This International Women’s Day, we’re shining a spotlight on our amazing Associate Director of Policy, Innovation and Partnerships, Fran White. Fran’s daily bread and butter in the NHS is building relationships with the many groups and organisations that we work in partnership with – a vital role that involves bringing together everyone from local authorities and the police, to the voluntary sector and local charities, to work out how we can work together to better deliver services for our population.
As part of this work Fran has been absolutely central in setting up the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Partnership – the major cross-organisational partnership locally, that meets to discuss and agree our joint priorities and how we are going to deliver on them.
Through this partnership work, Fran has also led on the development of the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Women’s Health Programme, a partnership of many local organisations working together to develop a collective vision for women and girls, and then using their individual levers to make those changes happen.
As well as building important relationships between different organisations, the Women’s Health Programme has conducted the largest local survey into the health of women and girls, giving us a really great insight into where we need to be focussing our efforts and how. The programme has also taken some strong first steps toward improving access to long-acting contraception, like the coil, for people who need it for non-contraceptive reasons like menopause or heavy bleeding. Previously access to these services was hugely varied across the area, but now it is much more widely available to those who need it.
Part of what makes Fran such an asset in this role is her extensive history of volunteering and philanthropy outside of and alongside her work in the NHS, both in her 20 years with Girl Guiding, and as a trustee of Portsmouth Pride. She said:
"It helps me to put myself in the Voluntary and Community Sector’s shoes and to understand some of the challenges. And then I think the other side of it is that you can advocate for the community a bit more in your role, when you can see it from the perspective of the communities that you work with. There's lots of crossover - I do a very similar role for Portsmouth Pride as I do for the NHS, in terms of helping to set the aims and strategy, so what I learn in each role helps the other.”
Fran has volunteered with the Girl Guides, particularly the Brownies, for roughly twenty years, but has been leading a ‘Ranger’ unit of 14- to 18-year-olds since covid:
“It’s a really nice space to watch girls grow and the whole point is to say to girls that they can do anything they want to do, and they’re able and capable of having any career or any ambition they want. Then you work together to find ways to enable them to do it. There are a lot of amazing opportunities that the girls get through Girl Guiding that I don’t think they’d have without.”
Working with young people is a genuine passion of Fran’s and the opportunities to do so are some of the most exciting parts of her role for her. One of the achievements Fran is most proud of in her career was working in London with young people on access to health services. Together they set up an app which took the NHS website and turned it into a more engaging platform for young people.
Working with young people is something Fran is keen to continue in her current role and she has also recently been involved with a project with University Hospital Southampton to gather young people’s voices:
“Young people are more creative. They’re more ambitious in what they think is acceptable and what they think they should have access to, and they’re quite creative at problem solving how to do that. I always find working with young people the best, most exciting, fun bit.”
As if all that weren’t enough, Fran’s long-standing advocacy and allyship for the LGBTQIA+ community is inspiring. She became a trustee for Portsmouth Pride when a friend who volunteered with them reached out for help with the governance and compliance side of the charity:
“Most people think of Pride as the big event we hold, but Pride is far, far more than that and the work we do as a charity goes much broader. We're trying to make Portsmouth and the surrounding areas an inclusive place for people to come and live, work and study, so we'll do things like work with local businesses on being more inclusive as employers and holding events throughout the year to provide safe spaces for the LGBTQIA+ community to come together.
“As someone that grew up in Portsmouth, I've always wanted to make the place I live better. I've had a good upbringing, good education and now I have a good job, and I feel it's really important that you give back to the place you're from and you make that place better for others too.
“Allyship is really important to me as well. I'm not a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, but I have a lot of friends that are and I see a lot of injustice in that community - in terms of safety, in terms of health access, it’s still there. It's not always completely visible, but for that community it still exists and that's wrong.”
Next up on Fran’s professional agenda is hosting the two-day Empowering Women’s Health event in Portsmouth Guildhall on 10-11 March. The event is an opportunity to bring together the partners from the Women’s Health Programme to reflect on everything they’ve accomplished. It has been jointly planned to ensure attendees hear from a diverse range of voices across the two days:
“We want to reflect the fact that women's health goes beyond the boundaries of healthcare. There are all sorts of different things that can impact it - educational factors can impact it, where you grew up, your background and experiences, and then also societal and historical views on women’s health, especially on things like periods and menopause. These all now have an impact on how people access services, so we're trying to build awareness of all this into the event.”
We are very fortunate to have Fran on our team in Hampshire and Isle of Wight and we’re proud to be able to acknowledge and celebrate her outstanding work this international Women’s Day.
