The career decisions people make while grieving

After someone experiences a significant loss, we often talk about their return to work.

When will they come back? What hours will they work? What responsibilities can they manage? What support do they need?

But I think there is another conversation workplaces need to be prepared for.

What if grief changes what that person wants from work altogether?

They might ask to reduce their hours. They might turn down an opportunity they previously wanted. They might decide they no longer want to manage a team. They might start questioning a career they've spent years building.

Or they might resign.

From an organisational perspective, these decisions can easily become a retention problem. But from the employee's perspective, there may be something much bigger happening.

Grief can change your relationship with work

When someone you love dies, it can change the way you see almost everything.

Things that once felt incredibly important might suddenly feel less important. Things you assumed you had years to do can feel more urgent. The way you want to spend your time, the people you want to spend it with and what you're willing to sacrifice for your career can all shift.

That doesn't necessarily mean someone suddenly stops caring about their work or loses their ambition.

Sometimes their definition of ambition changes.

A promotion might have been the goal before their loss. Afterwards, being able to leave work in time to pick their children up from school might matter more. Someone who previously loved travelling for work may no longer want to spend nights away from their family. Someone else might discover that work gives them purpose and decide they want to pursue their career more seriously than ever.

And for some people, they don't want work to change at all. When so much of life has changed without their choosing, coming back to the same role, the same colleagues and the same routine can provide a sense of familiarity and stability. Work can be one of the few places where life still feels somewhat recognisable.

There isn't one predictable response.

I also think that addition strengthens the entire article because the underlying message becomes: don't assume grief means an employee wants less, more, or different. Ask them.

Grief can change your identity too

We often talk about grief as missing another person, but loss can also change the person who remains.

After my husband died, I wasn't only grieving my husband. I was becoming a mum to triplets without the person I'd expected to raise them with. My family looked different. My responsibilities changed. The future I'd imagined for myself had changed.

I was still me, but I was also trying to understand who I was in a life I hadn't planned for.
Work exists within all of that.

When someone's identity, responsibilities or view of the future changes, it makes sense that they may start questioning whether the career they built for their old life still fits the life they have now.

That isn't necessarily an impulsive response to grief. Sometimes it's the beginning of understanding what they want next.

Not every career decision needs to be prevented

This is where I think employers need to be mindful.

When a valued employee says they want to reduce their hours or leave altogether, the natural response is often to work out how to keep them.

Can we offer more flexibility? Change their role? Increase their salary? Give them some additional leave?

Those conversations are worth having. A relatively small workplace adjustment might make it possible for someone to stay in a job they still genuinely want.

But retention shouldn't automatically be the goal.

Sometimes the most supportive thing an employer can do is create enough space for an honest conversation about what has changed.

Does the employee actually want to leave, or can they simply not see how their current role fits their life anymore? Is there something about their workload that could change? Are they making a permanent decision because they need temporary breathing room?
Or have their priorities genuinely changed?

Those are very different conversations.

Be careful about assuming grief has made someone incapable of deciding

There is another side to this that matters.

We can become so concerned about someone making a "big decision while grieving" that we unintentionally take away their agency.

Yes, grief can affect concentration, memory, energy and decision-making. Someone may need more time and space than they normally would before making a significant choice.
But that doesn't mean every decision made after loss is irrational.

Sometimes loss creates clarity.

Someone may realise they have spent years in a career they don't enjoy. They may decide time with their family matters more than the next promotion. They may want less responsibility, or they may want considerably more.

The role of a supportive workplace isn't to decide whether those priorities are right or wrong.

It's to give someone enough flexibility, information and breathing room to work out what is right for them.

Supporting grief at work isn't only about helping someone return

A successful return to work shouldn't necessarily mean getting someone back into exactly the same role, working exactly the same way they did before.

Sometimes it might mean temporarily reducing their workload. Sometimes it might mean changing hours or responsibilities. Sometimes it might mean supporting them as they rebuild their career.

And sometimes it might mean accepting that what they want from work has changed.
Grief can change priorities, identity and the way someone imagines their future.
Good workplaces don't need to prevent that change.

But they can give people the space to understand it before assuming the answer is simply to get them back to normal.