{"id":1494,"date":"2019-01-13T21:45:03","date_gmt":"2019-01-14T02:45:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/?p=1494"},"modified":"2019-01-13T21:45:23","modified_gmt":"2019-01-14T02:45:23","slug":"how-to-be-a-good-boss-in-the-face-of-tragedy-a-guide-to-bereavement-leave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/how-to-be-a-good-boss-in-the-face-of-tragedy-a-guide-to-bereavement-leave\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Be a Good Boss in the Face of Tragedy: A Guide to Bereavement Leave"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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A part of life, unfortunately, involves the death of loved ones. And when this happens, your employees will need to take bereavement leave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bereavement leave<\/a> is when an employee requests time off to deal with the death of someone close to them. As a boss, it can be a challenge to handle this kind of situation. Here is a short guide on how to handle these requests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Why the Need for Bereavement Leave?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Bereavement leaves are granted to give your employees time to make funeral arrangements, attend the funeral, and deal with the deceased person’s personal effects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In general, companies provide around three days of paid bereavement time if the deceased person was a close family member. They typically offer one day if the deceased was a friend or other relative. It’s also fairly standard practice to offer additional unpaid days off should the employee ask for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In some cases, this is especially important. For instance, if the deceased person has complicated business matters that needs settling it may take a few weeks to get everything in order. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sometimes, the bereavement process can be more complex. The deceased person may not have left a will or may have lived outside of the country. In this case, more unpaid days off might be required.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How to Handle Bereavement Leave<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The best way to handle bereavement leave is to implement policy on a case-by-case basis. When it comes to bereavement, there isn’t really a one-size-fits-all policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In some cases, you might offer unpaid time off. In other cases, you might require the employee use some of their vacation days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bereavement is similar to in that how you handle it will have a big impact on employee morale. Your employees will be watching to see how you handle the situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you don’t give the bereaved employee adequate time to get their affairs in order, other workers may form a negative opinion of the company. It could even cause people to start putting in job applications elsewhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other hand, if you’re generous and accommodate your employees’ needs, this will make them feel more secure working at your company. They’ll trust you to have their backs when they’re in need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you upset your workforce by not allowing someone adequate bereavement time, you could actually end up with more lost productivity from bad morale than if you had just given the bereaved employee the time off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How Can Your Employees Help?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Death is a difficult subject that should be approached delicately. If possible, you should ask your employees if their loved ones have talked to the appropriate insurance companies<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With security policies in place, it makes the whole bereavement process significantly easier. The bereaved person will be able to spend more time grieving rather than sorting out funeral expenses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Challenging Position<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Having to deal with bereavement leave is a challenging position to be in . You need to find a good balance between generosity and sticking to business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you give days off too freely, your employees might abuse your trust. On the other hand, if you don’t give people enough time to grieve, it could cripple the company due to bad morale. Find the right balance and you’ll run a successful business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Do your employees need a power of attorney form? Then we have they can use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A part of life, unfortunately, involves the death of loved ones. And when this happens, your employees will need to take bereavement leave. Bereavement leave is when an employee requests time off to deal with the death of someone close to them. As a boss, it can be a challenge to handle this kind of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1494"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1496,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1494\/revisions\/1496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}