Bereavement and compassionate workplaces

If your child dies before turning 18 or if you suffer a stillbirth after 24 weeks of pregnancy, you and your partner may be eligible for statutory parental bereavement leave and pay.

Sands has a ‘returning to work’ section in their bereavement support book for people whose baby has died or been told they may die soon. It is also offered in a range of other languages.

The Lullaby Trust has a guide for bereaved parents and employers following the death of a baby or child.

If you are caring for someone at the end of their life, Carers UK share advice on managing paid work and caring, and end of life planning. You may also find this anticipatory grief article from Marie Curie helpful.

Marie Curie provides workplace employer guidance on how to support a bereaved employee, templates including how to create a bereavement policy, and examples demonstrating how a manager, colleagues, and HR in the organisation can support bereaved people in the workplace. In association with What Works Wellbeing, Marie Curie have also written a guide to workplace policies and practice: supporting employees with terminal illness.

Sue Ryder has written a Bereavement Top Tips for Employers and Line Managers printable document – perfect for organisations that are less desk-based.

ACAS has information for employers about time off work for a bereavement and supporting someone after a death, with good practice examples. They also have information about if someone at work dies, and a free bereavement policy template.

Hospice UK runs a compassionate employers programme, designed to help organisations look after their people and support employees through grief, dying and caring, and also produces a Compassionate Employers HR Guide. Fees apply. Hampshire and Isle of Wight NHS are programme participants.

Cruse bereavement charity offers training and consultancy for organisations to become more confident and compassionate around death and bereavement. Fees apply.

Sands, the baby loss charity, offers workplace training and toolkits to help employers create a compassionate and supportive work environment to help managers and colleagues understand pregnancy loss and baby death, find the words to support bereaved staff, navigate relevant employment law and have compassionate policies in place. Funded training may be available for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) (under 250 employees).

CIPD offers terminal illness guidance for advice on supporting and managing employees with a terminal diagnosis, and guidance on creating a carer-friendly workplace (membership required) for those caring for others in their last years/days of life.

Macmillan provides information for employers to support staff affected by cancer. This includes informative videos for those running small businesses.

Havant and East Hants Mind currently delivers a programme of support across Hampshire for employers on suicide postvention and prevention in the workplace.

For those in the NHS, Samaritans and NHS Confederation created the NHS employee suicide postvention toolkit to help manage the impact of suicide and provide support. This evidence-based Postvention Guidance: Supporting NHS staff after the death by suicide of a colleague has been produced by Surrey, Birmingham and Keele Universities.

Any employees affected by suicide, recent or historic, can speak with Amparo bereavement by suicide support service in Hampshire or find more information on our crisis and suicide prevention page.

All staff should undertake the 20-minute, free online Zero Suicide Alliance training. Why not include it in your induction training to demonstrate to all new starters your commitment to suicide prevention? They also offer tailored training for specific groups including veterans, taxi drivers, prisons, probation staff, university students, and autism.