Let's Chat... How to handle grief in the workplace (with Samantha Langford)

#079. Let’s Chat… how to deal with grief and loss in the workplace.

In these Let’s Chat episodes, I (Claire Sandys) chat one-to-one with a guest who has lived experience or expertise in a particular area of grief.

Today I’m talking to Samantha Langford, from Lincolnshire in the UK, a workplace health and wellbeing consultant from Gaia Workplace Wellbeing Ltd, helping businesses maintain good health, wellbeing and productivity.

If you're an employer, you might think you’ve got a tidy process for basic bereavement leave, but would your team know how to handle someone going through the grief of infertility, divorce, child loss, or a death involving a police investigation or the media? 

In this chat Sam and I look at the importance of clear policies/processes, Bereavement Commission's recommendations,  how organisations can empower/support their managers, complex grief like trauma, Coroner's Inquests or Police Investigations, grief associated with menopause, sources of additional information and support, and much more. 

It's a complex area, but it's important, because everyone goes through it. Fortunately there's also lots of ways to get help, for all budgets.

For more about Sam, visit: https://www.gaiawellbeing.org

For resources Sam has provided these links to help:
https://www.letsimproveworkplacewellbeing.org
https://www.hospiceuk.org/compassionate-employers
https://www.natgba.com
https://www.sueryder.org/how-we-can-help/bereavement-information/grief-kind
https://www.childbereavementuk.org
https://training.sands.org.uk/bereavement-in-the-workplace
https://www.thelosscollective.co.uk/for-workplaces

And for my previous conversation with Sam about the death of her brother, visit:

Transcript

Claire : 0:00

Hello there, and thanks for joining me for another episode of Let's Chat. I'm Claire Sandys, host of and blog writer for The Silent Why, a podcast exploring all things related to loss and grief. And this week, we're focusing on these areas within the workplace. We've all probably worked in an environment that didn't know how to fairly handle sick leave annual leave and bereavement. And it is a very complicated area to get right. But that's why people like my guest today are around to help businesses. In these Let's Chat episodes, I specifically chat to a guest who has experience or expertise in a particular area relating to loss or grief. So whereas the 101 loss episodes chat to people who have been through specific losses, Let's Chat episodes are for me to talk to people on subjects that can help us navigate grief and loss. And through each episode because I want to capture some useful magic a bit like the Herman's on our usual episodes (check out www.thesilentwhy.com/herman for more on those fellas). From each of these chats, I'm building a tool shed, metaphorically of equipment to help us face and get through loss. So at the end of each episode, I ask our guest what kind of tool their subject is and I add it to my ever growing shed. On this episode of Let's Chat. I'm welcoming back Samantha Langford from Lincolnshire in the UK, who's a Workplace Health and Wellbeing Consultant with personal experience of bereavement, grief and loss. And she set up Gaia Workplace Wellbeing Limited to help businesses maintain good health, positive wellbeing and productivity. This might involve audits of what businesses have in place, as well as writing and implementing policies to help set up support and resources, which allow organisations to thrive in all areas relating to grief. We've actually had Sam on the podcast before to share with us about the death of her brother when she was just 16. So you can also listen to more about her personal story through the link in the show notes. Now, if you're an employer, you might think you've got a tidy process for bereavement leave in place that covers when an employee loses a grandparent, parent or even an uncle or aunt. But what about the more tricky griefs? If I just look through previous podcast guests for inspiration, I could ask you, would your workplace know how to handle someone going through the grief of infertility? What about someone going through a divorce? What about baby or child loss at any age? What if they lost a grandchild to Shaken Baby Syndrome? What about if they lost a young daughter in a school shooting? What if their husband died in an accident and they were left as a young widow and a mother navigating a police investigation? What about if someone's husband came out as transgender, but then their baby died? What about if a woman is going through menopause? Do you know what anticipatory grief looks like? Who in your workplace would be equipped to have conversations around these kinds of grief and loss? It's an incredibly complex area for businesses to do well. But as Sam points out, in this interview, the minute you employ even one person, you're going to have to deal with grief because everybody goes through it eventually. And sadly, with our culture, the way it is now, the emphasis on the workplace needing to know how to handle this is getting even more crucial, which might not sound fair, but it is the reality of what businesses are facing and it can't be ignored any longer. However, there's lots of good news, including ways to implement this kind of support for all budgets, as Sam will explain, and there are people out there to help you. So grab a cup of tea or coffee or maybe a virgin Mojito (I'm getting into those at the moment), and relax with me and Sam, as we chat... how to deal with grief in the workplace.

Sam: 3:25

I am Sam Langford. I am a consultant health and wellbeing professional. I run my own business, which is Gaia Workplace Wellbeing, which helps businesses to help their ecosystem thrive in all aspects of health and wellbeing within the workplace. I travel quite a lot and deal with a lot of different clients at the moment. I've got one main client based in Sheffield, but I also do a lot of associate training work for a company called March on Stress, which is around trauma, support for employees and sustaining resilience in the workplace, peer support programmes and I help deliver their training packages to to companies. The background how I came to be where I am, is I used to be a Crime Scene Investigator for the police for about 10 years. So I got used to dealing with trauma on a day to day basis. And when you come away from that world, you realise that actually it's not just the policing world that has this aspect of trauma as part of their lives and their work. And there are a lot of organisations where that almost becomes part of the work and no one's really thought about how they support people. So that's where all of that sort of side of things comes from. Along with that is my passion for helping organisations to support people through bereavement not just at the time of it but throughout their careers. So for the long term, so a lot of different things going on. But basically it all comes down to making sure that people are wholly supported through their health and wellbeing, regardless of where they work.

Claire : 4:50

So - started as a crime scene investigator, I feel like I need to start there, because that just sounds fascinating. So how did you get from that to doing what you're doing now, and you know, were you happy to leave that? Because that sounds like a fascinating job, I'm sure a lot of people are really interested in that area.

Sam: 5:04

Yeah, absolutely. No, it was. It was a fascinating job. And right from being a teenager it's what I've always wanted to do, I was originally going to be a forensic scientist and sort of changed and went down the route of becoming Scene of Crime Officer, SOCO as they were when I started, and I absolutely loved it. And I managed to land the most amazing job of doing that in Bermuda. Yeah. So um, but unfortunately, for me, while I

Claire : 5:26

Wow. was over there, I developed a chronic neurological condition. So behaving very much like MS in that I was finding loss of sensation and parts of my body, dizzy spells. So obviously, it was getting to the point where I wasn't able to do the job anymore. There's an awful lot of getting called out being by yourself at scenes, you've got to be fit and unwell to be able to do that. So I made the decision to move back to the UK where I started treatment. And that was about 10-11 years ago. So yeah, once I came back to the UK, I was like, 'right, well, what on earth do I do now?' And actually went into learning and development and training civilian investigators for the Independent Office for Police Conduct. So the oversight body that looks into issues with with the police any sort of allegations, complaints, or deaths in custody or those sorts of things. So I was involved in the L&D team in training new investigators and investigative processes, and dealing with crime scenes and all those sorts of all the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, all of those things that that govern everything that investigators do. And it was while I was working there, really then I really started to get passionate about workplace wellbeing. I was living with an invisible condition, a chronic condition, no one else outwardly knew there was anything wrong with me. But inwardly I was really struggling, I was really fatigued. Because it's neurological, I was struggling with vision I was struggling with cognitive sort of things I'd forget words, or I'd be training and words, entire sentences would come out in the wrong order. So I've really started to advocate for people with invisible illnesses, and look into how we can also support the investigators with the nature of the work. You know, some of some of the investigators were straight from university never really been exposed to anything traumatic and we were expecting them to either view body worn footage from incidents involving the police or watch CCTV from custody suite. So you know, there's a lot of things that they perhaps weren't quite prepared for. And that's when we started exploring how we could support them with sort of like the traumatic aspects of their work. It spiralled from there, really, I then did NEBOSH qualification in Workplace Health and Wellbeing and I then went on to do a Master's in Workplace Health and Wellbeing. I moved on from the Civil Service about three years ago and was working for a private company. Throughout the pandemic, I think a lot of organisations struggled and the health and wellbeing budget is invariably one of the first to go. And unfortunately, I was made redundant. It's not that it didn't sit well with me because it's not going to sit well with most people finding that they suddenly don't have a job. But I realised that actually, there were an awful lot of organisations in this situation where they, they didn't have the budget to employ someone to look after health and wellbeing. And that's when I started my company. So my aim is to specifically help sort of small medium enterprises, and charities that perhaps can't afford to have a dedicated person in their organisation to help them with workplace health and wellbeing, so I can help them whether it's with guidance or policies, or you know, helping them to tap into the resources that are in the in the area or training. It is all aspects of health and wellbeing, but I do have some topics that I'm particularly interested in trauma obviously being one of them, workplace stress, and how we manage that, and bereavement, which probably spans from my own interesting journey of bereavement whilst whilst working. So yeah, interesting journey, to say the least. It's really, it's so interesting. I love that you've got that experience there. Because it's not easy going through an invisible illness. I think, especially if you're someone who finds it hard to verbalise what it is that you're facing, you know, I've had things that are internal that you can't really see. And I'm not somebody who finds it very easy to ask for help or to say, I'm not feeling well, even just something basic at work, if you feel like you want to go home - that used to stress me out for hours sitting at my desk, thinking I need to tell somebody I need to go home. It's horrible.

Sam: 9:27

Yeah.

Claire : 9:27

So to have someone who's been there and really knows that I feel like that's a really valuable thing. So if you've got like a workplace, I think if I think around people I know that work in offices especially, you might have someone there that's bereaved or going through grief or an illness or something is happening with their mental health. Mostly, I think the employers are trying to navigate how much time to give them off, when to give them time off, and that's probably about it. There's not much else going on there. They don't know when to bring them back again. They don't know how to help them. There might not be any other way of helping them. There's no like counselling available. There's no support. So when you've got a basic workplace that sort of functioning like that, what is that you bring to that that helps them do that a bit differently.

Sam: 10:03

For me, the first thing is, is you need to speak to the employees. So if you can speak to people who have been through a bereavement or a grief of a loss, because we know it's not always about the death of you know, a loved one, we've got all those different aspects of grief whether it's house fires, etc. So it's to speak to employees and to find out what their experience was, what worked for them and what didn't work for them. And all too often, when we're having these conversations, we miss out on that element. Organisations go'Well, we've got all these policies in place, it clearly states in the absence policy that you'll get time off at this, that and the other, so all the information's out there'. But we forget that when someone is dealing with something like this, when we are stressed, we become blinkered and, you know, we get tunnel vision, we focus just on what's in front of us, we need someone to step up and to guide us through that and to tell us what's available to us, how we can find it, and where that information is. We need that signposting. And to be able to do that you need a clear process, you need to have policies and procedures and guidance in place that empower managers to have the right conversations with people and to understand you know, what, what's out there. We're not expecting managers to be bereavement counsellors or to be experts, but just to be able to have a compassionate conversation with someone and find out what their needs are, and then they can go away and you know, perhaps have you know, have a conversation with Human Resources, or if they use a HR consultant, if they're a small organisation, to have those conversations about what the next best step is. And I can help with that I can help you know, help them to come up with a policy, devise a policy, that covers all those different aspects of grief loss and bereavement. And actually, I think it's something that we're gonna be working more towards now, the UK Bereavement Commission produced a report with eight recommendations, eight principles for change and how we can support bereavement. And the report was called'Bereavement is Everyone's Business'. And the second point in there is creating sensitively supportive workplaces, schools and colleges. And one of their recommendations is legislation that brings in bereavement policies. So it is going to be something that organisations are going to need to start thinking about. So rather than the old line in an absence policy, or a special leave policy, there needs to be something that's much more robust, and gives much more clear guidance on what is available, how to access it. And you know, to support the staff members that are supporting the bereaved individuals through it, because they're going to be the ones having that conversation.

Claire : 12:38

Yeah. And I think it's so important that there is something in place that makes it, as far as you can do sort of like a level playing field for bereavements and things, because I've been in workplaces where it's just been done sort of 'at the managers discretion'. And that depends on the person going through it, if the person's particularly vocal about the fact they want more time off, they get it. And if someone doesn't mention anything at all, they don't. And I remember going into work there after my grandma died, and really kind of having a tough day of it. But thinking well, no one said anything different. And then there was another woman a couple of desks down that, you know, had a parent that was unwell in Africa and flew out there to see them thinking they were going to die, they didn't die, she came back about four weeks later, no one knew where she'd been, but no one dare say anything. And it's just that sort of, I mean, they're they're different. They are different griefs. And I understand that can be really tricky and you have to draw a line somewhere, because you can't have everybody having four weeks off at any death that they know about. But at the same time, if there's not any kind of policy there, that kind of puts something in place, it just makes it an even worse place to kind of work really.

Sam: 13:39

It definitely does. And then you end up with this sort of this, this discord between different individuals, you know, you might get one person whose parent has died. And they their manager said, 'Well, you can have three days' or someone else whose parents died, and then they've got two weeks off. And then you can take well, you know, what, how has that happened is that when it's down to the manager discretion, and that's where we need to be providing extra support for our managers say, these are the type of conversations to have, these are the questions that you need to you need to have. Because actually, from the outside, it might be well, the person has had three days off, they might not have actually had a particularly close relationship with their parent, it might be that actually, you know, their, their parental figure was an aunt and uncle or grandparent. So it's understanding all the nuances behind that. And I think the change in the family unit is something that needs to be addressed as well, because all too often when you see anything in absence policy, it states you know, you'll get a week off for a close family member. Well, you know, what does that mean? What does that mean and who's made that decision? You know, we need to start thinking more about... because bereavement, it's like our resilient, it's very dynamic, and it depends on each individual what they've gone through before in their lives, what's happening at that time, as well as the relationship of that person. I've had male colleagues die and I've been profoundly affected, because they've reminded me of my brother, or it's been at the similar time of year to the death of my brother. So you're trying to explain that to a line manager to say, 'well, you know, you weren't particularly close to this person, why do you need this extra time off?' It's like well, actually, because what it's done - is it's re-triggered all of those bereavement responses I've had before. So we'd need to be able to empower managers and sort of all our people managers, to be able to have these compassionate conversations, to really understand how someone is impacted, and what's going to benefit them. Because obviously, not everyone's going to want the time off, some people will prefer to be in the workplace, rather than be at home. So we need to be able to empower these conversations and to make sure that what we're offering is suitable for individuals that we're offering it to, rather than this blanket, well, you'll get a week off if it's a close family member. And if not, we're gonna make you use your annual leave. Because that's another bugbear of mine. Bereavement is not a holiday, it's really not a holiday. And I think, you know, if you have run out of bereavement leave, then sick leave, sick leave is the next option. I hear all too often people coming back from having time off to find that they'd run out of bereavement leave, and their managers just taken all their annual leave entitlement while they've been off. That's that's not what it's for at all.

Claire : 16:19

No, gosh, the more you kind of look at it, the more you realise how complicated it gets, to try and sort these things out. Because even like, you know, the death of a pet, I've said before on the podcast, you know, for some people, and it's not a big deal, you know, the pet rabbit dies, I didn't really see much of it, it was the kids, but for some people who live on their own, you've never had any meaningful relationships with humans, that, you know, that's gonna rock their life as big as some other human deaths. And that's not how it should be in life, we'd like to think that, you know, humans would matter more. But the reality is a lot of people don't have those sorts of relationships with humans in that way. So they connect to other things. And even like you said, the death of a parent doesn't mean it's a big deal, even if you haven't ever spoken to that parent, and they die, that can be complicated enough to throw you, more than a close relationship. So it's... Oh,

Sam: 17:05

It really is. And I think and this is something that came it's so complicated. out in the bereavement commission report is that we're starting to see more complex bereavement, and people experiencing these complexities of grief and all these different feelings that come with the death of someone. And like you say, if it's someone that actually you've not had a close relationship with, that can bring just as many strange emotions as someone that you have had that close relationship with, because you might not be grieving, and then you're gonna feel guilty, because you're not grieving, oh, I should be grieving. And it's really, really difficult. And there's a lot, there's a lot for people to process there. And I think, you know, a lot of people can feel that the workplace isn't the place to support people through bereavement. But actually, it's the one place where they're going to be going every single day, they've got their evenings and the weekends. But that's not to say that they've got that social circle around them, after a little while, you know, if they do have a family around them, their family is going to go back to their lives. So if especially if they live by themselves. So the place where all of that social support is, is in the workplace, it's absolutely the most ideal place to make sure that we're checking in with people who have suffered a bereavement, just to check, do they know what support is out there? Do they need some help in accessing it? Because there's so so many aspects of it, and people that live alone, they might have estates to deal with, and all other financial issues that come with that as well. It is such a huge thing. And I think if we get this right in the workplace, and people feel 100% supported, they're going to give much more to that organisation. And I think I think both Marie Curie they, they've done a report and the bereavement commission identified I think it's about 50% of people would leave an organisation if they weren't properly supported through a bereavement. And that's just the ones that would choose to. Sadly, I know far too many scenarios where it's not been well managed and they've ended up with sort of capability, performance issues, and leaving a job because actually, they're just not been coping with the death of someone, they've not been given the right support, they've not been given the right time off, and they've struggled. And because of that, it's led to performance issues, and it's led to them leaving. And that's just absolutely awful that that should happen because you've experienced something which all of us are going to experience. And that for me is the thing with bereavement in the workplace, it is the one thing that you can guarantee someone is going to experience as soon as you employ someone at some point, there will be grief, loss or bereavement. We can't escape it. We just can't. So why aren't we doing more to support people that are going through it because it's inevitable?

Claire : 19:43

Yeah, definitely. It's not like it's an interview question where they're like, are you going to face grief and loss while you're here? It's a guaranteed. It's definitely going to happen. And I think it's a sort of, I think it's necessary, but I think it shows you the changing times. Also, you know, we're recognising a lot of these things that might not have been recognised before, but I think going back decades, you'd hopefully you've got that support in the family or in the community, or around you. The ideal was maybe it was outside of work. But because people had all these support units and things they were part of, we were just in groups a bit more as people but with with the internet and with social stuff, and with, you know, Zoom and everything, we're now so much more isolated from real relationships, that you're right that the most time most people spend all year is going to be with their colleagues and under their employers. So whether they like it or not, they are going to have to deal with all these situations and learn how to do it properly. Just tell us we're talking to you on a different episodes in detail about the death of your brother, but just give us a synopsis of that and how you think that might be helping you in helping others through what you're doing now.

Sam: 20:45

Yeah, so my brother died. I was 16 years old when my brother died by auto erotic asphyxiation. So a topic very difficult to talk about. So my entire working life, I have worked as a bereaved individual. And obviously, for the first few years of that I was heavily impacted every anniversary of his death, probably more so because I wasn't able to vocalise what I was experiencing, and what I was going through, and I have had, I've had just about every response you can think of when it comes to dealing with bereavement in the workplace, I've had some amazing supportive managers that have been aware that the anniversary is coming up. And for that month, they've said, 'right, well, let's lighten the load of work that you've got at the moment, let's not having any deadlines, you know, what can I do to support you', right through to the other end, where one manager noticed that I always seem to be off sick around the same time of the end, and when I explained it to him, his response was, 'Hm well you can't really use that as an excuse forever'. So I've experienced so many different responses. And I just think, you know, that manager from that moment on, I was completely disengaged. That was it, you got the bare minimum for me, because I thought, well, what's the point, if I can't get you to understand how this is impacting me, or why this is continuing to impact me, then what's the point, so instantly how someone responds to an experience of, you know, if you've got a team, how you respond to that person in that team, and what they're going through, is going to make a massive difference for how they engage, their performance. And so you know, if you're an organisation, you're a business leader, you suddenly start saying, 'well hang on a minute, this is a no brainer, let's just support people, let's just be a compassionate employer. Because the more we do that, okay, they might need two or three weeks off when they, you know, suffer a loss. But if we support them through that, and we can support them through that for the rest of their career, then we've got a really productive and engaged workforce'. It feels like a no brainer to me, but it might be because I've been on that flip side of it. And I've seen the side where actually it hasn't been handled particularly well. And I, you know, you sitting there thinking, there must be a better way, there must be a better way to do this. And that's where I think my passion for this is come through. And now I work with an awful lot of different organisations, and understand the different training that's available to organisations. One of them for instance, Hospice UK, run a Compassionate Employers Programme. And it does what it says on the tin, you know, it empowers organisations to have this compassionate culture, so that when their employees suffer grief loss or bereavement, they know how to handle it, they've got the processes in place, and they've got this, you know, this wealth of information there at their fingertips to be able to support people, rather than it happening, and then scrambling around going,' Oh, what do we do now?' Probably, you know, sort of 70% of the time, I think that's what happens. And you know, we haven't even touched on death in service, what happens when an employee dies and how that's dealt with? And that's an entire nother aspect.

Claire : 23:44

What do you think, are some of the hardest situations that employees have to navigate in this area?

Sam: 23:49

I think a lot of people just have this natural assumption that yes, okay at some point, one of their, their team members or member of their staff is going to lose someone. But we always think, 'oh, you know, we're going to lose a parent'. No one ever considers them being the parent have lost a child, or they're being, you know, heaven forbid, they're being a police investigation, whether it's potential murder, or you know, accidents and all these other aspects. Because when there's a police investigation, invariably, there's media attention. So suddenly, you've got someone who's not just grieving, but they've now got all of these legal processes to navigate. They've got media attention into them in their lives, and they're supposed to get up and come to work every day, because technically, the only statutory leave for parent is two weeks. So you've got all of that to deal with. When there's a police investigation there is so much going on. You're constantly in contact with the police. And this is you know, for a quick investigation, if it's a long period of time, this could go on for months, years. Coroner's investigations are another one where there's a lot of questions being asked and a lot of probing into someone's life and who they were. And that's really difficult for any family, You know whether that's through, my aunt died through domestic abuse, and you've got that police investigation that goes on, you've then got the court case, if you've got an employee who wants to be there, how do you support them through that this is more than just bereavement, this is the myriad of emotions that come with that. And there are so many so many different scenarios, and you'll be aware of through the podcast, all these different things, it can impact on people and the processes, those legal processes that have to be navigated like on one of your podcasts when someone is grieving, but there isn't actually a body, so you can't go through those rituals. And it's surprising how much we need those rituals to help us normalise what we're experiencing and move on. So it's not just a simple case of someone who's losing an elderly person in their lives, they've got to the end of their lives, they've lived an amazing life. And we can celebrate that. There's that traumatic element to it, there's all these different things. So the more we can empower our managers and our staff, and the more we can help with that compassionate approach to these conversations, the more we can support people through these things in the workplace.

Claire : 26:05

Do you find that people tend to approach you for help, before anything happens, or does something like that happen, and then they're sort of scrambling around trying to like, 'oh, somebody needs to come in and help us with this'.

Sam: 26:14

At the moment, it's very much reactive, it is very much reactive. And as the Bereavement Commission Report suggests, you know, we need to be much more proactive about this, we need to get those those those steps in place. You know, very few organisations even have a process for a death in service, you know, does the line manager know what information needs to go to human resources and payroll, you know, all these sorts of things that needs to be communicated to the family, right this is what's going to happen next, this is what will happen, this is when their final pay will come through, and all of those sorts of things. But you know, just around that support for bereavement, invariably tends to be, sadly, that there's been a poor experience by someone who has either left the organisation and cited it in an exit interview, if there's been one, or there's been some bad feeling, or they've just said, 'you know what, I'm not supported, I'm just going to leave'. So we do need to start being much more proactive about this. And I think a lot of this has come from the pandemic and a lot of organisations through what we've gone through in the pandemic, and those organisations that have been trying to support people with the unimaginable loss and not being able to attend a funeral, not being able to say goodbye to people, how they've dealt with that. And I think organisations are starting to see that actually, we need to be more in tune with this, we need to be more prepared for these conversations and how we support people.

Claire : 27:34

What are the sort of common barriers you come up against as to why people might not employ these kinds of things?

Sam: 27:39

I think a lot of it comes down to is just our nature, isn't it? We don't want to talk about death. No one wants to sit down, and you know, let's have a lovely conversation about death today. Except for me, obviously.

Claire : 27:49

And me.

Sam: 27:49

And that's it, we don't, we don't want to talk about it. We don't want to face our own mortality. Invariably, we don't know what to say to people. So we think you know, the best thing to do is just let them just let them get on with it by themselves. But actually, that can do more harm than good, especially in the workplace. If an employee comes back to work, having had time off, and no one's mentioning the person that they lost, or talking to them, it's just even more isolating than what they're going through. There was so many really simple things that we can say to people say, 'Look, you know, I don't know what to say, there are no words, I know, there were no words, but I'm here for you. I'm here to listen to you, if you want to talk' and just allowing people that space. And there were some brilliant - The Sue Ryder Grief Kind campaign is brilliant, there are some little videos there and just, you know, tips on how to have these conversations and what to say to people, because I think most of the time, that is what stops us from being proactive, because we don't know what to say and how to approach it.

Claire : 28:47

I feel like a lot of the places I've worked, a lot of managers have functioned under more of a fearful kind of mentality, there's sort of like, if we ask people their opinion on something, if we get people involved, then we're going to have to deal with all the different opinions and we're not going to able to please everybody. So it's easier just to not do it. Or if we allow them to have more annual leave or more sick time or more bereavement time, then people are going to abuse it, they're going to take too much, we're not going to know what's genuine, I feel like they function a lot under that kind of fearful kind of stance rather than thinking actually, if we do this 90% of people are probably going to really benefit from it. There's always someone that takes advantage. And unfortunately, they seem to wreck it for everyone else. But I feel like a lot of people function under the assumption that everybody's like that, which is so damaging.

Sam: 29:32

It really is. And I think you're right there. And I've had some conversations over the last few months that have been quite similar to that. It's like, well, you know, we've got people who are often sick, and they just keep getting signed off, but it's just bereavement. Well, actually you've got absolutely no idea how complex that bereavement might be, and what's happened to that person previously in their life. They may well be needing absolutely loads of extra support. But you're right, there's this sort of assumption that we can't do that because people will abuse it. Well, why don't we try it? And let's see. Because by not doing it, you're not providing that support for, like you're saying 90-99% of your employees, because you think this small minority might abuse it. It's like, they're always going to be people that go 'right each year, I'm allowed this number of sick days before I hit the trigger, I'm going to take them whether I'm sick or not', there's always going to be that person, there's always going to be and there's nothing you can do about that. So, you know, there's only so many times someone can come in and 'go, oh, I need two weeks off because the pet dog's died'. And it becomes that and that's something that I think, because managers think, 'well, I don't know how to handle that. I don't know how to approach that, if that happens', we go, well, that's just not do anything. And rather than shying away from those difficulties, we need to be, you know, trusting our employees, we need to trust people you think, you know, if you're coming in and saying, 'I need time off, because there's been a death in my family', we need to trust them, that what they're saying to us, is the truth. And that's what they need. And if it goes on to that they need sick leave, well, let's support them, let's have conversations with them. What can we do as an employer to help? You know, do you want to come in just for a lunchtime to see your team and be with your team? Let's pick try and get you back in slowly, and around the people that want to support you. What can we do to support someone? Rather than going 'Oh well they're off sick with bereavement, I'm not sure actually believe them, but let's just leave them doing what they're doing and hope they come back'.

Claire : 31:30

How amazing would it be if like you said, there was a dedicated person in your office that looked after everything to do with like bereavement, sick, all that kind of stuff. So that if you had any of these situations, you went to that person, or they're the ones who phoned you had the conversation with you, it would actually stop a lot of people taking advantage because those people don't want deep conversations about why they're off. Actually just want to take advantage.

Sam: 31:50

Yeah.

Claire : 31:50

So it would probably prevent that. But and I've heard of, and I don't know how many of these are true, you see them circulating on LinkedIn and things at various points of companies that have done this, these extreme policies of unlimited annual leave, and they've left it up to their employees, or they've done, you can choose your own pay, but it's public. And actually, the majority of people, I seem to remember the annual leave one, most people didn't take their full allowance every year, because a lot of people are good people who work hard at their job. And if they enjoy where they work, they don't really want to take as much annual leave.

Sam: 32:19

Yeah.

Claire : 32:20

And if the pay is public, people then tend to choose their pay fairly, because the admin person is not going to say I want more than the FD. It's not going to work like that, it's going to be more kind of 'well, I think I'm worth this. What do you think?' And I think, yeah, that would be such a lovely way to function. But I also think, unfortunately, a lot of managers, they tend to work up from other positions, but at no point do we ever train them to manage people. And it's just not there. So let alone talking about bereavement and death. It's not in their wheelhouse. They've been promoted to this point and they're just not fit for the job, or they're not trained and supported for the job and then that causes so many more problems.

Sam: 32:54

This is it, I mean, you're absolutely you're absolutely right, I just think all of this comes down to and that's what workplace health and well being comes down to is making helping to make a business somewhere where someone wants to be, they want to come into work, they enjoy what they do, they feel like they're making a contribution, that they're valued for what they do they agree with the values of the organisation. So yeah, they're not going to, you know, take the Michael or whatever, you know, it's just, they're just, they're just going to be themselves. And that's what it's all about. But I do think there is this fear isn't there that if we do this, then people will abuse it. Yeah, it is a fascinating aspect of work really. I think it is anyway, I could literally talk about it all day.

Claire : 33:37

So tell me a bit about what you what you would do. So if you get called in, you get a phone call - 'come and help us we're in a situation' or 'we want to put something in place before that situation occurs'. What does it look like? Where do you start? And what does that process look like if employers are listening, and they're thinking, how does this actually work?

Sam: 33:53

So I'm actually doing this with an organisation at the moment. So the first thing we've done is I've gathered any policies that have that mentioned 'bereavement leave' and reviewed what's in there. And then I produce a list of recommendations. So using things like the Bereavement Commission Report and what they recommend for, for bereavement in the workplace and my own experience, gathered over years, as to how to put together a grief loss and bereavement standalone policy. So rather than it being in special leave, or in the absence management policy, it's completely separate. So I then go through make some recommendations as to the language that we use, you know, let's stop referring to close family members, and let's be more open and inclusive with the language that we use. And I probably want to make some recommendations for how to support managers in having those conversations. So some guidance for managers around bereavement and loss. In one organisation, we created a bereavement hub on their intranet. There was a wealth of resources there, so everything from fertility issues, prenatal issues, all of those sorts of things right through to anticipatory grief. So people that are carers or people, you know, we've got loved ones with terminal illnesses, and all the nuances and the different emotions that come with that. So there's this hub full of information where people can go, either if they're experiencing themselves or whether they're supporting someone. There's so many different things that we can do. And with this organisation, along with looking at their refund policy, and how we get that information out there, we're also looking at training for their line managers, so they have a programme for... new line managers go through a training programme, which includes all sorts of health and safety and human resources processes. So we're looking at having building on the day they already have about health and well being, which kind of concentrates just on workplace stress at the moment, but expanding that 1) so that managers know how to look after themselves, and 2) let's have a look at this, how to actively listen, when a team member is talking to you how to have these compassionate conversations. And that you don't have to have all the answers, you know, where you'll go to get that information, who's there to support you. So there really are a number of different things that I can do to help organisations with this. And I've got examples of bereavement policies that I can share, when I talked to someone say, you know, that doesn't need to be lengthy, you know, this is a really simple one. But it's making sure that that taps into pay and payroll for statutory leave and things like that as well. So it can be quite a big piece of work to be completely honest, especially for an organisation who's perhaps starting and they don't have anything. And they're just sort of like, 'oh, we deal with each case of bereavement as and when it happens'. So if someone's in that situation, it can be really daunting to know where to start. So that's where I can come in to have these conversations and say, you know, can I reach out to some of your employees that have been through a bereavement in the last couple of years and see if they want to talk to me about what that experience was like, then I can get that really rich data, that experiential sort of data, and take that back to an organisation and say, you know, these are the things that you've done, which are really great. Let's get that in the policy, you're doing that brilliantly. But actually, there's a few other bits and pieces here that we can start to build on, we can start to look at what that looks like.

Claire : 37:04

And how does it work out, not specifically, but cost wise, if people are looking at this and think 'well, it sounds like a great idea, but also sounds really expensive, can you do it in different stages? Is there different brackets of what you can pay for? How does that look like?

Sam: 37:15

Absolutely, I mean working with me. So I'm sort of aiming at working with SMEs and organisations under 250. And I have sort of sort of a price point that reflects that. But equally things like the Hospice UK, their Compassionate Employers, you can just join that and you join this sort of community of other organisations that have joined the compassionate employees programme, and you get all access to policies, and guidance, and all those things and training for line managers. So depending on the size of the organisation, and the budget that's available, I think there are, you know, there are options out there for everybody. An audit of policies, depending on the size of the organisation, depending on sort of how many certain policies there are, so for that, I would review all of the policies that relate to I mean, we were looking at specific areas, so it might be menopause, or it might be bereavement, I would do all those reviews and produce some recommendations. If that organisation then said, 'Well, that's great, but we haven't got the time to write the policy, can you go away and draft it?' then there's additional for that there as well. It's really difficult to quantify because it depends on what the base point is. So an organisation that doesn't have any base point, then you obviously looking at much more work, you've got that data collection piece, and all those sorts of things that go with it. But I think, you know, for larger organisations, the Compassionate Employers Programme, I think is one of the best I've seen for doing this type of thing. And although it's coming from Hospice UK, so you know, they're coming at it primarily from the angle of anticipatory grief. It provides people with those vital skills, those transferable skills that will work for all aspects of grief, loss and bereavement. And just any sort of sensitive topic that needs to be discussed really. It does depend very much on how much work does this look like it's going to be. Some people will say, well, actually I'll pay you your daily fee for as long as it takes. Other people say, 'actually, can I pay a one off fee up front and you do it all'. So yeah, that's is a problem with consulting. What I will say is I am priced for SMEs, I am in that affordable bracket. And I am wanting to work with SMEs to improve their approach to workplace health and wellbeing. So I will work with people to come up with a price point that works for them.

Claire : 39:32

Something you mentioned there that was interesting was menopause. And being in surgical menopause myself and knowing the traumas that causes of trying to work, or not as case maybe, is that something that's becoming a bit more widely known sort of supporting people?

Sam: 39:48

Yeah, yeah, definitely. We are seeing a much more increase in people understanding that we can't shy away from talking about menopause anymore. I mean, we have an ageing workforce. demographic people are working longer, more women are working longer, you know, this isn't the 1950s anymore, we are working much longer. And we should be able to work work longer. We shouldn't have to go to you know what hit menopause, I didn't sleep last night because I sweated through the duvet three times, you know, and I'm so tired today that I can't come in. We should be able to say that to our boss and say 'You know what, I'm going to be a little bit late today because I just really had the worst night ever. But I will be coming in', or 'I'm going to work from home today', if I've got that facility or, you know, 'can I change shifts so I only work afternoons?', all of these sorts of things that we can do. And I think we are starting to see much more of a shift in organisations understanding that and working towards making sure we're supporting people through the menopause and raising awareness so that those that don't personally experience it, understand what's going on, and how to be compassionate about it, how to have inclusive conversations where we're not discriminating, and we're not going, 'Oh, God, hot flush again', you know, we need to being inclusive with the language and the conversations that we have. And yeah, it definitely is something that we're starting to see much, much better. But equally, and a lot of people fail to think about this one we think about menopause, is that that grief aspect that comes with that loss of fertility, especially, and this might be something that you can resonate with, it's something you've had that fertility journey, and this is this is it, this is where that then stops. That can be so, so difficult for a lot of women to process and to deal with. And it is a grief, it is a bereavement. And you've got that on top of those physical symptoms that are going on as well, and the other the sort of other emotional things that you're experiencing. And I've mentioned it to a couple of people before and they've gone. I've never thought about it that way. But now you say it, that is what I'm experiencing, and I didn't understand that before.

Claire : 41:53

Yeah, you get caught up in so many other things. I remember after having my hysterectomy sort of months down the line, just finding myself thinking, 'well, if I got pregnant or...' just just loosely because I'd had that the whole whole way through the infertility stuff - 'If'. And it's still there as a mind pattern. And I remember just sort of thinking to myself, 'No, that's a 'never' now, that's never gonna happen'. It's a weird thought, because your mentality doesn't change overnight because something happened physically in your body. So it's a weird thing to go through. And for me, we'd already fortunately made that decision to the hysterectomy wasn't what stopped us having children, but if that had been what had stopped us having children, that would have been a whole different ballgame. Yeah. Because there would have been a lot more grief attached to it in other ways.

Sam: 42:34

And it is exactly the same as you know, when we lose someone that we love the amount of times we go, 'Oh, I just tell them about... oh, I can't'. And it's exactly the same thing. It takes the brain a little while to understand and to reconcile with what's happening, and absolutely, it's something that isn't talked about enough. When we talk about menopause, we concentrate on the hot flushes, anger management issues that people have and how to approach work, but we very rarely talk about this grief element that comes with it as well.

Claire : 43:03

Yeah, that's true. That's true, because it kind of you're hearing a little bit more now about things like the brain fog and how, you know, women have thought that maybe they're getting early onset Alzheimer's and things because their brain has feels like it's changed so much without the right hormone support. But you don't hear so much about the grief aspect. So you're right, that's a kind of area, where we're sort of catching up a little bit. But there's so much to it that needs... and the fact that every female goes through it. It's just mind blowing that it's not something that we're taught about, even as women, let alone the men.

Sam: 43:33

Absolutely. So the company I worked in previously, I ran a workshop for people that will experience menopause. And I start off by talking about what hormones are, how they work in the body, what they do. And the three hormones that are part of menopause and people are going'three?!' like 'yeah, testosterone!' so many women that I've spoken to, that are just like 'I've never thought about testosterone' and well that's why your brain functions going all over the place because the testosterone levels are all over the place. Why aren't we talking about menopause? It's so bizarre. But that's one of the first things I do is start by educating so that women can understand why they're getting the symptoms they're getting if they understand what those hormones do in the body and the role they play. Suddenly, most of those symptoms start to then make sense. You start to understand why your skin is dry because your oestrogen levels are low on all those other things. We've gone off at a tangent now.

Claire : 44:26

No, we have, yeah, I could do that for an hour! But, but no, you're right. It's such a complicated journey. And I had no idea when I was embarking on it. I thought I was solving one problem. And I became it became a whole other one with hormones. They're not fully understood medically yet. I think that's the problem isn't it? Even the experts saying there's still areas of this we're working out. We're catching up, but I like to think with all this stuff that even if we don't see the fruit of it, whether it's menopause or bereavement in the workplace, you know we're paving the way for those behind us and there are just a lot of things in this generation that we're trying to stand up and speak about and and help.

Sam: 44:56

And I think that's it. We we all know any culture change takes a long time. And that's essentially what we're doing. We're trying to open up a door to talk about things that for the, for the most part, certainly for my entire life, you know, people haven't wanted to talk about and to change that takes a long time. But we're working at it. And I think certainly over the last two to three years, this whole area of how our health and well being impacts us in the workplace, and vice versa. We are starting to see there's a lot more to it, and people are starting to really think about it, really understand it and see what we can do to make improvements.

Claire : 45:31

Could have spoken about this all day with you.

Sam: 45:33

Yeah, you best stop me!

Claire : 45:35

I have one more question. So we've been talking about our workplaces becoming more aware of bereavement, loss, grief, menopause, all those other things. So as a useful tool for employers to have this information and knowledge going forward for their employees, if it represented a tool for them, what kind of tool would it be?

Sam: 45:54

So I thought long and hard about this, thinking about the support and the training that we provide in the workplace to help health and well being and that it's something that's going to help an organisation thrive. And I think it's a water irrigation system or sprinkler system, because these are transferable skills that we're talking about as well. You know, while we were focused on bereavement, being compassionate is a transferable skill. So an irrigation system is going to get vital resources to where it's needed quickly. So it's efficient and it's effective. And specifically for bereavement support in the workplace, it is the best place to do that. We we are best placed to get that support to people quickly because we're going to see them much more frequently than our sort of social communities

Claire : 46:45

An irrigation system for water. I like that. I'm already picturing a fancy gutter on the edge of my metaphorical shed roof that collects rainwater, shoots it down the drain pipe and into a water butt, that's attached to a hose pipe that has strategic holes in it so I can automatically water the plants effectively when I turn it on. Water and how it gets to where it needs to be is an extremely vital tool for any garden to thrive. If you want to find out more about Sam and Gaia Workplace Wellbeing, you can check out www.gaiawellbeing.org And I'll put a link in the show notes. You can also hear Sam's other interview for our 101 loss episodes last 44 about the death of her brother through auto erotic asphyxiation, where she spoke out for the first time on how hard it is navigating a grief that people don't know how to speak about through the link in the show notes. Thank you so much for your time and sharing your knowledge on such an important area, Sam. And thank you for joining us and listening to The Silent Why. If you'd like to support the podcast and my work, which is entirely run on kind donations from listeners, you can do that at www.buymeacoffee.com/thesilentwhy- link in the show notes. And if you've got a subject you'd like me to chat to an expert on, please get in touch via our social media or the website or email thesilentwhy@gmail.com and let's chat...