"They Didn't Want Us Telling Clients" — Co-Worker Dies, Company Won't Acknowledge Death

The company you work for doesn't care about you, even if you die.

Well, they do, only because they now have to find a replacement for your role. At least that's the message relayed to TikTokers in a stitched video clip posted by @theatreknitter, who shared a heartbreaking tale of the response that leadership at her place of work had when a co-worker passed away suddenly.

"I had a co-worker die last week and her entire existence at the company was summed up in one email," another TikToker who goes by Marie on the social media platform states before the video ultimately transitions to @theaterknitter sharing her own story about a co-worker who passed away.

While visiting Key West, Fla., OP said that she hopped on her company's Slack channel to "brag" to them that she was in the Keys while they were not. But while inside the office messaging client, she said that she noticed there was a lot of "chatter" — which she thought was out of place.

Turns out that one of their co-workers didn't log on for a webinar, which, according to @theaterknitter, wasn't too much of a cause of concern at first. But after they attempted to call her and didn't receive a response, the TikToker said that she started to toe the line between frustration and worry.

She initially suggested to her boss that the company perform a "wellness check" on the employee; however, she was informed that this wasn't possible. The TikToker was then told by her boss that since she was on vacation she should just relax and not worry about it.

However, a few hours went by and while she was out with her mother she was contacted by the company again stating that they haven't heard anything from the worker, so the TikToker, again, suggested that they perform a wellness check, which the company wouldn't conduct.

That's when she decided to go and reach out to a member of the employee's family via Facebook. And it was after she decided to do this that she got the news of what happened to her co-worker.

"She died. She died. She died alone," the TikToker said.

She flew back home the next day, and said that she spoke with the departed's mother for the first time ever in the wake of her death.

The very next day, the TikToker states, she was in a staff meeting at her bi-coastal company, on a conference call with some folks in San Francisco (she was in the Boston office).

As the meeting went on, her and her Massachusetts co-workers thought that the West Coasters were going to mention the woman's death. But minute after minute in the meeting, they made no reference. After 90 minutes of talking, she thought, surely, they were going to say something.

"They said nothing, to acknowledge this person's existence."

The TikToker made known just how upset she was about the San Francisco team's lack of a response, so much so that a member of the West Coast team hit her up about it, asking what the problem was. She explained that she wasn't exactly thrilled that they didn't bring up the co-worker's death.

She was told by them that they did, indeed, give a verbal memoriam of the woman over the call, but that the Boston team didn't hear it because they were having audio issues.

The TikToker said that it probably would've been better if the folks conducting the meeting waited until there were more people on the call to discuss her passing after she was told by her bosses they "didn't want to repeat it."

Then in the same conversation, their boss immediately asked if she wanted to talk to someone else about taking over the now-dead employee's role.

She enlisted the help of this other co-worker to help fulfill the work duties of this other team member and while she was sitting with him she started to bring up the subject her West Coast bosses broached to her, i.e., if the co-worker was down to take over the role.

"I don't want to talk about it," the man said, to which the TikToker replied that his not walking to talk about it wasn't going to stop her bosses from mentioning it to him or attempting to have his role taken over.

"He said, can you give me 24 hours? I said, yeah. Their bigger concern was making sure her job got covered. And making sure, and then they didn't want us telling any clients. And these were, we were very close with our clients. Yeah, so, yeah, just make sure that, you know, that all the time you give up for most jobs, they won't care," she said at the end of the video.

Numerous commenters replied that, unfortunately, they too have learned this the hard way: "This has been one of the saddest lessons in adult life to learn," one person wrote.

However, there were also others who mentioned that they weren't shocked by the callousness presented by her company: "I don’t know why that’s a surprise; your co-workers usually are not your real friends."

Someone else said that hearing her story prompted her to skip out on work: "This convinced me to call out for an event I really want to go to."