Although not a popular topic, it happens – someone dies while employed. Whether it is sudden or expected, the death of an employee can be challenging for staff and management. Management may be unclear on the short and long-terms steps to take when they receive a call from a friend or family member with news that an employee has passed. If an employee’s death happens on the job, that is a unique matter that requires contacting Cal OSHA. However, here are some tips on the communication steps as well as how their final pay and benefits are handled. There is the “people side” of this and then the pay and benefits transactional side. We’ll cover both briefly here.
First things first – who to contact? Depending on the employee’s role in the organization, it may be necessary to contact the board or senior management on how to announce this loss internally, as well as to clients and shareholders. It’s important to contact the employee’s family to understand their wishes on the publicity around this loss.
