IKEA wasn’t where I expected grief to hit me.
But there I was, walking past sleek displays and tiny model kitchens when a wave of tears came out of nowhere. It wasn’t triggered by a memory or a particular item. It was something deeper, a bodily reminder that the world had shifted after losing someone I loved.
The death of my fiancé changed everything. It altered how I experience space, silence, and even the most mundane moments. It also changed how I show up in the world, even at work.
Before that loss, I didn’t fully understand how grief lives in us. How it doesn’t wait for convenient moments or tidy stages. How it can sit quietly in meetings, leak into decision-making, or show up in a space like IKEA, unannounced and uninvited.
Just like I had no idea that grief would hit me in a place as ordinary as IKEA, I also didn’t expect a meaningful conversation about life and death to emerge in the middle of a quiet moment with my mother.
We were standing together at my grandmother’s funeral, in a beautiful, grassy area of the cemetery. It was serene. The kind of stillness that makes you pause. In the distance, deer were moving across the field, their quiet presence somehow comforting. My mom watched them for a moment, then looked off and said, “I want to live here.”
At first, it felt out of place, ambiguous, even odd. But her words stayed with me. They became an opening, a gentle nudge into a deeper conversation: about what peace looks like, what it means to be remembered, and how we make meaning in moments we can’t always plan.
Grief, I’ve learned, doesn’t just come in waves. It also opens windows. And if we meet those moments with curiosity instead of control, they can reveal powerful cultural insights.
Through that lens, I started noticing how culture shapes everything around loss. From what food is served at a repass (…and my realization that not everyone knows what a repass is!), to who is expected to speak, to whether tears are seen as a burden or a release. I remembered laughing at an Instagram post between a Black woman and her white colleague, where the colleague asked, “Can I come to the repass?”. Note, if you still haven’t looked it up, it’s not that kind of party! What could have been awkward became a moment of cultural invitation. It reminded me that curiosity, when met with openness, can bridge even the most personal cultural differences.
As a coach and equity strategist, I think a lot about how culture shows up in leadership. But I hadn’t realized how often we ignore the culture of grief in our workplaces.
We ask people to “bring their whole selves to work,” yet we make little room for loss. We talk about mental health, but we rarely name the grief that comes from personal loss, communal tragedy, or even constant exposure to violence in the news. Whether it’s George Floyd, Gaza, Sudan, or someone we love, grief shows up. And it deserves our attention.
Leadership, to me, includes listening differently. Especially when it’s uncomfortable. It means recognizing that someone might be mourning even if they’re not wearing it on their sleeve. It means understanding that cultural cues around grief vary and being willing to learn what those differences mean.
It might look like checking in differently during 1:1s, creating space in team rituals to acknowledge collective grief, or rethinking your ‘return to work’ norms after personal loss. These aren’t big policies; they’re cultural cues. And leaders set them, whether intentionally or not.
I want to thank Jamie Arthurs for opening up a conversation on a recent episode of Unpacked: Culture Chronicles that helped me see grief not just as an individual experience, but as a collective one. One that intersects with culture, space, and the quiet moments we too often ignore.
If grief has taught me anything, it’s that how we handle it says everything about our workplace norms and how we care for one another. It’s in the silences we allow, the support we offer, and the ways we honor both presence and absence. Grief isn’t separate from leadership, it’s part of it. And how we respond matters, even when the moment catches us off guard, in a place as unexpected as an IKEA aisle.
What This Means for Leaders
Grief isn’t always visible, but it’s always real. And in a multicultural, multigenerational workforce, how people grieve, and how they’re supported can shape team trust, performance, and retention.
If you want to lead inclusively, grief must be part of the conversation. Not just when tragedy strikes, but in the everyday ways culture, memory, and humanity show up in your team.
Where might grief be present in your organization, quietly shaping the culture? What would change if you made space for it, not just in policy, but in practice?