Handling the Death of a Colleague

If I was writing an obituary about Beth I would be screwed.

I couldn’t tell you who her family were, her spouse, or even how many pets she had

On seeing my dog Otis make a cameo on an MS Teams call she mentioned that she too had a dog, though that would not suffice to write a fitting tribute to someone I worked with for the last 18 months.

Don’t get me wrong we had a fantastic working relationship, but I couldn’t tell you much except that she was always helpful and was good at what she did.

So I couldn’t help feel a fraud when colleagues reached out to hear how I was doing

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“It’s a lot to process, why not take some time out?”

Not going to lie when I heard the news I had a little cry, I’m not heartless.

My mind raced around to make sense of the suddenness of it all – I’d only been speaking to her a month prior when she went off sick and I was asked to pick up a couple things in her absence until she got back.

No one knew the severity of it all, I mean terminal cancer with weeks to live? How was that fair? Other people I’d known to fall to that horrible disease had always at least got time to make sense of it all and get their affairs in order.

I was not the only one of my colleagues to have been knocked down by the news.

And then I felt regret that I’d not known more about her, but really we all know what it’s like in this job, grouped together with random people, finding common aims and working as a team. In a remote working world, you’d overhear even less of those conversations knowing more about the individuals you spend so much of your life with.

Rarely from my experience in the corporate world do we make a connection for life, lasting beyond the same employer, instead making nice platitudes about keeping in touch, but in reality going our separate paths and moving on.

Then I thought beyond back to when the news had broken, my first instinct was to talk about her work.

“If you need help picking up [project] let me know”

Critical me cringes at the thought of even thinking this, never mind saying it, even in death I couldn’t help offering assurances that work would continue.

More emphatic me recognised what I said as an act of kindness, reaching out to support in pretty much the only way I could be useful in these times.

Over the next few days I met with mutual connections rocked by the revelation, we made small talk all repeating the same thing “…only saw her a month ago… didn’t know it was that bad… she was mentioning her cough not long ago… if only…”

We also discussed who knew – I volunteered to get in touch with other mutual colleagues who wouldn’t have heard yet.

Hanging up after my MS Teams call I came to the realisation through all the experience, knowledge and training I’ve gained throughout my 20+ year career, how they hell are you supposed to tell people someone you once worked with was now no longer with us?

Obviously not by bloody email.

I rang each contact, one by one, each time feeling like I was living a lucid nightmare, and even though I knew, everytime I told someone I had to double check I’d not had some horrible misunderstanding.

Although I’d enjoyed the benefits of working from home since Covid, I cursed the impersonal nature of breaking this news through video calls, and swore in frustration at that one colleague who’d made himself impossible to contact because he either was in a meeting, or had set his status to ‘Do Not Disturb’.

By this point I began thinking about my own health “what if…”

Stop it!

“…it doesn’t bear thinking about leaving my girls behind…”

Stop it!

“You’re fine, just always keep it in mind to never take your life for granted and the time you have with your loved ones…”

For me, this year has been a “bad one”. But putting into context in this situation, all the problems I’ve faced are meaningless and won’t be on my mind by this time next year.

I thought about the work we’d been doing together – our last conversation was about a project launch which had been delayed and I thought what a shame it was with all her hard work, she never got to see it.

Then I laughed at my stupidity because who’d give a toss about work anymore when facing your final days.

As the team, colleagues, departments, select people in an organisation who knew her make sense of it all, I think about how you handle the death of a colleague.

I don’t know if I have the answer, but it helped to:

Be strong – offer support to colleagues (both emotionally and with helping with the struggles of extra work).

Respect that although your relationship was only on a professional level, it’s okay to have feelings about it.

And if you start thinking about it from your own perspective, and the “what if’s” – don’t feel like you’re being selfish and making it about you. Use it asa lesson to never let you take the gift of life you have for granted.

James @Perfect Manifesto