Women's innovation in tech; Working in retail; Valerie's Life in Shoes

Published: Dec. 1, 2020, 1:01 p.m.

Two of this year’s TechWomen100 Award winners join Jane to discuss getting more women and girls into the tech industries, including via a new app. June Angelides, an investor, speaker and mentor who founded Mums in Tech has won the Editor’s Choice award. Rav Bumbra gets the Champion award for her work recruiting women to work in tech fields and mentoring schoolgirls. With non-essential retail due to open again tomorrow, we discuss the situation facing shop workers - many of whom are women - working in the UK's high street stores. Hastings shopkeeper Pratibha Paleja talks about the difficulties of dealing with frustrated customers and reports of shop workers being assaulted. Retail analyst Catherine Shuttleworth and Joanne Cairns, deputy head of research at the Union of Shop Distributive & Allied Workers discuss the wider issues facing women working in the sector, including the risk to jobs from the predicted collapse of the Arcadia group, and the reality of asking people to restrain their shopping in the run-up to Christmas. Listener Valerie tells the story of her adventurous life through a pair of shoes and two pairs of boots. She wore the boots while becoming the first British woman to summit Mount Manaslu, the trek shoes she bought for an Everest marathon and the fur-lined boots she wears when the temperature gets really low. How does it feel to reach the age your Mum was when she died? Jo Morris talks to four women who feel a clock ticking. Their stories are all different but they have one thing in common – none of them have felt able to talk about this before. They didn’t want to worry their loved ones or vocalise these dark thoughts. Titania is 44, her Mum died at 54 and her Gran at 64 and she feels she sees a pattern. Presenter - Jane Garvey Producer - Anna Lacey