abstract: Losing a colleague is a strange expe- rience. Most people in management have now gone through the process of either personally or organisation- ally seeing the impact of redundancy and premature retirement. Sometimes it is very sudden and people can feel aggrieved that they have not had the opportunity to say goodbye or good luck. It means that when you next meet the individual out shopping it is very difficult to know how to behave let alone what to say. But this social awkwardness does not compare to the situation when a colleague dies.