Employee died suddenly, how do you announce this

LegacyUser

Assistant manager of a department, about 20 or so staff.
All good workers and everyone gets on. Pretty good atmosphere here.

The manager is away, our receptionist deals with HR issues and she is away too.

An employee died over the weekend, very unexpected, they were pretty young.
Quite popular, here 3 years or so.

And how I found out is the team leader told me they never came in today so I called their home and got the bad news.

How the hell does a manager deal with this situation?

I don't want to send an email, people will read it at different times and god, it seems so impersonal.
Could call a meeting this afternoon, people are off at lunch at the minute.
Announce the sad news, say if anyone wants to talk to me or needs to take afternoon off that should be fine. I can spare maybe two staff this afternoon, the lad was pretty popular.

I can email around funeral arrangements when I learn them

Realy, this is will be probably be done before I get a reply on boards. I may call company HQ and ask HR there.

Any managers here? What would you do?

csm

Sorry you didn't get a reply to this. Tough question.

In my workplace (ca 140 people), those closest to the person who died were told in person and given support (chance to talk to welfare officer, go home early, etc). An email was sent round a bit later to make sure all others were informed.

I think this was a good approach as telling everyone together would have been impractical and harsh on those who knew her best. In a smaller place you might do things differently.

What did you do in the end?

csm

Sorry, just noticed it's 20 or so people. In that case I would have gathered everyone together and told them. Perhaps telling close friends beforehand.

LegacyUser

Thanks for reply,

Everyone knows everyone realy and our group of 20 are close enough.

In the end I waited until after lunch, got the 20 or so and said it to them all.
I said they could go home, one person spoke to their team leader and headed home for the day, that was fine.
Of course, I can only spare a few, if several wanted to go home I would have to refuse so glad it didn't come to that. I think that's understandable

Company HQ were informed and sent around an email around 3pm.
A pretty standard email, much like any template you'd find if you googled for it.
They're sending around an experienced lady from HR tomorrow for a few days. One to one chat if anyone wants it.

Seems to go ok, I've never come across this in my career
And hope it's a long time before me or my team do again

3DataModem

Tough spot. Condolences.

Only situation I've been in is where the employee died at work... awful. Execs went around and told everyone in person in small groups. Some stayed in office, some went home.

csm

Horrible situation. Sounds like you did a good job though, well done.

D.McC

Perhaps placing an ad in the situations vacant section of your local newspaper..

dudara

D.McC As a relatively new poster, please be advised that such comments are not in line with the tone of this forum. There are other forums on boards where such humour is acceptable.

dudara

Sounds like you dealt with it well. A colleague of mine died at work a few years ago (collapsed in front of us, diabetic coma, ambulance called etc) and it was shocking how unprofessional the managers were. Wouldn't tell us anything, rumours were flying around the place all day, some people were told and not others. No kind of counselling was even suggested despite the fact that about ten of us had actually seen her die. We just had to get on with it. I hope that never happens again.

Max001

Oh dear. DMcC and I were actually thinking the same thing! :eek:

Seriously though. I had to deal with a death at work some time ago and I called in CRUSE bereavement counsellors and they did a stellar job. We had them onsite for a few days, then a day a week for a few weeks and all the time, employees had a number to call, to set up a session at home or in work. Everything was confidential. CRUSE organisation's experience and expertise go all the way back to the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster, where they trained counsellors to deal with the aftermath. They were involved with the Kings Cross fire too I believe, as well as many other major incidents. They're a bit thin on the ground in RoI, but expanding slowly. I'd never consider using any other agency and the feedback I got after our incident was that they successfully helped everyone of our employees that went to them for help.

Mrs OBumble

I'll add one thought here:

If you're a manager, it's a really good idea to have a rough idea of what your organisation's HR policies for emergencies are like, before the crisis happens.

Some companies are touchy-feelie, and will spring for counsellors and allow time off even bringing in staff from other branches to cover. Some won't and expect that employees look after their mental health in the same way that they look after their physical health, ie off the clock.

When you're faced with a crisis, you need to which way your company leans, because it will help you know how to respond. And you need to know where you can get help quickly if you need it - eg the phone call to head office/HR should have been your first point of call.

padser

One thing I wouldn't do is post enough details of the situation up on a popular message board that someone from the company reading the board might find out that way.

That could be just me though.

D.McC

dudara wrote: »

D.McC As a relatively new poster, please be advised that such comments are not in line with the tone of this forum. There are other forums on boards where such humour is acceptable.

dudara

You’re right of course. It was insensitive of me. Apologies to the OP