Zoe Sinclair
Co-Founder
Zoe is one of the founders of This Can Happen. She is also the founder of Employees Matter, the largest provider of employee engagement seminars and webinars in the UK.
Grief is a topic that This Can Happen is championing, and we continued this discussion at our June conference. In the opening keynote of the day, Jane Roques-Shaw, Global Director of Employee Experience at Dentsu, shared her personal experience with grief and bereavement - and her key implications for the workplace.
Jane Roques-Shaw
Global Director, Employee Experience
With over 20 years of global cross-industry experience in employee experience (EX) design, HR and Employee Engagement, Jane is passionate about creating engaging, productive and inclusive workplaces that enable people to thrive and grow. Jane is also a keen advocate for improving the experience of grief and other key life moments in the workplace.
Amber Jeffrey
Mentor and Podcast Host
Amber Jeffrey is a celebrated podcast host, online community facilitator, grief mentor and consultant. Her work & podcast, The Grief Gang, specialises in breaking down the topic that is grief one conversation at a time. By sharing her own experiences of loss as well as the stories of others on both her show and online platforms.
Diagnosed mental ill health remains one of the final taboos to break in the workplace mental wellbeing conversation, often due to a lack of understanding or misconceptions about the challenges that these employees face. In this panel, we spotlighted a series of inspiring individuals who are living with diagnosed mental ill health, explaining how it impacts their wellbeing experience at work, and showing how employers can create a more mentally supportive and empathetic environment for them to work in.
Arif Jiwany
Global Head of Occupational Health & Wellbeing
Arif Jiwany is a highly experienced GP & Occupational Health Physician who has worked in both the NHS as well as several different industry sectors. Having previously been at Shell, Cancer Research & GSK, he has been the Head of Occupational Health & Wellbeing for the Haleon, the former consumer division of GSK for 18 months. Apart from establishing a new function which operates as a centre of excellence. He & his team are responsible for developing & driving the new health & wellbeing strategy, improving the quality & delivery of health programmes and improving governance related processes. Our ambition being to create a culture that enables our people to be at their best.
David Gordon
SVP, Global Head of Tax
David is Global Head of Tax at GSK, and also leads on Wellbeing for GSK's Finance organisation, with a particular focus on mental health - aiming to normalise conversations around mental health.
Alice Linley-Munro
Travel and Resource Planning Manager
Alice is the Travel and Resource Planning Manager at Oil Spill Response Limited, which is the largest international industry-funded cooperative which exists to respond to oil spills wherever in the world they may occur. Her department exists to select personnel who will be mobilised to incidents, and to coordinate their travel and security arrangements to ensure they remain safe and well, regardless of where they are working. Alice is a passionate advocate for mental health awareness, having vowed to contribute to breaking the stigma of discussing mental health issues both in personal and professional settings. At the age of 40 in 2022, Alice was finally diagnosed with inattentive ADHD following a long journey with her own mental health which began some 20 years earlier.
Liam Reynolds
Workplace Mental Health Officer
Liam is a Workplace Mental Health Officer at Mental Health UK. Liam combines his knowledge of working within business development divisions for 10 year’s, with a passion for mental health support and awareness. Diagnosed in 2020 with borderline personality disorder and OCD, Liam transitioned into the mental health sector to inspire organisations to provide mental health support for their staff. Liam speaks to organisations, helping them assess the mental health challenges they face as a business, and supports them through a range of workplace programmes, raising awareness through talks and weaving his knowledge and lived experience into blogs and articles.
In this 1:1 interview, we attempted to understand how an organisation can grow and build a holistic mental wellbeing strategy, ultimately moving from singular and sporadic mental wellbeing initatives and benefits, to an overarching, year-long and nuanced plan of action.
Catherine Ritchie
Wellbeing and People Experience Manager
Catherine Ritchie is Wellbeing and People Experience Manager at global law firm Clifford Chance. A key member of the firm's HR team, her focus is on driving forward the strategic and programmatic elements across all locations, but with specific responsibility for the UK and Middle East. Since 2018, Catherine has been developing people-first strategies to promote wellbeing and positive experiences across market-leading businesses. In 2023 she was recognised for her work by Make a Difference (Best Multinational Workplace Wellbeing Programme). Her training in marketing combined with her rich experience means her work achieves impact across diverse populations.
Sylvia Bruce
Director
Sylvia Bruce Ltd
Sylvia is a former banking executive and now a workplace mental wellbeing consultant, NLP coach and integrative counsellor. She also talks openly and honestly about her personal experience and transformation from mental ill health (suicidal depression) to mental wealth. In her last position, Director, HSBC, Global Banking & Markets, Sylvia lead a globally respected team working in highly pressurised environments managing a multi-billion USD portfolio. As HSBC’s mental health network Chair, she also passionately drove the Time to Change agenda forward. Sylvia has an insightful blend of business, professional and personal experience and now works with various organisations championing workplace mental wellbeing, creating mental wellbeing confident and supportive workplaces and encourage a practical, business risk-based approach to recognising mental wellbeing as a workplace asset. Sylvia’s work with RidersMinds was instrumental to their extraordinary success at This Can Happen 2021 awards.
In the UK, 1 in 5 adults experiences domestic abuse and in the last year alone, 2.4 million adults were victims (ONS). Increasingly, the workplace is becoming a psychologically safe space for employees who are living through abusive situations, which includes physical, economic and psychological abuse. In this powerful and solutions-focused session, we wanted to draw upon lived experience to raise awareness of the mental toll that this can take on employees, and highlight how businesses can step in and provide tangible support to these members of staff.
Ayesha Fordham
Membership and Partnerships Manager
Ayesha’s role as Membership and Partnerships Manager at EIDA involves supporting EIDA Members, including Strategic Partner Members and Beacon Members, to take effective action on domestic abuse. She manages EIDA’s Ambassador programme, ensuring the survivor voice is at the heart of everything EIDA does. Ayesha also connects and engages with partner organisations from the domestic abuse sector to bring in the expertise and knowledge of the specialist services.
Ayesha previously worked in a dual role within the City of London, partly as the Domestic Abuse Vulnerability Policy Officer at the City of London Corporation, where she coordinated and delivered the City of London’s strategic response to domestic abuse and violence against women and girls, alongside her role as the Independent Domestic Violence Advocate, supporting victims and survivors of domestic abuse.
Andrew Lane
Head of Business Strategy and Change
Andrew joined the Probation Service as the Head of Business Strategy and Change in 2019 after a number of years working in the education sector in the UK and overseas. As a domestic abuse survivor himself, Andrew is determined to use his experience to help support others who might find themselves in a similar position or who may be worried about friends, family or colleagues. Andrew is an ambassador for the Employers Initiative on Domestic Abuse (EIDA), and the co-chair of the Safe Space Forum within the Ministry of Justice.
Kate Osiadacz
Head of Responsible Business
| Kate has worked for almost three decades in the retail banking sector with a career that spans roles in frontline customer delivery, programme management, corporate communications, and responsible business. In 2020, she helped to create, and now leads, TSB’s responsible business programme the ‘Do What Matters Plan’. She’s responsible for driving the Bank’s social and environmental commitments under the Plan that, together, promote financial and social inclusion, encourage good business practice, and support a just transition to a greener planet. Devoted to doing what matters for people, Kate has steered TSB’s support for victim-survivors of domestic abuse. She is most proud of TSB’s Emergency Flee fund, launched in December 2022, that offers TSB customers and colleagues, who are victim-survivors of domestic abuse, between £50 and £500 to escape an abusive relationship. |
With the NHS overstretched in terms of resource and finance, it's more important than ever for workplaces to offer tangible support to their employees when it comes to supporting their mental health and wellbeing. In this keynote session, we explored exactly how employers can offer mental healthcare support that helps to fill the gap between employee needs and healthcare waiting time - and what is and isn't within the workplace's remit.
Susan Gee
Head of Occupational Health & Wellbeing
Susan is Head of Occupational Health & Wellbeing at Yorkshire Water and previously worked at Bradford Metropolitan District Council. An experienced occupational health professional she has an outstanding record of achievement created through the development and implementation of robust strategies, initiatives and organisational change in occupational health. She was previously a visiting lecturer in sickness absence management at Leeds Becket University and has a BSc(Hons) in Occupational Health, an MA in Health Care Law and an MSc in Leadership and Change in Health and Social Care.
In our first Awards-focused panel of the day, we spotlighted two contrasting entries; firstly, highlighting an entry that had successfully developed a sustainable and impactful mental wellbeing strategy year-on-year, and secondly, a workplace that had built a new strategy for the first time.
Toni Graves
Global Head of Reward and Wellbeing
Toni is an experienced HR professional with 20+ years in professional services. She trained as an accountant at PwC, working with global clients across multiple sectors. After 10 years in client facing roles she moved into human resources and went on to shape and drive the firm's reward strategy. As part of the HR leadership team, she was also responsible for employee relations and global projects. She joined A&O in 2016 as Global Head of Reward and also became the firm's first Head of Wellbeing. Throughout her career Toni has worked with senior leaders to create people strategies that drive change and improve performance across many aspects of the people agenda including diversity, resourcing, performance management and wellbeing in the workplace - a topic she is passionate about.
Carolyn Cole
Chief People Officer
Carolyn Cole, Chief People Officer at Air IT is an experienced leader having worked in HR for over 15 years in a variety of industries ranging from construction and technology to agriculture, and insurance. She has successfully led people functions for the last six years and specialises in organisational change, wellbeing, M&A, ESG, and working with businesses to support the best possible culture and drive the overall employee experience. Carolyn is a trained MHFA and is a MHFA instructor having trained over 100 people to date. She has created wellbeing networks, buddy systems, women in business networks and has taken an active part in working towards reducing stigma and discrimination in the workplace. Presently at Air IT Carolyn continues to blend strategic leadership with compassionate understanding, with top of the agenda remaining the wellbeing and mental health of Air IT colleagues.
Kristina Adey-Davies
Head of Wellbeing and Inclusion - Global
Kristina is a work psychologist focused on approaches that encourage individuals and teams to build on healthy behaviours that support both wellbeing and high performance. Kristina joined Freshfields Global Diversity and Inclusion team in 2017 to evolve the firm’s global approach to mental health, and more recently wellbeing. She has developed and implemented a number of interventions across their global network, including their Global Mental Health First Aid programme, with over 300 people trained in mental health first aid skills and senior leadership training focused on high performance habits. Kristina holds an MSc in Occupational and Business Psychology, an MBA from Henley Business School, she is a Mental Health First Aid Instructor, and an Executive Coach.
In this session, Kathryn Courtenay-Evans, This Can Happen’s very own Head of Research and Insights, presented key insights, findings and emerging themes from our pre-conference survey, which reflect delegate thoughts around workplace mental wellbeing.
Kathryn Courtenay-Evans
Insight & Strategy Director
Kathryn oversees This Can Happen's new initiative - Research & Insights, which is helping companies to measure and benchmark the success of their mental health strategies.
This panel discussion highlighted a range of inspiring women and allies, speaking about their mental wellbeing challenges in the workplace, and how businesses can develop psychologically supportive environments to retain more women in the workforce.
Geraldine Gallacher
CEO
Geraldine Gallacher is CEO of the Executive Coaching Consultancy, which she started in 1994, as one of the first executive coaching providers, and now has over 90 coaches internationally serving a wide range of industries, and an Accredited Master Coach with the Association for Coaching and Team Coach with the Global Team Coaching Institute. She is also Vice President of the City Women’s Network and Author of Coaching Women – Changing the system not the person published by Open University Press.
Claudia Cole
Mental Health and Wellness Writer
Freelance
Claudia is a freelance writer based in the UK. With a focus on increasing awareness about mental health and wellbeing, she has an interest in writing about her first-hand experiences with overcoming depression and reducing the stigma surrounding mental healthcare. She holds a bachelor’s degree in creative writing and a Level 2 Certificate in Awareness of Mental Health Problems.
Carolanne Minashi
Global Head of Inclusion
Carolanne has held leadership roles in Talent Management, Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Employee Relations and Health & Wellbeing. Carolanne joined HSBC in 2021 from her role as Global Head of Diversity & Inclusion at UBS, previously she was at Citi where she started her career. Carolanne is the recipient of the 100 Women in Finance 2023 EMEA Industry Leadership Award, an award presented annually in recognition of exemplary professional talent, business ethics and passion for investing that further define and advance the industry’s standards of excellence.
Passionate about driving real change, Carolanne is focused on fixing the system rather than fixing the people and driving impact through inclusive leaders. She combines data science with deep technical expertise and a principles based approach to produce strategies that work for the long term. She is a member of the Women’s Leadership Board at the Harvard Kennedy School, and the European Advisory Board for Catalyst, a Chartered Companion for the Chartered Management Institute and a Trustee of Catalyst UK. Carolanne is currently researching the impact of the Menopause on Women in Senior Leadership positions.
Asad Iqbal
Senior Manager
Asad (he/him) is a Senior Manager at EY, where he has been for the last nine years. During that time Asad has led on Wellbeing and DE&I which are both areas he is extremely passionate about, alongside his technical role as a Forensic Accountant. Asad is particularly keen to explore how we can open up the conversation on topics that are often considered taboo, and in particular how we can engage more people as allies. Asad has been nominated for an Amplifying Allyship award twice in the EY Unity Awards, and has won an award for his role as an ally in the EY Forensic Womens' Network Awards 2024.
In the penultimate session of the day, we looked at how to effectively develop a mental wellbeing strategy that reaches and engages all members of staff across all locations - and not just those in head office or those who are at their desks all day.
Steve Mosley
Information & Communication Manager
Steve leads the IT and Communications team in Omexom, a global engineering and construction business. He has worked in many sectors including manufacturing. IT and local government. Steve is passionate about employee wellbeing. Two of his family members suffered serious mental health issues including a suicide. He strives for inclusion and support for all employees regardless of position. In an industry where site employees are often the forgotten ones, he is determined to change this. Steve leads the wellbeing team within Omexom and has developed many initiatives including Fish and Chip Friday.
Vikky Goodwin
Information Manager & Lead MHC
Vikky is an Lead Mental Health Champion for VolkerRail who last year won various awards for her workforce Initiative Building Relationships On Site (BROS). She has been a Mental Health Champion for 6 years and has spoken across various industry platforms about the ways companies can engage site workers in their mental health initiatives, and introduce better working relationships on site and in the office.
Rob Cheeseman
Head of Health
Rob is a proven leader in the health and wellbeing space with over 20 years experience in occupational health and performance coaching. Embodying authentic leadership to inspire multi-discipline teams to deliver results for people and businesses. "I love what I do, work hard, play hard and deliver everyday with a smile on your face whilst we constantly learn and try to evolve as a humans ourselves."
AI quickly became the most talked about technology trend of 2023, and we are only at the early stages of understanding what we can do - and how it can impact us. Conversation is rapidly growing about how AI and mental wellbeing intersect, and in this future-facing closing session, we saw the implications that the technology has upon mental health at work - and the key, tangible takeouts that employers need to be aware of.
Dr Paris Alexandros Lalousis
Lecturer in Artificial Intelligence in Mental Health
Paris is a Lecturer in Artificial Intelligence in Mental Health at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King's College London. He graduated with a first-class BSc (Hons) in Psychology from the University of Wales. He undertook a MSc in Brain Imaging & Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Birmingham, graduating with distinction in 2017. Following that, he worked as an Assistant Psychologist in the Early Intervention in Psychosis service for the Birmingham Children’s Hospital. He undertook a joint funded Priestley University of Birmingham - University of Melbourne PhD at the Institute for Mental Health and the Centre for Human Brain Health. He then worked as Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the University of Birmingham leading his site within the NIH-funded PRESCIENT consortium and coordinating with international collaborators from 10 countries and 12 sites to successfully develop novel machine learning solutions for psychosis.
Including a Champions spotlight panel at 6:45pm.
Harpreet Butoy
Software Engineer
Harpreet is a wellbeing champion at NatWest and a mental health advocate in the Sikh Panjabi Community. His main focus is on the intersectionality between wellbeing and inclusion, whilst bringing the topic of mental health alive within minority communities.
Natalie Degg
Global Internal Audit Manager
Natalie has worked for Experian for 13 years, is a qualified Chartered Manager and a passionate people person who loves to engage with individuals. She believes that no one should feel alone or unheard and that support should always be available. Natalie is a qualified mental health first aider and trained domestic abuse awareness advocate who prides herself on being there for people when they need it the most. She proactively shares best practices and acts as a role model for her peers and the wider business. As an advocate for employees, Natalie champions the mental health and wellbeing agenda within Experian and is not being afraid to push the boundaries to ensure that this topic is considered as part of all business decisioning.
Lauren Carey
Technology Consultant
Lauren is an experienced Agile Transformation Consultant at Accenture, helping organizations thrive in a digital age and deliver real customer value. Day to day she enjoys building happy, healthy and empowered teams to work in a more human-centric environment. However, with her number 1 Gallup Strength being Empathy, it means her real passion is Mental Health and what it means to be mentally well. Lauren co-leads Accenture UKI's Mental Health Network which has a 3000 strong Ally community, and aims to reduce the stigma around Mental Health Challenges by providing regular events, Ally Training, and fostering a wider community of people who maybe want to feel less alone in how they feel and what they've experienced.
