From Diversity & Inclusion to Menopause Coaching: Sarah Cooper's Journey to Building Belonging at Work

In this episode, Lauren welcomes Sarah Cooper, founder of Flamingo Menopause Coaching and a graduate of the Women of a Certain Stage Menopause Coach diploma program. Sarah brings over 10 years of HR experience, specializing in diversity and inclusion strategy, employee experience, and most notably, building workplace belonging—particularly for women navigating menopause.Sarah's journey from contact center customer service to leading diversity and inclusion initiatives for an entire organization is a masterclass in identifying gaps and creating solutions. When she joined her last corporate role, they were just beginning to explore menopause support. Sarah volunteered to set up the menopause support group from scratch—and what she learned became the framework for seven other employee network groups across the organization.This conversation explores what diversity and inclusion really means beyond checkbox exercises, why belonging (not just fitting in) is the foundation of workplace culture, how one painting of a flamingo became a business metaphor for creating safe spaces, and why Sarah's "menopause geek" tendencies finally found their perfect outlet after redundancy gave her the push she needed to go all-in on her passion.If you've ever wondered how to make menopause support feel like genuine cultural change rather than a lunch-and-learn tick-box, or how to transition from corporate security to entrepreneurial freedom, Sarah's story will inspire you.Key Points Covered:• From Customer Service to Employee Experience: Sarah started her career in contact centers on the phones, then transitioned into HR about 10 years ago—swapping customer experience for employee experience, which became the foundation for her people-first approach.• The Menopause Support Group That Changed Everything: When Sarah joined her last company, they were just beginning their menopause journey. She volunteered to set up the menopause support group from scratch, and her learnings from that became the framework for seven other employee network groups across the organization.• What D&I Actually Means: Diversity and inclusion isn't just about reporting gender pay gaps or diversity in hiring (the "hard elements"). Sarah's strategy was heavily focused on belonging—making sure everyone in the organization felt they had a place, were accepted, understood, and valued for their unique contributions.• Belonging vs. Fitting In: You can have diversity and inclusion policies without having a diverse workforce. True belonging means diversity of thought, acceptance, finding your place in the organization, and feeling like you truly belong—not just fitting into someone else's mold.• The Family Analogy (With Caveats): Sarah is resistant to calling workplaces "families" because you're being paid to be there and many families are dysfunctional anyway. But the sense of belonging she aimed for was similar—ensuring women of a certain age don't feel pushed out, misunderstood, or like they no longer belong.• Culture Starts with Line Managers: Senior leadership matters, but most employees (especially in large contact centers) never interact with the CEO. What makes the real difference is your immediate team and line manager. Do they understand you as a person, not just your role? Do they show kindness, flexibility, and genuine care?• Common Sense Isn't Common: Sarah's HR mantra: "If we just had managers that use their common sense and were nice people, we wouldn't have HR problems." But somehow that common sense seems to "leave them at the door" when they become managers.• Lunch-and-Learns Don't Change Culture: One soft lunch-and-learn on menopause (or any topic) doesn't make culture change. Real transformation requires line managers and team leaders developing life skills—listening, communicating, understanding—that go beyond any specific diversity topic.• The Flamingo Story: Sarah originally planned to start her business in 2020, but COVID derailed it. After getting made redundant again, she thought: "If I'm ever going to do it, I need to do it now." The name came from a painting she created at a leadership offsite—despite her art teacher once telling her she had "good ideas but couldn't put them into practice."• Creating Safe Spaces to Thrive: The painting instructor broke the task into manageable chunks, created an environment where everyone felt safe, and didn't judge anyone's work. Sarah came away with something that "vaguely resembled" the example and thought: "I quite like this." That experience of creating safe spaces for people to thrive became her business philosophy.• Flamingo Fun Fact Friday: Sarah is implementing "Flamingo Fun Fact Friday" on social media—sharing fun facts about menopause to educate and engage her audience with personality and playfulness.• The Menopause Geek Revelation: Sarah has "always been one of these people that researches the hell out of something" and became "a bit of a menopause geek." When she got made redundant, she'd been thinking about training anyway—and realized this was her moment.• The Conference That Changed Everything: Before being made redundant, Sarah saw Lauren speaking at a conference (where Vicki Ramsden also spoke, who later became a faculty member in the diploma). That planted the seed for choosing Women of a Certain Stage.• Why This Program: Sarah knew she didn't want a self-paced online course with no interaction ("I just don't do it"). She wanted live sessions with accountability. She also didn't want to just train people to deliver material—she wanted coaching skills because coaching was already part of her leadership style.• The Comprehensive Factor: Sarah was impressed by the comprehensiveness—not just menopause and coaching content, but also business mechanics for setting up your own practice. The quality of teaching and variety of expert speakers exceeded her expectations.• The Personal Growth Surprise: Sarah expected to learn information but "hadn't expected to grow so much as a person and increase my confidence." She realized she needed to take more care of her own health and wellbeing—practicing what she was learning to teach.• The Decluttering Turning Point: For the first 3-4 sessions, Sarah was "just learning it"—studying how coaching was delivered. Then they hit the decluttering module and "something switched in my brain." She finally let herself be coached rather than studying the process, and "that was the turning point."• Allow Yourself to Be Coached: Lauren always says during the menopause plan delivery: "Allow yourself to be coached. Don't study how I'm delivering this." The magic happens when you stop analyzing the technique and actually experience being coached—that's when transformation occurs.• The Freedom of Entrepreneurship: Sarah loves the freedom to do what she wants without someone telling her what to do. Her brain constantly fires with ideas while walking, shopping, watching TV, or at the gym—"Oh, that would be a really good post!"• Risk-Taking When Passionate: Sarah isn't naturally a big risk-taker or daredevil, but she's realized: "I don't mind taking risks when it's something I'm really passionate about because it feels like the right thing to do."• The Corporate Safety Net vs. Solo Reality: In corporate, you have admin people, comms people, technical people—everyone doing their specialized thing. When you work for yourself, everything is down to you. Even if you outsource, knowing how your own business works and setting up systems is crucial.• Finding Your New Rhythm: One of the biggest challenges is creating a new routine when you no longer have meetings, deadlines, and projects dictated by others. You need discipline and self-imposed deadlines or "you can easily find yourself wasting the day" and it becomes "an expensive hobby."• Project Management Still Applies: Sarah used to manage projects with tools and techniques in corporate. She's had to remind herself: "All those things will help me. If I do a project plan, it will help me." The skills transfer—you just need to apply them to yourself.• Outsource Your Weaknesses: Sarah tried to create her own logo—it was "rubbish." She outsourced it for a reasonable price, and someone turned Fabian (her flamingo) into a professional brand with a full toolkit, colors, and social media-ready assets. Play to your strengths; outsource the rest.• Pay in Time or Money: You're paying either way—either with your time or with money. When something clearly isn't your strength and you'll waste loads of time on it, outsource if you can.• Learn Before You Outsource: Even if you plan to outsource eventually (like social media), learn the basics first. You need to understand messaging, calls to action, information types, sources, and brand fit before handing it to someone else—especially when accuracy matters.• Your Brand Will Evolve: Logos change, messaging changes, how you talk about your work changes. Sarah's seen people get stuck in "I need the website, I need the logo, I need everything perfect" when the first thing they should do is reach out to their existing network—that's where initial business comes from.• The Gym Talk Success: Sarah did a talk at her local gym. One woman almost didn't come because she thought