Violence in the Funeral Workplace

The busy season lies just ahead for most of you...that time when the phone never stops and the prep room is always full and incessant floral deliveries...

Pressure...sometimes of nearly geologic proportions...

Our business is a natural pressure cooker. It can break the best of us. It can turn an ordinarily disciplined staff into a bunch of poo-flinging fraternity monkeys.

Adding the pressure of busier times can really get ugly.

Now, to be clear, I am not speaking of some Fort Hood-type situation...but I am addressing the destructive and demoralizing everyday haranguement and hostility that needs to be removed from your workplace.

After meeting with good friends over good drink last week, and be regaled by the tales of intolerable behavior (often acted out in front of ownership and management types), I see this being a situation that is probably far from unique.

Hopefully, you have a handle on it. You squash the actions before it festers into something that will land you in court...like sexual harassment, intimidation, a "hostile workplace" or any of their bastard relatives.

Strictly enforcing your firm's code of ethics (which should have a section on peer treatment & respect-if it doesn't, get one in there. Now.)

Don't run the risk of damaging the staff you have worked so hard to develop (remember the Guerrillas in the Midst post?), don't risk the liability that a damaged staff could drop the ball on something big (and land your butt in the middle of a legal and PR nightmare) and don't make a bunch of lawyers rich because a pissed-off ex-employee got fed up with the monkeys and your lack of management skills/guts etc.

Violence doesn't always mean gunfire...don't be foolish enough to ignore what's going down inside your own walls.

To end this tome with a more usual tone, don't forget the true meaning of the coming Thursday. Even if the picture isn't perfect and some challenges are facing you, be thankful you have the ability to face them. Be thankful for whatever good the past year has brought you. Being thankful lets the Powers that be know that you appreciate the blessings they have delivered to you, and that's frees them to send more. Read the Prayer of Jabez if you need an additional lift.

All the best to you,

Dan Heaman, CFSP