"It was St. Patrick’s Day, March 17. Late that first morning, while seated in my corner office on the second floor of our headquarters in San Antonio, the bank officer walked into my office. As I looked up to greet him, he noticed I had tears in my eyes. Not knowing what to say, he simply turned around and walked out of my office, closing the door behind him."
Herb's office encounter isn't unusual. In fact, most bereaved employees find themselves similarly isolated. But the problem is much larger than employees simply not knowing what to do or say.
Meet Kristen. Kristen is the managing editor of Human Resource Executive magazine. On October 20, 2015, she was at her company's own HR Technology Convention in Las Vegas when she received a phone call from her neighbor.
Earlier that day the neighbor had noticed Kristen's cat roaming outside alone. Jim, Kristen's husband, adored their cat, and the neighbor was concerned as she hadn't seen Jim in a few days. Kristen had talked to Jim on the phone just that morning, but asked her neighbor to check on him just in case. The neighbor agreed, and found Jim's lifeless body in his bed, dead from an apparent heart attack.
In a state of shock, Kristen had to return to her hotel, pack her bags, and catch the next flight home—alone.
"Because I had used up all the time I was entitled to under the Family and Medical Leave Act caring for my father with hospice, I was left with my allotted 3 days of bereavement leave —still the national standard—before returning to the diversion and demands of my job."
Kristen became determined to address the elephant in the room and last September contacted me for an interview about grief in the workplace. We connected on that grief level, a language we both understood, and talked for quite a while. Following our interview, I emailed Kristen some strategies to use in her article.
I had forgotten about my conversation with Kristen until the article was published in Human Resource Executive magazine this past March. Kristen sent me the link.
As I read through Kristen's article, I was surprised to see she highlighted the strategies I had sent her and delighted to see myself cited me as the source. Even more important, I realized I was reading the foundation of a curriculum about handling grief in the workplace.
Over the next 6 months I worked hard to develop the strategies into a full fledged curriculum to be taught from an academia standpoint.
On October 6, 2017, I'm teaching the first Employee Crisis Response Curriculum called Grief in the Workplace at a local college. It outlines step-by-step strategies for HR leaders, managers, administrators, and directors to learn how to respond to an employee's crisis. Further, it offers strategies that minimize disruption and maximize workflow— and along the way improve corporate culture. The class offers 3 solid hours of information and strategies every workplace should have in their procedure manual.
It's important to distinguish that this curriculum isn't about outsourcing the grieving employee to the EAP. It's about employing internal strategies to balance the needs of staff with needs of the shareholders.
Grief isn't limited to a cubicle. When crisis happens to one employee, it affects the whole office.
Which is what this curriculum is all about.
It's about Herb. And Kristen. And the Herbs and Kristens of the world.
"Bereavement in the workplace is still a new frontier."
Yes, it is. But it shouldn't be.
For local companies, click here to find how to register your managers and administrators. Continuing education credits are available for those who need it.
That cool part is that it's all just the beginning. Later next month I'll teach this curriculum around the world via a new global webinar platform to be announced next week. Further, we'll begin training the trainer—people who can teach this curriculum in their own local colleges and corporations.
In today's competitive job marketplace, employees are looking not just at wages and benefit packages. They're looking at corporate culture—how well a corporation takes care of employees. Our curriculum teaches corporations how to do that in times of crisis.
Creating and teaching corporate curriculum is the next step on my journey toward making the world a better place for future generations.
Cheers!
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