Warning: this letter consists of a loss of life by suicide.
A reader writes:
I work for a small firm (about 150 workers) that’s about to merge with one other firm. We are in the midst of planning for allocating places of work and reconfiguring our area to make it work, however our management workforce is caught on what to do with one office in specific.
About four years ago, one of our workers died by suicide in her office. While her household requested that the explanation for loss of life not be disclosed, her physique was discovered by a coworker and the method of loss of life required a full scale cleansing and refurbishment of her office. The entire office was closed for a week and I’m sure that the rumor mill did its factor and that the majority of us at the time knew what occurred and the place it occurred. She was in a function that meant she interacted with everybody in the firm and it was a deeply traumatizing occasion.
In the aftermath there have been a number of workers who requested to do varied cleaning or spiritual rituals in the area (burning sage, having a priest bless it, bringing in a psychic to ship a message to our deceased coworker) however management felt like that might get each virtually and legally problematic in a hurry, so stated “no.” Despite the incontrovertible fact that the office in query can be extremely fascinating below regular circumstances (giant area, a number of home windows, a stunning view), no person wished to maneuver into it.
After about six months, there was some dialogue about changing the office into another sort of area however no person may agree on what it could possibly be used for since some individuals flatly refuse to enter it. Then the pandemic hit and it turned a moot level attributable to distant working.
Now we’re about to start sharing office area with new individuals and that office continues to be vacant and there may be sort of an unstated office taboo about it (even some workers who weren’t working right here when the incident occurred gained’t go into it). On the transition planning workforce now we have one one who thinks we must always simply give it to the new individuals, with no reference to the historical past. One individual thinks we must always convert it into a storage room (which we don’t want), and one one who thinks we must always supply it to the new individuals however give them a heads-up about why individuals are bizarre about the area. But if that signifies that they don’t need it both … does it simply sit empty without end? We have fairly low turnover so it’s solely potential that there will likely be individuals nonetheless working right here in 20 years that knew about the occasion, so will it without end be “haunted”? I feel somebody on our management workforce ought to simply take it however I’ve been overruled.
What’s the proper factor to do right here?
Turn the area into one thing else and make it as completely different as you probably can.
Do you not want space for storing as a result of you have already got ample present storage areas? If so, relocate one of them into this room. Or stick a copier in there, or submitting cupboards, or a fridge and a few cabinets. If you possibly can carry in a carpenter so the area seems to be fully completely different, that’s splendid. Knock down a wall, do a new format, completely different paint, all the things — however most of all you need a completely different use for the area so it’s not an office.
Your firm’s workers have made it clear that they will’t see this as an office; they see it as the scene of one thing traumatic, and understandably so. Yes, it’s been four years — however individuals are allowed to really feel what they really feel, and what occurred sounds terrible sufficient that it’s not stunning that they do. And sure, it’s potential that in the event you assigned it to somebody as their office and compelled them to work in there, in time individuals would cease associating it with tragedy. And if the individual you assign it to is one of the new individuals, perhaps they gained’t care that a lot. But perhaps they may — and so they’re prone to hear about it from different workers sooner or later — and why try this to somebody in the event you don’t should?
It’s value some reshuffling to respect individuals’s emotions.
