Returning to work after maternity leave or starting your career after motherhood? Good luck (because you’ll need it). Charity, Pregnant Then Screwed, and a collective of advertising creatives have launched a campaign to highlight the discrimination that exists.
So now you’re wondering, “Is that discrimination real?” For those who haven’t experienced it (perhaps yet), the campaign is based on research by Pregnant Then Screwed and Women in The report found that 12.3% of women are sacked, constructively dismissed or made redundant while pregnant, on maternity leave or within a year of returning from maternity leave. If scaled up to the general population, this is approximately 74,000 women a year forced to leave their job. hat’s a 37% increase from 54,000 in 2016. Almost 50% of pregnant women, those on maternity leave and those returning from maternity leave had a negative experience at work.
The campaign began with Pregnant Then Screwed live-streaming a giant physical shredder shredding the CVs of mothers aired across a billboard in Westfield London through Ocean Outdoor, known for its high footfall, and on a website, for the next four weeks. Everyone is also invited to support the campaign by engaging via their LinkedIn profile and ‘shredding’ their CV. Once they’ve done this, they’ll receive a social asset they can post on LinkedIn to help highlight the ever-growing number of mothers who experience discrimination in the UK.
The full campaign will include OOH posters provided by Clear Channel across the UK to coincide with The Apprentice airing, its words stating, ‘Mum, you’re fired’ – sadly, it doesn’t matter if you land the job; if you’re only going to be pushed out when you become a mum; plus print in national publications and 30-second spots featuring the voices and CVs of real women who have experienced pregnancy and maternity discrimination across Acast’s network of top podcasts.
Gemma Phillips, the creative director behind the stunt, commented, “Pregnancy and maternity discrimination not only destroys the confidence of hundreds of thousands of women, it costs the economy severely too – it just doesn’t make business sense. With recent conversations about returning to the office and the role back of D&I initiatives, this campaign lands at a really interesting time in the world of work. Career Shredder not only sheds light on this huge waste of talent but importantly provides ways to stop it.”
Joeli Brearley, founder and CEO of Pregnant Then Screwed, added, ‘’We have long suspected things are getting worse, not better. Our free advice line is ringing off the hook, it has reached a point where we simply cannot cope with demand. To find that 74,000 mothers a year are being pushed out of their job for daring to procreate is not surprising, but it is devastating. That’s a woman being pushed out of her job every seven minutes in the UK for doing something that is part of the human existence.’’
The campaign is asking companies to increase their paternity leave offer, advertise jobs as flexible unless they have a good business reason not to, and collect maternity retention data to offer further insight into company behaviour.
Credits:
Creative Director: Gemma Phillips
Creatives: Sam Sword, Harry Osborne, Gemma Phillips
PR: Celia Venables, Shoutybear Ltd
Production Company: The 5Gs
Executive Producer: Emma Jackson The 5Gs
Executive Creative Director The 5Gs: Greg Furber
Technical Director The 5Gs: Oliver Kibblewhite
Shoot Studio: Rising Tide Studio, Devon
Designers: Kerry Roper, Harry Osborne
Motion Design: Neal Coghlan, Ben White
Media Support: Ocean Outdoor, Clear Channel, Mindshare, ACAST
Website Partner: Inqvine
Sound Studio: Strings and Tins
Print Support: Candy & Co
