We teach managers how to run performance reviews, handle absence, and have awkward capability chats. But almost never how to support someone who has just lost the most important person in their life.
By Kim Ellis
For a lot of companies, bereavement is treated like a policy issue, not a leadership skill.
If I’m honest, the closest I’ve ever come to covering bereavement in manager training is a scenario or a bullet point in the “difficult conversations” section. And that’s not because I don’t care. It’s because nobody has ever asked for it. And I’ve never pushed for it.
Most organisations have a bereavement policy – usually something put together by HR. But that doesn’t prepare the line managers or team leaders to have those conversations, a side bar in a 2 day training course just doesn’t prepare people for the reality.
Policies aren’t always human
When my Grandma passed away, company policy said I was not entitled to any time off unless I took it from my holiday entitlement, because she was not classed as immediate family.
What the policy did not take into account was that my Grandma looked after me from the age of nine to fifteen. I was devastated. I was also knee deep in delivering a new starter induction. There was no way I could have held it together well enough to do my job properly.
My boss disagreed with the policy and fought for me to have a week to grieve, support my dad, and deal with everything that comes with losing someone you love.
If I had called the employee helpline or HR, I would probably have been given a counselling number and reminded of the policy. Instead, I was met with compassion.
Employers need to do better and take into account the relationship, not just the family tree.
When the unthinkable happens to teams
Sometimes it is not a family member who passes, it is a team member. Many people spend more time with their colleagues than with their own families, so those bonds can run deep, and the impact can devastate the whole workplace.
These are the moments managers are almost never trained for. There is rarely a neat policy to lean on, no clear script for how to support a team through something so unexpected. It is in these moments that the limits of process become clear, and the need for real, human leadership comes into focus.
The cost of getting it wrong
I read an article which stated half of employees would leave their job over poor bereavement support. And I have to say I blooming agree, if they’d have told me I had to stay and keep training I’d have told them where to shove their job.
The article from HR News states:
Nearly half (48%) of people who have experienced loss would leave their job if the support received is inadequate. The figure climbs sharply among younger generations, to 57% of Millennials and 74% of Gen Z.
Team leaders, managers and the senior leadership team need development, not just in the core management skills but in empathetic areas too. I’ve seen too many managers who think being a good manager is down to your team hitting their targets…or that their team all like them and invite them to the pub.
Bereavement training isn’t a wellbeing nice to have. Think of it as retention, culture, and employer brand on the line.
Five ways to raise bereavement support during a scoping call
If our management training only teaches people how to manage work, not how to lead humans, then it is not leadership development at all. It is just process with a different label.
Raising this with clients can feel awkward, so here are five ways to open the conversation with confidence.
- Position it as leadership, not wellbeing
“Alongside performance and absence, are you currently equipping managers to support people through life events like bereavement?”
This frames it as a leadership capability, not a soft add-on.
- Use risk, not emotion
Share the stat about nearly half of employees considering leaving after poor bereavement support. Clients listen when they understand the commercial impact.
- Ask about confidence, not policy
Avoid asking if they have a bereavement policy. Instead ask,
“How confident are your managers in having those conversations when someone loses a loved one?”
Most will admit they have never trained it.
- Offer a small, safe starting point
You are not asking them to rebuild their whole programme. Suggest a short scenario, a practical conversation framework, or a micro learning module. Low effort, high impact.
- Make it about real life, not compliance
Explain that people do not grieve based on job handbook definitions, and their managers should not lead that way either.
But what about self-employed folk?
We don’t have the traditional support functions in place that we would have if we were employed, so we need to find our support from a different place.
That may be our profession or personal networks.
Grief counselling from companies like Cruse Bereavement Support.
Mind also has a list of support organisations which you can access.
No two people will grieve the same way, what helps you might not help somebody else. You may need to try a couple of things until you find something that clicks.
Grief is not something to fix, it is something to be supported, and as self-employed people we have to be just as intentional about that as we are about building our businesses.
