it short.

John Hawker: 18:31

I'll jump in there as well and say that completely resonates, because my company name is global tech collective. If you try and say that quickly when you're introducing yourself on the phone, it is a tongue twister. So GTC has just been born from that, basically. But anyway. So, company name aside, as an HCO coach, how do you go from change to where you are now, at least making that decision to move into where you are now?

Danielle Howell: 18:52

Yeah, so I have the pandemic really to thank for that and where I was at the time. So I was a contractor and I was in a very fortunate position where I would go into firms for around a year ish, do my job and then have a few months off which was amazing to actually do things I wanted to do. I took six months off to go and do an iron man and at the time of the pandemic, just before that, I actually took time off to then go and do this triathlon coaching out in New Yorker and it wasn't a paid job, it was just something that came up, an opportunity again that I said absolutely. I have very basic that. The first and level two, I think, is fitness coach, something that I considered doing a while back.

Danielle Howell: 19:39

But they wanted people to come along that could share experience and could resonate with some of the people that were out on camp that weren't professionals, that were just people that really loved triathlon and wanted to improve. But I'm going to be flying down the road at 50 miles an hour so I could go, go and spend time with those people to really tell them my experiences of triathlon and I've got many of those stories as well and you know, to be able to help people and give them that confidence they needed to push forward. So when the pandemic hit, we were out there and things changed ever so quickly, like they did everywhere around the world, and it was a very quick 24 hours where we had to just decide let's get everyone home, let's all get out of here, because Spain was quite strict, weren't they? They really locked down, yeah, definitely.

Danielle Howell: 20:27

And we didn't know where what was going on, so it was a case of come home and I moved back in with my parents so I wasn't isolated for the lockdown and I struggled to just sit around and do nothing.

Danielle Howell: 20:40

So I thought, right, let's take the opportunity and actually think about a business, because I don't know right now where my next job is going to be coming from. It was a very uncertain time and I just started googling all sorts of things, as you do, and the opportunity of a health coach came up and I just read some more about it and thought you know what this sounds really appealing and something I would love to do. The qualification of a health coach and a life coach was this bundle that I could do and study for a number of months to get that qualification, and I thought, hey, let's jump in, because we just don't know what's coming and I wanted to be busy and do something that would benefit me. And so I did that and decided to set up a business and, I would say very softly, launch it, and that was mindset and personal development coaching, and in fact my actual company name is Nuvida Limited, which means new life.

John Hawker: 21:37

I saw this. I saw this. Yeah, I was going to ask the meaning because I had no idea, but that's a really lovely concept.

Danielle Howell: 21:43

Sort of a mix of languages, but we spent hours my mum and dad, I think, loved lockdown just sitting there spending time with me coming up with business names.

John Hawker: 21:53

Brilliant, that's great.

Danielle Howell: 21:54

And so I started to do that and, obviously, with how things were at that time, people were isolated and people did want that extra support to focus on themselves a little bit more, and I was doing everything on Zoom and it was a lot easier to do that than it ever had been in the past, and so that's what I did, and I did that with a lot of people that I knew. Already I wasn't really going out and getting marketing my business and getting clients from elsewhere. It was very much, I would say, a low key kind of launch and a low key run business. And then I got pregnant with my daughter and I took a little bit of time off to have her and I decided just to stop things and take some time out. I can't tell you exactly when it was, but I just had one of those light bulb moments where I started to see lots of talk about menopause, which was great, but I started to see some more talk about cycle tracking, which was something that I have been doing probably for about five or six years.

Danielle Howell: 22:54

I could see then, when I thought about all the women that I'd worked with, there was a pattern that was emerging of them not showing up for sessions or not doing the actions that we had set, and I could see that actually it was hormone related. We'd had those conversations. It's time of the month and I'm going to blame that. That's my reason and I just thought there's something here, there is something that I can really genuinely help people with, and so this whole world opened for me, where I started to look into this a lot more and decided to then in September last year, and properly I say, relaunch my business and actually make it more of a business than a hobby, really push it to do what I can to help more people. The rest is history, as they say, isn't it? It's just gone from one strength to the next. Obviously, you mentioned my TED talk, which was just a mind blowing opportunity I never imagined would come my way, incredible, incredible.

Danielle Howell: 23:49

But guess what? I jumped in yeah.

John Hawker: 23:52

I want to talk to you about that in a bit more detail as well, daniel, your TED talk, because there would be lots of people listening to this and I'm going to name drop one of them, a chat called Mark. I won't mention his surname, but Mark will be listening to this wondering how do you get that opportunity? Because I know he's desperate to try and get this. So we'll talk about that in a bit more detail. But to go from relaunching a business to then a TED, the TEDx stage, and then to have your TED talk shared on their YouTube channel, that is quite the rise, isn't it? That's an incredible thing to have achieved.

Danielle Howell: 24:24

It really is and even now and we talked about Jen earlier and she always says to me you know you need to talk about it more because I kind of forget it happened and it's passed and, yes, it's a great thing, but it's very easy. I'm quite a humble person, really, I don't like to go and shout about this stuff, but I know equally it really helps with people knowing the authority that I have, that I'm able to give these messages, to deliver these messages.

John Hawker: 24:49

Yeah, I completely agree. A lot of my services around consulting and advising people to get comfortable selling themselves.

John Hawker: 24:57

I think it's a British thing as well this inbuilt humility or maybe even this feeling that if we talk about our achievements too much, it feels like a brag or it feels like we're showing off when really something like that deserves the airtime. Daniel, I thought it was amazing and I've got a couple of questions on the back of that TEDx talk, but, yeah, what a journey. And it just shows the running theme here is embrace the opportunities, take those openings with both hands and dive right in, and I think in your case it's really worked out. It should be inspiring for a lot of people listening to that story up to this point.

John Hawker: 25:30

Can I ask a question and I wasn't going to ask it, but this is me embracing this uncomfortable situation or uncomfortable conversation and just trying to maybe shine a light or hold the torch for other men that may not have wanted to ask this question. It might have come up. Why were you tracking your hormonal cycles at the time? Was that to do with contraception? Was that to do with trying to conceive? Can I ask that question Of?

Danielle Howell: 25:51

course you can. And no, I literally read a book one day I think someone recommended it to me for no real reason other than it was just be interesting, and it's called Period Power by Maisie Hill. And I read this book. And you ever get a book where you read it and you just start nodding, literally constantly saying this is all now making so much sense. And I read it and it blew my mind as to a lot of the experience that I'd had throughout my life really in terms of this fluctuations.

Danielle Howell: 26:24

Now I will talk about jumping into things. It would be lovely to be able to look back and say when in my cycle was I making those bold decisions and taking those leaps, because I do equally have those moments where I literally question myself and can I do this? Who am I to go out and talk to people about this stuff? And so, going back to your original question, I read the book and I just found it really interesting, and so I started to track my own cycles, purely from a perspective of just inquisitiveness, if that is even a word, just curiosity, just wanting to know, I mean. Later on, it has actually proved very useful in, yes, conceiving. That was quite interesting knowing exactly when I did conceive and then also going forward from that knowing when not to conceive to using it as contraception, to actually know when are the times to avoid having sex because at that time, you know, didn't want to have another baby on the way just yet.

John Hawker: 27:29

Yeah, I guess I wanted to ask that question because the mind goes to. There's a lot more press and a lot more discussion now around hormonal cycles and tracking them from both conception and contraception. But also, I guess I completely understand I'm nodding along as you're talking about reading a book where you're just nodding along and my, there've been plenty for me over the years, but one that started me on a journey was a book called Lost Connections by Johann Hari, and another one he did called Stolen Focus, and one of my examples of books where I read them and I'm like, oh, there is a message you're telling me here that even resonates and makes me feel like I'm not alone or it makes me think. That's why I'm feeling like I'm feeling. Maybe I need to explore that further.

John Hawker: 28:09

So the fact that you were tracking kind of shows that you're I guess you're carrying through with what you're preaching to people, aren't you? Ultimately, because you're seeing the correlation between these periods of productivity and then periods where maybe you do feel like you've got lost, a syndrome, and you do feel like have I got the skills and confidence to go out and do this? Would you put all of those, let's say, peaks and troughs of. I've got to term it as confidence or self belief. Can they all be connected to your hormonal cycle?

Danielle Howell: 28:39

No, you may have external factors that are influencing that. You know that this could become, coming down to how you were brought up or you know the environment that you're in at that time. It's not necessarily all hormones at all, but you'd be surprised how much your hormones can influence that. And that's what's really interesting when I work with people and they have those moments of kind of realising that, oh my God, my hormones are really influencing how I'm literally living every single day.

John Hawker: 29:07

Yeah, okay. So what does the role of your job as an HCO coach actually entail? Talk me through what it is you actually do with the clients that you work with.

Danielle Howell: 29:17

So it's really. It depends. I mean, I kind of have a number of different hats I wear, so I do do speaking where I just go and provide that awareness. I and, as you say, to both men and women, people with periods, people without periods to give them that understanding of what the cycle actually looks like, how it can impact people and, if you are someone with periods, how you can use that to your advantage with one to one clients or with a group program. It's very similar, but really digging down a little bit deeper into that and what that really looks like. So I do teach people how to actually track their cycle, because that is something we should all be taught, probably at school, to be honest, and I hope that Things are starting to change in that world, but I really hope that is something that comes into the curriculum going forward Learning how to track, learning how to connect with your own body, to understand the signals that it's sending you, because we often overlook it or we see it as something else. We give it another purpose, another reason, and it's working through with people how to do that, tracking, how to connect, and then, for the optimization piece, it's about this leveraging that power. So there's so many different ways it can impact you.

Danielle Howell: 30:30

We've just talked about confidence. That's literally one element, and we could be talking about procrastination how much you can focus on things, the different types of work that you want to be doing at different times. So, going and doing a talk, you're obviously, yeah, gonna feel more confident, but equally you're gonna be more energetic and you're actually going to speak more eloquently, because the way that the brain is working is different, whereas when you come to your period and the weeks before that, you're more inward focused. You definitely got that imposter syndrome coming in. You're actually gonna want to focus on more analytical tasks, more deep work, but probably more on your own. So that collaboration piece probably could be a bit of a struggle at that time. There's so many different. I mean, this is literally scratching the surface. There's so many different elements.

Danielle Howell: 31:21

So what I do with people is we work through what are their challenges? What are the things they're finding? They're inconsistent with what. What are they finding? One week they're amazing, smashing it, and the week later they're literally dreading it so much they spend three hours doing something really, really simple because they just can't focus on it. So we look at that and we put systems in place to help them to structure their workload. If they have that ability to, to use the right skill sets and the right energy that they have throughout the month to make just make things feel a lot easier, to make you go to work and want to do those things, because that's what your body wants to do on those days and ultimately that makes you be a better person and be more successful in your career or your business.

Danielle Howell: 32:08

I mean an interesting one, obviously, talking to you about recruitment, you know what? When do you schedule interviews? So there's limit limit sometimes isn't there as to how much control you have. But If you went and had an interview when you're off your late ink, for example, you're probably gonna get the job because you're gonna go in there feeling confident, you're going to literally physically glow and you're going to speak really well and be able to sell yourself.

Danielle Howell: 32:33

Versus a week or two later where you show up to that interview with massive imposter syndrome why I'm even here? To be honest, you may even not get through the door. You may have that internal battle before you get there and turn around and think I'm not even gonna bother going and you go there. You just can't get your words out. Your your fumbling your own focus. Your mind is just crazy. It's going going mental like a million miles an hour and you probably walk out. And even if you have done a half decent job, you probably walk out thinking I didn't get it because I'm crap, and this can really impact your mindset just so much. So does that make sense as a kind of working example?

John Hawker: 33:13

Completely. Yeah, and, to be honest, that's the. That's the sentiment I took from your TEDx talk as well, and it was so enlightening. There's elements of it.

John Hawker: 33:21

I took as a recruiter this why I think it's so important for you to have more of a platform to be able to speak to both individuals and also we're gonna speak about a bit more detailed organizations around what they can be doing to support their people With this. But, yeah, it makes complete sense and I wonder how many people, how many women I've worked with over the years that would even have heard of this concept. Well then, factor that into when they're booking in interviews as well. I'm not gonna make this all about me, but I know, in terms of recording the podcast and you do mention that men have a cycle as well and I'm really interested in that. I'm not gonna hijack that, this topic of conversation but I wonder if that impacts us in the same ways as well, because there are definitely times where I am more focused on this, usually for the not to be honest with you, but there are times where I'm more focused and in the zone with recordings or live talks or anything like that. So it resonates on both a personal level, but also I think it's such an important message to be to be speaking to people about.

John Hawker: 34:16

I'm gonna touch upon a few more questions that might feel like I'm going all over the place, but it's just so much to cover in what it is you do and I'm genuinely interested in it. But let's talk about periods in the workplace and the stigma around it and how you can help organizations start to broach those what are still kind of taboo conversations. So what do you do? How do you even start broaching the topic of periods in the workplace with the businesses you you consult with?

Danielle Howell: 34:43

Yeah, it's a tough one sometimes because people, to be honest, don't even feel comfortable having the conversation with me about potentially bringing it into their business.

Danielle Howell: 34:51

That's the first hurdle that I can hit sometimes, but the ultimate goal is to create an environment and a workplace where people do feel comfortable, and that really stems from communication. That's one of the main Parts, and there is, interestingly, a new British standard that's just recently been launched on not just menopause but menstrual health generally in the workplace, and I think that's a great step forward, for companies provide some really good support in terms of how to Put in, put these processes into place to actually create that safe environment, create that safe space, to create forums for people, networks for people. And it's quite interesting because I've seen, you know, a couple of years back when I was in court, but I saw lots of women's networks, whereas now I'm having conversations and the women's networks are no longer there because that was felt unequal. You know, men didn't have a network as well. So there's different types of networks being created that seem to be a combo.

John Hawker: 35:50

It's definitely interesting. Is it positive or negative in your opinion?

Danielle Howell: 35:53

I feel there needs to be a space for women to have some conversations. There also needs to be a space for men to have these conversations and there is a space to have them together. Right, I feel like there's options for all three. I used to be part of a woman's network and we had we always invited men along and that actually was good because it showed the people who are willing to be more open to that and To embrace it, and you kind of then could gauge where people were, whether they were supportive or not so much, and I think it provided the awareness.

Danielle Howell: 36:25

I feel there needs to be a space for all different types of groups of people and I do appreciate as a business you can't have millions of networks. It wouldn't be feasible to run those kind of things. It's a tough one, but I do feel a safe space for me to go in and talk to people. I think you do need to have different messages for different people and something like this if we're not yet there in talking about it, to bring it in where you've got all sorts of people there. It's not always comfortable and I think we need to maybe take small steps to get to where we want to be.

John Hawker: 36:57

Yeah, gender equality and how men and women are treated in in any size of organizations, I think is a is quite a sensitive topic and, again, complete subjective, and loads of people have different views. I do completely agree with what you're saying in that, especially around this topic specifically, I think it's really important to introduce men into the conversation to ensure that we are clued up and knowledgeable and we can support the women in our life, both personally and professionally.

John Hawker: 37:24

but you do need a safe space where women can talk freely about it because some people can have different levels of comfort in having these conversations with men present. The risk is always that business is going to create all these networking groups and it becomes very siloed. But I do think we need to find a mid ground, especially with this kind of topic.

Danielle Howell: 37:42

I agree that we do also have to think about that. We have people who are non binary. We have people who are transgender, people who have periods, who don't identify as a woman.

Danielle Howell: 37:51

So, there does need to be a way for me to be able to connect with those kind of people, because their experience is quite different and actually can be quite challenging for them, particularly in the workplace, where they are experiencing these cycles and yet they can't talk about it in the same way as someone else just saying, oh, it's my time of the month. They can't have that conversation. So that's also a whole other area of challenge for people that are identifying as that, because they're really restricted and it just has many limitations for them in the workplace.

John Hawker: 38:23

And this I have to be honest with such a complex subject. This is exactly why businesses should be talking to you. If all you're doing is focusing inward on how your organization can help without getting external expertise, it's going to be an incredibly hard subject to tackle. So, yeah, there's a lot of sensitivity around, a lot of things we're going to discuss over the course of this next half hour or so. But, yeah, bringing many in on the conversation, I think is important, but, at the same time, creating safe spaces for everyone that wants to get involved in the conversation, I think is equally so as well.

Danielle Howell: 38:55

I've had literally three, three men over the past two days come to me and say I just want to understand it more because I I see the patterns and I see the fluctuations and I'm seeing that as maybe something I'm doing wrong or there's something bigger, a bigger issue here that I need to know about. And they're saying to me if you can just tell me the basics so that I understand, I will be able to be exactly what you say a better husband, a better father or just a better colleague. If we're talking about the workplace, for you to be a better colleague or a better manager, it just has so many benefits.

John Hawker: 39:33

Interesting as well, because when I first was introduced to your TED Talk through Jen, I listened to it with self-serving to a degree, but I could better support my partner Not any point that. I see it from a broader perspective of how managers and leaders can better support the people going through that in the workforce as well. Do you find in your line of work that you get many male leaders come to you, or is it a case of you know with the businesses specifically that you work with? Do you feel like it's women banging the drum and starting the conversations, or do you get many men reach out to you and say I want to be a better boss, I want to be a better leader, more compassionate, more empathetic?

Danielle Howell: 40:10

Oh, I would love to be in that place. If I'm being completely honest, we're not quite there, Please do yeah, I am getting men come along because they are inquisitive. They do want to learn more, which is amazing, and I will celebrate that as a step forward. But to be where you say, and the men are coming forward and driving the conversation would be amazing. So anyone out there listening who wants to do that, then this is your opportunity to change how we're doing it.

John Hawker: 40:39

This is the call to arms. I think we should be banging the drum for much more of that messaging as well, and it's a shame in a lot of ways, but you're so early on in the journey, daniel, that hopefully, opportunities to speak like this and your TEDx talk and all of the live speaking events you're going to be doing really start driving it into these leaders' minds that they need to be putting the hard grafted and they need to be putting the work in and reaching out to you, not just relying on women to bring this subject to the forefront.

Danielle Howell: 41:07

So, John, as a recruiter, in what you do I would say, thinking about when people come to you and have conversations or they're sending you messages, having that awareness of, well, where could they be in their cycle and why are they turning around tomorrow and telling you, actually I'm not going to go for that job anymore? Or, you know, actually I don't think I'm capable of that. Trying to understand, and obviously you can't just say, well, do you have your period today? That would be totally inappropriate. But it's just the awareness and having that awareness to maybe say, give it a week, see how you feel in a week, because their mindset might shift, their energy might shift and their confidence might shift. So it's just having that awareness can make all the difference.

John Hawker: 41:49

That is something that I'll take away on the back of this conversation as well, because it's very easy to just go OK, well, look, it's not the right role for you, or take something on face value without just testing the water slightly. And yeah, I mean, the worst scenario is ever that you go are you on your period or is it your time of the month? And we've all seen horror stories of how that's received when it's not my advice.

John Hawker: 42:12

Definitely. Yeah, danielle does not condone this message, but I think, yeah, just just leaving that window open, I think, is quite important, rather than just shutting the door completely. So it is advice that will definitely take. Ok, I've got more questions. If you are speaking to a business that are open to this conversation about trying to support them, create environments where people are more supported, what are practical tools that you can offer to people generally, but I guess to employers as well, on how they can support their people? And I don't want you to give all of your secrets away here, danielle, but if you can give us some tips, some actionable advice, maybe that people can take away from listening to this episode.

Danielle Howell: 42:51

It might depend a little bit on the type of business and the structure of the organization. I actually had a live conversation on Instagram last week with a business owner who runs a biscuit company. They make branded biscuits some amazing biscuits, by the way, the Biscary a little plug for her, there, there you go yeah.

Danielle Howell: 43:10

We had a great conversation because she's actually put into place a process where they are a group of women, all women in their business, and they have a whiteboard with magnets and so they have everyone's names and they have different colors for each phase of the cycle and with a little guide on the side. So what they do is they put the magnet, the color of the magnet, next to their name when they're in each phase, so they're just. That's their way of bringing that awareness without having to say to people, leave me alone, I'm cranky today, or, equally, I might be super energetic and a bit OTT today, which might be too much for you, and so it's kind of giving people that signal without having to do that. She was explaining to me how productive that's made the team, because they're just able to well, firstly, collaborate better because they have that awareness. But actually she's leveraging people's strengths so they may be going to events where they're needing people to have that energy so they're able to tap into. Well, who's got the most energy right now You're going, because that's going to work really well. If you haven't got the energy to show up and do as proud as a business, then let's not do that. So that's really been really interesting. So that's obviously a small business where they can do that.

Danielle Howell: 44:28

When you're talking about huge corporate organizations it's maybe not quite so easy to do those kind of things. For the larger corporate organizations there's definitely a place to just. It's about respecting, I think is the first thing, the awareness and respecting. Yes, don't go and ask are you on your period? Just please avoid that. But having that awareness to be able to understand that somebody may just need a bit more flexible working that day, if that's a possibility, maybe working at home rather than being told they've got to come into the office Again. I know sometimes there's limitations, but having that flexibility to offer it can be a real support to people because there's the confidence, there's the emotional side, but there's also the physical.

Danielle Howell: 45:15

Some people coming into an office when they are potentially heavily bleeding is a really uncomfortable thing and that is hard if you've not had a period before to understand what that feels like. But to sit there at a desk where you could be also really hot the aircon may be equally too cold, you may feel cold and if you're really worried about leaking, that's a horrible thing. You can't focus on the work that you're doing, you can't be productive because your mind is elsewhere. And if you're going into a meeting room with loads of people it can just be really intimidating and feel very uncomfortable. So, having that respect to maybe office and flexibility in location and working hours as well, maybe people just need to take a few more breaks.

Danielle Howell: 46:01

Now there's a thing isn't there around trusting your employees, because some people might say and I have heard it oh, my employee just wants to take breaks, to just have a rest. Well, that's not a good working relationship, there's no trust there. If you can trust your employees that they need that time for them to be able to come back and do a better job, then that's a win for everybody.

John Hawker: 46:23

I completely agree, and I think it's really interesting the kind of tools that you were saying that smaller business use. You can build them on scale as well, but I think in bigger businesses it all starts with just having the respect is a great word to use being comfortable enough to have the conversation with your leaders or managers or directors whoever it is to be able to say this is what's happening with me. So you need to foster a culture where that's OK, there's no stigma or to be around it, and that, for a lot of big businesses, is not what's been happening for decades and decades and decades.

John Hawker: 46:58

So, you know, change management. It's a big cultural shift for so many organizations, which, again, is why they need external specialism to go in and advise them on how best to do it. You made a really good point. I'm going to ask two questions on the back of both points you made. Let's start with this one. You mentioned the four phases or you mentioned phases, but four phases of the hormonal cycle. For someone like me who has never heard that there are four phases of the hormonal cycle before, can you explain what they are and that why understanding what those phases are would benefit your life as well, or the well-being of people that can get clued up on that?

Danielle Howell: 47:38

Absolutely, and you're not alone, so many people don't appreciate those four phases so effectively.

Danielle Howell: 47:46

Everyone with a period is having a cycle last around 28 days, and it's really worth mentioning. Every single person with a period is going to have a different experience. No two people are having exactly the same experience, but there is this typical framework of what a cycle looks like and you probably heard it in the TED Talk and you'll hear it if I talk in any other place about the seasons, because it's a really easy way to remember it rather than the science words that can be a bit jargon-y. So if we start with the period, because that's the phase, everybody does know that is your winter and you'll be able to resonate with this it's winter, it's cold, you want to just probably line the sofa, grab a blanket, get cosy and eat crappy food.

John Hawker: 48:35

That resonates completely.

Danielle Howell: 48:37

Exactly, and that is exactly how a person who's having their period is going to feel. They're probably very lethargic, their mood is very low and they'll probably be a bit emotional. So you may see some tears, but that is all just reflecting the drop in hormones that has happened for the period to take place.

Danielle Howell: 49:00

Then a period will last, say, three to five days approximately, and again some people will have longer, some will have shorter. Then you go into this spring phase, and so, from a science perspective, the hormone levels are actually rising, and so that reflects in your energy. Your energy levels start to rise as well. Often, this is the most creative phase for people. It's when they can do some really good content creation. If they're sort of a content creator in their job, if that's their sort of media or marketing, this is the phase to leverage that. They will definitely feel more motivated, whatever job they're doing. Just more positive, more energetic.

Danielle Howell: 49:38

This is probably one of my favorite phases. Actually, I think this is my favorite because it's just where things are starting to shift and you can see more positively. Everything's looking better, and that's a great time to start new projects, tougher tasks that maybe you didn't want to tackle last week, and learning as well. Your brain is actually adapting. I can't really state this as a fact because I need to go and get my source for it, but I think your brain changes around 25% throughout the cycle, and that just highlights to you it's not just a physical thing. This is your brain is actually changing throughout the cycle. So then we're going to summer, and this is when you're ovulating, and I've said this before, it's like the David Attenborough programs where you see a bird or an animal that's coming into mating season and they do a little dance, don't they? They get really confident and cocky and puff themselves up. But we're doing the same thing. You will start to see it Once you start to see the pattern and you start to track.

Danielle Howell: 50:40

You go oh my God, this is happening. You feel confident, you want to go out, socialize, dance on the tables, whatever it is you want to do, and this is the time for networking, interviewing, you know, asking for a new job, asking for that pay rise You've just got that edge about you. And if you are sort of a business owner and you're doing creating content, then again social stuff, going live on Instagram Perfect time. If you're doing the kind of job I used to do change management, going out and engaging with end users I mean, you are on fire at that time. And if you're a salesy type person.

Danielle Howell: 51:20

A sales type person will make lots more sales during this time because they are just attracting people and people want to buy from people, right? So if you're giving off this really positive vibe, people will buy from you. And then it does start to dip a little bit. So you go into autumn where you know similar to the sort of season of the year where it calls and this you are going to go more introverted again. Even if you're an extrovert, you will still have a level of introvertism. Is that a word?

John Hawker: 51:50

I think, so we can go with that.

Danielle Howell: 51:52

Let's go with that.

Danielle Howell: 51:54

You know you will start to just focus more inward and you might be a bit moody, you might be self critical and it's because those hormone levels are getting ready to drop significantly for your period.

Danielle Howell: 52:07

This is the time again to probably work more by yourself Stuff that you would do sort of your typical admin tasks. For me as a business owner, like finance review and I hope my accountant isn't listening it's not the thing I love, but this is a time to actually do that because your head and your brain is in a space of coming to the end of a cycle, so it's feeling like you want to close things down, get things ticked off the list so that you're ready to move into a new cycle. So I have one client actually she her day 24, which is as she's coming towards her in her autumn phase. She is super productive in a sense of I want to get everything done. I just want to get everything done and off my plate. And that's because she's in her autumn phase, coming to the end of her cycle and ready to start a new cycle. So are you still with me? Does that make sense?

John Hawker: 53:04

I'm completely with you and again, I keep using the word resonates. But I had a quite a candid conversation with my partner this morning who said I just went into the kitchen, said, are you okay? And again, as a man I don't know whether that's the right question to ask, but I had just had a sense, been together 12 years and I just had a sense that maybe the winter was winter was coming. I mean, it sounds like such a I don't mean to quote Game of Thrones or Jon Snow, but winter was coming. So I just said are you okay? And she said yeah, I feel like I'm about to come on my period and this is happening.

John Hawker: 53:35

So the seasons and the way you describe it, just it just fires this imagery of my head and I can remember specific period, like I say period, specific moments during the course of the month when all of those things really kind of align as well. So again, for any specifically men listening, I'm sure women are nodding their heads while listening to this, but for men, we can all probably relate to the seasons that you're describing there. So, 100% with you.

Danielle Howell: 54:00

I mean, if your other half is tracking her cycle, she will be able to tell you exactly the day that her period will come, rather than I think it's coming, and this isn't about being able to predict in advance. It's taking her temperature every single morning and this is something so simple, but we're just not taught so if she takes her temperature every single morning before she gets out of bed and that's a critical piece she's able to know. I can tell you the day I take my temperature and my temperature actually drops by about 0.3 of a degree, I know today it's coming. Really. Yeah, it's that amazing and I love that, because I spent years where you'd be like, oh, is it coming today or not? And you go out feeling very uncomfortable because it's that really weird uncertain period. But my period again.

Danielle Howell: 54:53

But yeah, if she's tracking, she will literally be able to know and, yes, it's great that she's in tune with how she's feeling. So she know it's approaching. But the more you can get, take the next step and actually really get control of your cycle and know exactly when different things are happening. On the flip side of knowing when your periods coming, you know exactly when you're ovulating because the temperature goes up again, so it's being able to look at the data. That's actually telling you what's going on inside.

John Hawker: 55:20

Yeah, giving men an opportunity to be able to support their partners better, or any any women in their life. I think, if you are knowledgeable enough to know what phase you're going through when You're better to equip them with the support that you might need. So, if you do need more support, if you need less support, if you just need to be left the hell alone, all of these things are really going to be helped by tracking your cycle. So I can, I can see that straight away. My partner would love listening to this I'm not going to keep talking about because she'll be. She wouldn't want me sharing too much, but anyway, that's, that's good.

John Hawker: 55:56

Okay, I think you've answered in describing the phases. I think you've answered there as well what the benefit is of tracking 100% okay. So going back to businesses and this idea of being able to Advise them on how to create more supportive environments for people that are having periods, having their cycle, there will be businesses, as most businesses do, that look at what's the return on investment if I'm going to pay for this now. I asked this question to someone and it was. We were talking about ADHD and well being and creating its support environments people with neuro divergent Challenges and her response was incredible and I'll share that with you in a second. But for businesses that are sat there little bit cynically and saying what's the ROI that we can expect? What do you say to businesses that are looking at from that perspective?

Danielle Howell: 56:48

I mean, you could have some amazing people working for you that are just inconsistent in how they're performing and how what their productivity is looking like, purely because of their hormone cycles, and they may not even be aware themselves. So if you're able to help with the education piece that that may not even be supporting them, it's actually just educating them, providing that opportunity then actually they may themselves be able to turn it around in terms of being more productive because they're able to focus on the right things at the right time. Equally, if you can provide that support, I think it helps with loyalty, doesn't it? And people staying with companies. We talked about that earlier. If, if you're able to feel comfortable and in a safe space where you're given that respect and you're trusted, then you're more likely to stay somewhere.

Danielle Howell: 57:40

And the other thing I would say is around actually attracting the best talent that's out there, because Now I have seen other women going for jobs and asking these questions do you have a policy on menopause? Do you have support around menstruation? And the more it's talked about, the more it will start to become commonplace in the interview stage as well. So you know, on a job spec, if you want to be able to highlight that you're supportive of this. People are gonna love that to say amazing. I know I can go here and they're going to support me, even though I may have fluctuations throughout the month, and that is a great way to be able to attract the best people as well.

John Hawker: 58:21

It's a fantastic answer. I do a lot of advisory around employee value proposition, which and and there's a lot of focus at the moment on menopause support policies and an updated policies that HR teams are rolling out all over the place now and they should be and I posted a couple of articles about why Menopause is such a taboo subject to talk about within within companies and business in general as well. I think awareness is key. So just building awareness education piece 100%. Again, I think that aligns really nice to with what so many businesses should be trying to do at the moment as an employee value proposition.

John Hawker: 58:59

In a way, it's low hanging fruit. Everyone within a business is going to be impacted by this in some way, shape or form, whether it's directly from them going through the cycles themselves, or colleagues that have to support their people, or managers that have to support their people. So this is something that all businesses should now be doing as part of the employee value proposition and what they're building and what they're offering. So I think that's a that's a fantastic answer and it's a no brainer. How can you say we don't want to invest in that? It's impossible.

Danielle Howell: 59:29

Is my opinion. Thank you, john. I appreciate that. I think you. You're absolutely right, though, and the common thought process is just to focus on the women, and actually it is so much bigger than that.

Danielle Howell: 59:43

That's one element but, actually yes, to provide the education piece for everybody and to allow them to have that communication improved can only be a good thing for not just talking about periods. The better relationship you can build between colleagues. It will help with collaboration generally and help people to work together to support business strategy. It just brings the business together to work in the same direction.

John Hawker: 1:00:08

Yeah, I think that's a really good point. It's that cohesion, isn't it? Collaboration is a key thing that all businesses are trying to build and trying to improve upon, and half of that is breaking down the barriers, isn't it? And breaking down boundaries that are that have been existed for, you know, centuries as well, and it's great these conversations are now being started to be had, although there's still a huge stigma around it. So if we can start Getting everyone to feel a bit more uncomfortable at first and then, and then, hopefully by the end of the conversation, feel more clued up and knowledgeable.

John Hawker: 1:00:39

I was going to ask about how understanding hormonal cycles would benefit male employees, but I think it doesn't need to be as specific as that and I think you've answered the question. Really, it's not about benefiting Male employees, it's about the business, the direction and everyone being supported. Have to ask the question because you mentioned your TEDx talk about male cycles. I mean it's really interesting to me. I've been accused of being on my period before because I've been in the mood, daniel, and it's I'm just going to tell you. You know, and it's happened quite a lot of times now, I don't know if there's any truth in why I was in a mood at the time. But Talk to me a little bit about male cycles. Is there any chance of they? They run the same kind of season description that you, that you gave before.

Danielle Howell: 1:01:21

Well, no, actually, and this is why it's so interesting, particularly with the workplace, because the structure of the workplace effectively replicates the structure of a male, traditional male cycle. And.

Danielle Howell: 1:01:34

I know the workplace is changing a little bit, but what we're talking about is a 24 hour cycle. So you don't, you know, you wake up in the morning with high levels of testosterone and gradually throughout the day they will drop, and then you wake up tomorrow and it'll be the same. Now, obviously that's quite generic. Obviously there may be people that are slightly different to that, but that's the the typical stereotype. So for you, you do get obviously variations. You may be a morning person, you may be an evening person. I know you were emailing me late last night, so I'm going to assume you're an evening.

John Hawker: 1:02:07

I mean with with a five and a two year old. I have to be a morning and an evening person, so I just switch off at some point. But yeah.

Danielle Howell: 1:02:16

That's so true and so traditionally what you would see is the workplace opening up in the morning, men coming in probably being quite so sure in the morning and actually wanting to network with other people, have morning meetings and you know what are we doing today and kind of getting that that work mode kick started. It would then gradually decline. Maybe in the afternoon they'll focus more on deep work by themselves. Then happy hour comes and they want to go have a little wind down before heading home to just chill. And I don't want people to think I'm saying every man, just go home and chill, because I know many men don't do that. This is just purely the traditional stereotype of the hormones, as they are working throughout your body in the day. So yeah, that's sort of how the workplaces evolve, which is why it's hard for women to sometimes fit into that typical nine to five regime, because their hormones aren't working in that same way.

John Hawker: 1:03:15

Okay, that again is a really insightful point, because I was not aware again, I saw this in your, in your tent or the imagery in the graph that you show just shows how, in a way, how messed up it is and how how the current system of work is kind of working against women to be their most productive. Because you show this graph that we describe it.

Danielle Howell: 1:03:36

Absolutely, and I'm all about gender equality, don't get me wrong and I think it's amazing how the gender gap is is closing, but we do have to, at the same time, respect that we are physically different and so for years, women have just been trying to push away, push through all of this and be consistent. Day after day and I hear it every day on. You know messages that are coming through, be consistent, be consistent. And I've read some amazing books as well that you talked about. You know power of focus, the miracle morning, atomic habits all of this stuff is about consistency, all written by men. So it's about taking those elements of those books and actually being able to adapt it to the right phase of the cycle to allow that consistency to come through, if that makes sense.

John Hawker: 1:04:26

Yeah, it really does, and I think that's going to be like a knowledge bomb which I was always hoping we're going to be dropping in these, in these episodes where we discuss having discussions with specialists in these fields. I think a first for a lot of men to hear but probably the majority of women listening to this that our working day is really structured again maybe unsurprisingly, in a way around around men's cycle and not fit for purpose for women and I guess in a positive way then of how the pandemic affected all of our lives, with all of this flexibility now that is open to us for the first time in again decades across across genders. I think that, hopefully, is allowing women to have environments that work better for them. Would you agree with that from what you're seeing in the conversations you're having?

Danielle Howell: 1:05:10

I absolutely would. I think it's been a real game changer. I'm starting to see more organizations recalling employees because they want to go back to the old way, and I think some women not just women, but I do see women finding that challenge because they have found that so beneficial for them to be able to Live more in line with their cycles. They can sit at home on the sofa in their pajamas and do work on a couple of days if they need to, and that's okay because they're still doing the work and they're still getting it done, but Just in a different way. So I hope that we don't go too much back to what it was, because I think it's been a huge eye opener for businesses to see how people can be trusted, can be just, can have that ability to work in a different location. It can work and we proved that. So to go back would be a real shame because I think, absolutely as you say, it's really benefited, in my opinion, women obviously. I'm sure men as well Completely yeah, and I think the larger.

John Hawker: 1:06:10

A lot of consultancies are starting to call their people back into the office four or five days a week now, and that's the driver, and they're citing these productivity studies to say that productivity is dropped, which I just think is Try not to swear too much, but is bullshit in my opinion. And and there is a there's an agenda there they are driving that message because they probably they're leading the company of the way where they don't allow trust, they don't allow people autonomy. I think, if we add to the fact that what we're doing again is not allowing people to have environments that work for them driving them back into the office nine to five that that's only going to first off impact productivity but also lead to attrition, people leaving businesses to go to the companies that still offering that flexibility. So I hope this kind of surge that we're seeing stops soon, because it there is really a push and I think it's the wrong thing to be doing. Okay, right, I am so thankful for the time that we spent doing this, daniel, and I think there's so much. I mean we could speak for hours because it's such.

John Hawker: 1:07:09

It's such a complex topic as well, but I think so much of what you've discussed is going to empower people. Hopefully it leads them to do their own research. Hopefully it leads them to reach out to you as well. Tell people how they can reach out to you so if they're interested in working with you, either one to one or it's a business hopefully men from businesses as well that want to reach out to make sure that their people are being supported with with increasing their knowledge and proven and on this area, how do people reach out to you?

Danielle Howell: 1:07:36

So I have a website, wwwthehcocoachcom, and originally that was the hormonal cycle optimization coachcom, so obviously that got shortened.

John Hawker: 1:07:51

How to change.

Danielle Howell: 1:07:52

So, the HCO coachcom. Now on there I do have some information about specifically workplace stuff that I do, so you can download that and just take a look. Equally, if anyone wants to just email me to set up a chat, I would more than welcome that and you can just email me. Daniel at the HCO coachcom. If you want to see content, I am on LinkedIn and I am on Instagram, the HCO coachcom. There's a theme and I do try to put stuff out there just to to help people give tips on things of how to do this better, to provide that awareness a bit more. And but yeah, if you want to contact me directly and talk specifically about what it is that you need, then obviously I would welcome those discussions, particularly from the men. Come on, let's.

John Hawker: 1:08:40

Come on, yeah, we really need. This needs to be a call to action for men to get in touch as well, and I'm going to include all of the links to that into the podcast description, including it's 15 minutes long, your TED talk, I think from start to finish on YouTube, but it flies. It provides so much insight and value and for anyone that listens to that men or women it just makes you want to learn more, so that 100% the link to that will go in the podcast description.

Danielle Howell: 1:09:06

I do have a one page guide which, if anyone's listening and wants to get their hands on that, it just really simply breaks down the four phases and how you should eat differently during those phases, how to move differently in, what kind of work to focus on. You can download that by going to the website, the HCO coachcom forward slash free dash stuff and you can download your copy and that will be quite a good thing to just pop on the wall and remind yourself.

John Hawker: 1:09:32

That's fantastic. Yeah, and again, I'll share the links to that when we when we start promoting this episode. Right, danielle, I'm conscious we've overrun on this, but I do have a closing tradition on this podcast. Other podcasts have closing traditions where a previous guest I'm not going to name the podcast, but previous guest leaves a question for the next guest. I don't do that. Yeah, you might. You might have heard of that one. I don't do that. I get my mum to ask my guess a question, roughly who you are. Usually a hasty call on the morning of a recording and saying mum, I've got this guest, can you please think of a question to ask? I don't listen to the question beforehand, I just play it down the microphone to whoever my guest is and mum will ask it. So, if you permit me, I'm going to play the question and let's see what mum has asked. This time. Let me know if you can't hear it.

Lisa Hawker: 1:10:22

Hi, danielle. I've always been fascinated by the fact that if women are together for a period of time, their cycles will eventually marry up. Have you ever seen this happen with the companies that you work with? Thank you.

John Hawker: 1:10:40

Did you hear that first, danielle? Was that loud and clear?

Danielle Howell: 1:10:42

I did I love that and that's a really great question actually. Well done, mum. Good question.

John Hawker: 1:10:47

My mum's name is Lisa, if you wanted to direct an answer to Lisa. But yeah, thank you for that. Mum appreciate that.

Danielle Howell: 1:10:53

Good question. So, lisa, yes, and that's a really interesting one. So cycle syncing is the term used for that, as well as tracking. So often when I talk about cycle syncing, people think I mean that about different women's cycles all syncing at the same time. It's not necessarily what I'm referring to, but to answer the question and I definitely see this and I have experienced this I have two sisters and we've had this in our house where, yeah, we do end up syncing together and I find it absolutely fascinating.

Danielle Howell: 1:11:27

Now, traditionally in you know, we're going back to many, many years ago where you'd have communities of people that they would actually find there would be almost two camps one where you're one, where you're having a period together and one where you're having ovulation. At that time, and how that seems to have evolved, is it enabled the group of people that were having their period to just take a step back and do what they need to do to be better at self care, and then the other group would be able to step up because they had that extra energy and were able to step up and support those other women. And this is, as I say, going back years. But I find that fascinating that that actually happened. And now how much of that is myth versus fact I don't know, but I've certainly read about it.

Danielle Howell: 1:12:17

But there is a definite case for people syncing if they're in close proximity to each other. Equally, there is a lot of work done around the moon cycles. Now, I'm not massively woo, I'm much more about practical tools. But I know there are people that have strong beliefs that you are aligned to a moon cycle. So that is why we find women all then syncing up, because they're actually responding to how the moon is moving around us at that particular time. There's a whole world of research done there.

John Hawker: 1:12:52

We could do another episode on that, yeah, but that's a really insightful question. You never know what you're going to get when my mom asks the questions and some of them are complete curveballs, but that was very relevant. So thank you very much, mom. I appreciate that, and thank you for indulging it as well.

John Hawker: 1:13:07

Danielle, it's been an absolute honor to speak to you and thank you for being kind in the way that you've answered my questions, because it's a topic that I am sure so many people are so ignorant to or about and around, and it's a genuine drive of my own motivation to try and get more clued up so I can support not only the women that I'm close to in my life, but also people that I'm helping to find jobs and align with the right opportunities. So I'm sure so many people listening to this I'm going to have taken so much inspiration from it as well, and your story about how you started in the first place, because that's the other thing we do here. We talk about why you're doing what it is you're doing. So thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

Danielle Howell: 1:13:48

Thank you for being kind in the questions that you were answering.

John Hawker: 1:13:51

You're very welcome.

Danielle Howell: 1:13:52

It's been a pleasure.

John Hawker: 1:13:53

I'll speak to you soon. Thank you so much.

Danielle Howell: 1:13:55

Thanks, John.

John Hawker: 1:13:57

Thanks for listening to Jobs Worth. If you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to like and subscribe. You can stay connected by following me on LinkedIn for more insights on the world of work behind the scenes, content and updates on upcoming episodes. We're really thinking about guests for season two, so if there is a particular topic you'd like us to discuss, then please send in your suggestions to hello at jobsworthcom.