Support After Suicide for Workplaces
Create a culture of care: equip your people with practical tools to help them navigate grief and to support one another
Take the awkwardness & guesswork out of grief support at work
Grief in the workplace
When a suicide occurs, or an employee is grieving a loss, the impact on colleagues and teams can be significant. Grief does not stay outside the workplace. It affects how people think, feel, work, and relate to others. It can be difficult to know how best to respond, and how to strike the right balance between ensuring employees feel well supported in their grief, and minimising disruptions to productivity.
As a leader or People & Capability professional, you don’t need to navigate this alone
If you feel unsure how best to support your staff, I can help. I equip people with practical tools they can put in place immediately to help them better cope when life is messy and hard (Delivered with good measures of compassion, sensitivity and ‘heart’!).
I offer a range of masterclasses, workshops and support sessions, tailored to your organisation. The first step is a complimentary conversation to understand your needs and agree what support would be most helpful. This allows me to understand the unique needs of your workplace and, for us together, to agree what needs to happen next, and the aspects that you would like my help with.
Contact me to discuss what support could look like in your organisation. Your employees, and your organisation’s bottom line, will thank you for doing so!
What partnering with me could look like in practice
Here are some of the ways I work with organisations: helping you show your people that you care. All sessions focus on supporting people after suicide and strengthening how organisations respond to grief:
90-minute workplace grief literacy session for all staff
Half or full-day workplace grief literacy training for selected staff or people leaders.
Keynote, masterclass or workshop for your next conference or team day, focused on supporting people after suicide.
A series of grief education & support sessions for staff who are grieving.
All sessions can be delivered in-person or online.
Let’s talk about your organisation, and what support would be most helpful for your people.
If you're an Employer questioning whether to seek grief education and support for your team, let these facts convince you to reach out.
The cost of unsupported grief in the workplace
One in four employees may be grieving at any one time.
James & Friedman (2003)
Grieving employees unsupported at work will be absent from work for an average of 30 days, due to the loss.
Wilson, MacLeod & Houttekier (2016)
Estimates of the length of time work performance is impacted by bereavement, ranges from months to years. Symptoms of ‘foggy brain’ which impacts a person’s ability to concentrate on work-related tasks or perform at previous levels, can last from six to 18 months.
Corporon & Cooper
Presenteeism - when an employee is physically present at work, yet not present emotionally and unable to perform tasks to their usual standard - cuts individual productivity by one-third or more. This equates to about 87.5 lost workdays per grieving employee.
Corporon & Cooper
Keen to support your staff, yet unsure how? Let’s chat.
You may feel confident in your leadership, yet out of your depth when it comes to supporting staff through grief. That’s understandable, this is rarely taught. Partner with me, and show your people your willingness to show up for them. The benefits will come back to you tenfold!
All employees are likely to take bereavement leave at some point in their working life, with the medium number of bereavements experienced by employees, being five.
Hemp (2004)