Grief Costs Companies Hundreds of Billions Each Year in Lost Productivity

Workplace Healing's Innovative Human Recovery Platform™ Transforms the Way Business Leaders Support Grieving Employees Affected by Life Disruptions; Preserves Corporate Fiscal Health; Grief Forecast™ introduced by Workplace Healing as a free resource to project how much unsupported grief will cost a company each year

KANSAS CITY, Mo., June 7, 2023 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Unsupported grief in the workplace costs companies billions of dollars every year – up to $225.8 billion, according to the Centers for Disease Control. It doesn't have to, though. With tools from Workplace Healing, business leaders have an easy-to-use solution to lead their team with calm, care and confidence through inevitable life disruptions that cause grief – like the death of a loved one – while also preserving corporate fiscal health.

Workplace Healing last year launched the Human Recovery Platform™, a B2B SaaS, the first and only platform on the market that transforms the way corporate leaders, managers and care teams support grieving employees. Now, there's a complimentary business tool from Workplace Healing: The Grief Forecast™ – a completely free resource that projects in seconds how much unsupported grief will cost a company each year.

Since life disruptions are inevitable, companies can use Workplace Healing's new Grief Forecast to learn how grief will likely impact their bottom line. Based on a revolutionary, proprietary algorithm, the Grief Forecast considers the number of employees and average salaries to estimate how much annual revenue companies will lose if they don't adequately support grieving employees. It just takes moments for employers to enter the required figures and obtain a customized forecast.

"Unacknowledged or mishandled grief in the workplace not only hurts employee morale and culture, but also undermines employee engagement, retention and the financial well-being of your organization," said Workplace Healing Co-Founder Lisa Cooper. "The prevalence and impact of grief on corporate America is profound: One in four employees is grieving at any given time, and over half of employees will consider leaving their jobs when employers don't provide support after someone they love dies (National Council for Palliative Care and Dying Matters)."

Besides turnover, ignored or mishandled grief leads to billions of dollars of lost productivity as companies experience higher rates of absenteeism, weakened morale, costly on-the-job errors and presenteeism, which is when an employee is physically but not emotionally present and unable to perform tasks sufficiently.

The most common grief-invoking life disruption – which affects an average 4 million employees in the American workforce each year – is the death of a loved one, according to the American Hospice Foundation. Other challenging disruptions include divorce, miscarriage, caring for an aging parent, personal illness and injury.

Unsupported, these life disruptions can result in an estimated 57.5 lost workdays per year from presenteeism, according to GCC Insights, a workplace behavioral change expert. In addition, Harvard Business Review reports that presenteeism slashes productivity by one-third or more. And Gallup-Healthways research shows that grieving employees who feel unsupported emotionally by their employers are 320% more likely to have high presenteeism, a key factor in lost productivity.

Few corporate leaders know what to say or do to best support a grieving employee, which is where Workplace Healing's customized and intuitive software can help. Unlike anything currently available, the Human Recovery Platform strikes the delicate balance of empathy combined with practical action to help managers reengage grieving employees, restore productivity, strengthen corporate culture, and decrease turnover. The first-to-market software:

• Provides an easy-to-use platform available 24/7 with a menu of head- and heart-based tactics for leaders/plan builders to choose from, helping them demonstrate thoughtful, practical support customized to their employee's specific life disruption.
• Suggests specific head- and heart-based actions to maximize employee reintegration. Examples of head-based initiatives include HR employee benefit support, EAP access and scaling workload. Heart-based tactics target the emotional well-being of your employee, such as flowers and cards, meal planning and gift cards.
• Helps leaders participate in their employee's recovery by avoiding communication missteps and eliminating the awkward feeling of not knowing what to say or do to support a grieving employee.
• Offers a built-in scheduling function that delivers gentle reminders to act on initiatives they've selected to support their employee, including important anniversaries and meaningful dates.
• Yields an extensive database and exclusive educational resources, helping leaders further enhance their empathy skills.

Workplace Healing was born from a personal tragedy and a difficult re-entry into corporate life. Grounded in extensive qualitative and quantitative grief research, it is adapted to the needs of the corporate environment.

"Workplace teams have the ability to become an important part of an employee's healing journey, so that businesses can continue to prosper after an employee experiences a life disruption," said Workplace Healing Co-Founder Mindy Corporon. "Successful companies are built by humans who connect, collaborate, and feel a sense of belonging. That's why we created the Human Recovery Platform to address an often-overlooked aspect that weakens corporate culture, which is unsupported grief."

Workplace Healing began offering its innovative Human Recovery Platform in February 2022 and quickly gained momentum in the marketplace with clients who experienced positive results. For example, as one of the early adopters, Cohen-Esrey was able to spring into action with team grief support immediately following the unexpected death of one of its employees.

"Anybody who's been in business for any length of time has undoubtedly encountered a team member's heartache, whether it's a death or serious illness," said Lee Harris, Cohen-Esrey president and CEO, and Workplace Healing client. "Using the tools offered by Workplace Healing, we didn't feel helpless or awkward and immediately provided the kind of support that was needed in the moment."

With proven tools from Workplace Healing, business leaders can quantify potential productivity losses due to grief in the workplace and then take proactive steps to reengage employees after a life disruption while protecting corporate fiscal health. Please click here to learn more about the Grief Forecast and click here for a demo of Workplace Healing's Human Recovery Platform.

About Workplace Healing
Workplace Healing is the innovator of the Human Recovery Platform™, a B2B SaaS, which helps corporate leaders retain valued employees and preserve morale by transforming the way they support team members affected by challenging life disruptions. With its practical, intuitive design, the Human Recovery Platform is a first-to-market, 24/7 leadership solution that guides busy professionals to easily and strategically balance the head-based corporate environment with heart-based support. By thoughtfully acknowledging an employee's life disruption with meaningful words and practical actions, leaders effectively strengthen long-term employee engagement, retention and productivity. Learn more at WorkplaceHealing.com.

Media Contact

Elaina Boudreau, BELA Communications, (913) 660-0548, eboudreau@belapr.com

SOURCE Workplace Healing