I've had this happen a few times over the years. It's really tough.
In one case it was a very popular and looked-up-to engineer. Out for a jog one day and an unknown heart defect dropped him dead before he hit the ground. People were very broken up over it and donated food and all sorts of things to his widow and kids. I think a small charity was set up in his name.
In another, nobody really knew the guy outside of his group. But he had had a very bad cough for a few months that to be honest, had become kind of a workplace annoyance and was blamed for everything from loss of productivity to a rash of URIs that ran through the office for a few weeks. He didn't show up one day and everybody assumed he had finally decided to take some time off and attend his cough. The next day it was announced he had died. There was no further information and nobody outside of his immediate group and management really knew anything about him or how to reach out to his family. His desk was filled the next week.
Finally, a guy I knew and my friends all used to work with, broke off to try his hand in the restaurant business. Things didn't go well and mired in debt and suffering from some mental illness issues took his wife and daughter hostage and committed suicide (his wife and kid made it out with very minor wounds). I think everybody was in such shock over such a mild mannered person doing such a crazy thing that people wanted to get over it as quickly as possible and pretend like we all didn't know him at all.
In the first case, everybody really took a day or two to come to terms that it had happened. Work really ground to a halt. People showed up to work, but took lots of time out of the office in coffee shops talking and processing the event. We named a room after him and had some ceremonies, everybody showed up to his funeral. It really took a few weeks for everything to get back to normal.
In the other two people really just carried on pretty normally by the next day or two.
In the last case, because of the way he went out, very violent and unpleasant, I think there was definitely an effort on the part of people to just...forget about him and pretend he had never existed. There was some occasional chatting about the event and how unexpected it was. But it was really detached like an event on the news involving a minor C-grade celebrity. But of course, we hadn't worked with him in a couple years at that point so his impact in our day-to-day was pretty minimal.
I think it really has to do with office popularity to be honest. If you're buried up in a corner someplace and don't interact with anybody...it's easier for people to get over it.
Right. What time of year was it in the first case? I would think it's easier to get over if it's the summer or around Christmas when people are going home for vacations.
That's a good question, it was...10, 11 years ago? I think it was spring or early summer. Looking back, I think the endless ceremonies, reminiscing, room naming...his office was a shrine for a couple months and nobody emptied it of his personal affects until his widow came and asked...I think it extended out the difficult feelings longer than it would have if everybody had been driven back to work or gone on vacations or something.
Someone in my company died of illness - someone quite young so it was a surprise and a shock to all around him. It has been more than a year and his computers are still on his desk...
My first day on the job I erased the whiteboard in my office. When a couple people walked in and saw what I was erasing (a short inspirational phrase on the corner of the board), everyone had a look of horror on their face.
It turned out that a close friend of the company had been in the office and written that phrase on the board. He died the next day. That was 2 years before I erased it, and everyone had been keeping it as the last thing to remember him by.
An Exec I worked for died. I was fairly new and didn't really know him, so I just kept working. Others were a lot more affected. I remember there being group meetings to talk about his life etc. After about a week, someone said in one of the meetings, "That's enough crying, back to work." Seemed harsh at the time, but everybody went back to work. A room was named in his honor. Life goes on.
In one case it was a very popular and looked-up-to engineer. Out for a jog one day and an unknown heart defect dropped him dead before he hit the ground. People were very broken up over it and donated food and all sorts of things to his widow and kids. I think a small charity was set up in his name.
In another, nobody really knew the guy outside of his group. But he had had a very bad cough for a few months that to be honest, had become kind of a workplace annoyance and was blamed for everything from loss of productivity to a rash of URIs that ran through the office for a few weeks. He didn't show up one day and everybody assumed he had finally decided to take some time off and attend his cough. The next day it was announced he had died. There was no further information and nobody outside of his immediate group and management really knew anything about him or how to reach out to his family. His desk was filled the next week.
Finally, a guy I knew and my friends all used to work with, broke off to try his hand in the restaurant business. Things didn't go well and mired in debt and suffering from some mental illness issues took his wife and daughter hostage and committed suicide (his wife and kid made it out with very minor wounds). I think everybody was in such shock over such a mild mannered person doing such a crazy thing that people wanted to get over it as quickly as possible and pretend like we all didn't know him at all.