Biztory UK Introduces Period Leave

Here at Biztory we’re always keen to identify ways to make our team's life a little bit easier. On International Women’s Day, a big topic was periods. We discussed how periods can impact a person’s life, what we could do to de-stigmatise them and what we could do to support people.

Of those who have periods, around 80% will experience period pain at some point in their life, and around 5 to 10% will experience pain severe enough to impact their everyday life. So it’s likely that some of the Biztory team will be suffering in some way. After International Women’s Day the UK Leadership Team took time to research what was being done elsewhere and how we could implement it into our own policies. One of the main ways we found was period leave, this is similar to sick leave but specifically used when people are struggling with period pain.

Period leave is not a new concept and has been around for decades. In 1947, Japan became the first country to introduce period leave into law and it is becoming a more common policy.

Period leave has a range of benefits. Studies have found employees feel more respected and are more productive. But it also prevents people coming to work because they feel they have to. One article on the BBC told the story of a young person working as an editor,  ‘They decided not to call in sick. “I just don’t think [a period] counts as a sickness,” they say.’.

At Biztory, we are committed to our values and the two we wanted to show here are ‘we are sensitive’ and ‘we belong’. So one month later, we edited the Biztory UK sickness policy to include period leave. This gives our team the reassurance that using sick leave for period pain is okay, and also highlights that repeated use of period leave will not be deemed inappropriate, reassuring those with frequently painful periods. We are continually looking for ways we can support our team and make our workplace more inclusive, but we’re hoping this change will allow people time to rest when it’s really needed.