Devastating News
During a mandatory group meeting, an introverted coworker found out via text that her aunt had passed. She interrupted the host to relay this to us, obviously because it impacted her, and she needed to share this. She stated how she was very close to her aunt and how her passing was very unexpected. My fellow Zoom folks reacted very oddly.
Her statement first got awkward-pauses. Then, after some short condolences, people circled back to the agenda in no time. They proceeded to pick up where they left off so naturally, with this devastated person still sitting in the meeting, unsure of what to do. It was as if we were so normalized to bad news that we couldn’t take more than a minute to show an adequate amount of empathy and ensure this person was ok.
It seemed dehumanizing. I cut the speaker off and told the coworker, “Hey, this meeting will always be here. But, unless you’d rather stay on, please go be with your family!” At that point, she broke down in tears, thanked me, and said, “I am sorry I can’t be here, guys,” and left. I was happy I could do that for her.
Otherwise, that poor gal would’ve just sat through an hour-long meeting holding back tears from her profound loss. I was just shocked that I was the only one in such a large group who showed her any proactive empathy. It was terrifying to see how transactional Zoom meetings can get.
Story credit: Reddit / colormemantis