Specialist HR Topics and Masterclasses, Wellbeing

Podcast Episode 189: Working With Cancer

27th February 2023

3,683 views

4 min read

This Episode: `Working With Cancer`

Lucinda is joined by Barbara Wilson and Dr Liz O’Riordan, to discuss the important topic of working with cancer. As professionals who have both experienced this devastating condition up close, Barbara and Liz share their invaluable insights, discussing all-important legal entitlements, and the best ways of ensuring that those who find themselves suffering through a cancer diagnosis are treated with the utmost care, respect and fairness at a time when it is needed most.

Key Takeaways

Most medical directors and HR line managers are not aware that once diagnosed with cancer, you are legally disabled and have certain rights.
One in two of us will be diagnosed with cancer in our lifetime – a huge number representing half the population. 1000 people are diagnosed every day.
Some organisations have great policies, while others have none in place. Some have great policies but no structure for rolling it out on a local basis. We need a sense of uniformity and order.
A terrifying statistic is that many women suffering through cancer do not tell their places of work for fear of being “retired”. They carry on and push themselves to the limit, making themselves even worse.

Best Moments from ‘`Working With Cancer`‘

‘She gave me the power to say that this is what I am entitled to’

‘More and more of us are surviving cancer and want to return to work’

‘Some HR teams don’t understand their responsibilities’

Valuable Resources

Actus 360 now

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About The Guests, Barbara Wilson and Dr Liz O’Riordan

Publicis Groupe Working with Cancer Pledge

Website – https://www.workingwithcancerpledge.com/
Pledge – https://www.workingwithcancerpledge.com/about-the-pledge

Barbara Wilson– Founder and Director of Working With Cancer.

Barbara is a senior HR professional with over 40 years’ experience. In 2005, after being diagnosed with breast cancer and based on her professional and personal experience, Barbara set up a group with the aim of helping those of working age affected by cancer to return successfully to work. The group was the first to develop guidelines on work and cancer for HR professionals, line managers, employees and carers.

Barbara is a member of the CIPD, trained as a coach at Ashridge Management College, and is married with two sons.

Website https://workingwithcancer.co.uk/
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/working-with-cancer/
Instagram @workingwithcanceruk
Twitter @WorkWithCancer

Dr Liz O’Riordan

Liz was a 40-year-old consultant breast surgeon when she was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer in July 2015. She suddenly realised that she had no idea what it was like to be a patient, despite spending her working life treating the disease. She started an award-winning blog to help doctors and patients see what having breast cancer is really like, in a friendly, informative way and now speaks all over the world about her experiences, including a TEDx talk (Jar of Joy), focusing on digital healthcare, self-care, and how to improve the patient experience. Her upcoming memoir comes out on 6^th July 2023.

Book pre-order details: https://unbound.com/books/under-the-knife
Speaker, Author and Storyteller – liz.oriordan.co.uk
Podcast Host – Don’t Ignore The Elephant
Co-author of ‘The Complete Guide to Breast Cancer’
Instagram @oriordanliz
Twitter @Liz_ORiordan

About The Host

Lucinda Carney is a Business Psychologist with 15 years in Senior Corporate L&D roles. Lucinda also has a further 10 as CEO of Actus Software where she worked closely with HR colleagues helping them to solve the same challenges across a huge range of industries. Certainly, it was this breadth of experience that inspired Lucinda to set up the HR Uprising community to facilitate greater collaboration across HR professionals in different sectors, helping them to ‘rise up’ together.

“If you look up, you rise up”

How To Be A Change Superhero – by Lucinda Carney