9 Workplace Stories Of Compassion Where Coworkers Spoke Up, Managers Gave People a Break, and Teams Shared the Load

• I had been assigned to take over a project after the person leading it resigned. I was told it would be temporary, but within a few weeks, I was handling the project alongside my own workload. I started falling behind. I missed two deadlines and made a couple of mistakes that I normally wouldn’t have made. I was embarrassed and assumed my manager was going to question whether I could handle the role. Instead, during our next team meeting, one of my colleagues asked why I was still handling the project’s weekly reports, client emails, and internal meetings on top of my regular work. My manager admitted she hadn’t realized how much of the previous person’s work had been added to my plate. The team went through the project tasks together and divided them among four people. My manager also arranged for the project deadline to be extended by two weeks because the original timeline had been based on having a full-time project lead. I didn’t suddenly become better at my job. I simply stopped trying to do two people’s jobs at once. Within a few weeks, my work was back to normal. Nobody had given me a lecture about time management or put me on notice for the mistakes I’d made. They looked at what was actually happening, fixed the situation, and gave me the chance to recover. That’s what compassion on a team can look like. Sometimes it’s not about making someone feel better. It’s about noticing when they’re struggling for a reason and refusing to make them carry the blame for it.

• I’m an only child, single, no children, and have no extended family left. I’ve been reclusive most of my life so only have a couple of friends who I don’t see often though we talk and text a lot. Anyway, after my mother passed in 2003 I went back to work, and everything seemed normal, but of course I was grieving privately. One day I was in the ladies’ public restroom washing my hands at the sink, and an older coworker who worked in another part of my office walked in. She took one look at me, came up to me, and embraced me in a motherly way. She said nothing, but she didn’t have to. I hugged her back and thanked her. She then went on with her business and I finished washing my hands. I can’t express how comforting that hug was and I’ve never forgotten it.

• I was pregnant with my seventh child when my boss rolled his eyes and said, “Some people have no shame.” The next day, HR rejected my leave request. My boss smirked, threw a stack of documents at me, and tapped one page detailing disciplinary rules for performance improvement. “You should pay special attention to this,” he said. “Pack up. I’m transferring you to the night shift.” I stared at the paper, trying to understand what I had done wrong. I had worked at the company for nine years, never missed a deadline, and rarely taken a day off unless one of my children was sick. But my boss had made it clear that he thought my growing family was an inconvenience. The night shift meant working until 6 a.m., then taking two buses home to get my children ready for school. My husband worked long hours, and we couldn’t afford a babysitter. I tried to explain this to my boss, but he waved me away. “Maybe you should have thought about that before having so many children,” he said. I went back to my desk and fought back tears. I couldn’t afford to lose my job, but I couldn’t see how I would manage the new schedule, either. That afternoon, a colleague named David noticed I was unusually quiet. When he asked what was wrong, I showed him the transfer notice. David had three children of his own. He read the letter twice, then asked if I had spoken to HR about the practical difficulties of the new schedule. “They’ve already rejected my leave request,” I told him. “I don’t think anyone wants to hear it.” “Then let’s make sure they do,” he said. The next morning, David accompanied me to HR. He helped me explain how the night shift would affect my pregnancy, childcare arrangements, and ability to continue working. He also reminded HR that my performance reviews had consistently been excellent and that I had never been given a reason for a disciplinary transfer. HR agreed to review the decision. They also spoke to my manager about the way he had handled the situation. A few days later, I was called into a meeting. My transfer had been cancelled, and HR approved my leave request after reviewing the company’s policies. I was also offered a temporary adjustment to my workload so I could continue working comfortably during the remainder of my pregnancy. My boss barely looked at me when I returned to my desk. David, however, stopped by with a cup of tea and asked how I was feeling. I thanked him for standing up for me when I felt I had no one in my corner. He shrugged. “You shouldn’t have to choose between doing your job and taking care of your family. We all need a little compassion sometimes.” I never forgot those words. David hadn’t needed to intervene, and he certainly hadn’t needed to risk an uncomfortable conversation with management. But he saw a colleague struggling and decided to help. His kindness reminded me that compassion at work isn’t just about being friendly or offering someone a sympathetic smile.

• At a retail job in my early 20s, a customer was (albeit mildly) rude to me but it really hit me emotionally so I went to the back and burst into tears. A really kind-hearted manager noticed me crying and after hearing what happened, he gave me a hug and told me to never change because my sensitivity is part of what makes me special and makes me good at what I do. He probably has no idea, but his words really touched my heart as I had always been pretty sensitive and had never been so gracefully received for who I was, as I was. Years later and his words still come back to comfort me, especially in times where I feel alone and misunderstood in my emotions. I’ll never forget him and I hope to meet another boss like him one day.

• I worked at one of the first Apple stores when I was 18. We used to do these midnight events for big OS releases (so people could buy the CD in a box). It was always pretty crowded and one time an older dude got cranky and started yelling at me about how long it was taking to check out and that he was an Apple shareholder and that he paid FIVE DOLLARS for parking. The whole store got quiet and everyone was looking in our direction. My manager saw this happening, took $5 out of the till, handed it to the dude, took the box out of his hand, and said “have a nice evening.” I felt like a million bucks.

• First job after college. I was working in animation and had to move a bunch of large animation files to a different server. The IT guy told me to cut and paste the files instead of copying them because it would take too long. I put the files in the wrong location, realized my mistake, thought, " Oh ok ill just do it again" and deleted them all and immediately realized I hadn’t copied them. They were gone. Total panic. I called my friend who worked there and who helped me get a job — he said ’ OK let’s see if the back up caught it." It didnt. I had to tell the line manager, tears in my eyes. He said, ’ Its ok, go home and we will deal with it in the morning’. The next day I showed up. Box of donuts in hand for the crew who were very nice about it. The manager spoke to IT about fixing thr back up and the guy who had told me to cut the files apologized to me and said they wouldn’t do it anymore because it was an easy mistake to make. My direct boss had to work overtime and weekends to reanimate it all. It was like 30 seconds of footage which is a lot. He was also nice about it and showed me how to set up all the scenes for him so he could animate. He was just like, ’ Oh yeah anyone could have done that!" That was circa 2008. Its amazing to me how they understood what happened and made a plan to fix the problem and not a single person was angry with me, they understood. I have worked outside animation for a long time now in some chaotic environments where a problem a tenth in size would send colleagues into total rage, filled with blame, backstabbing and anger. But the worst mistake I have ever experienced was the calmest situation, handled by adults and I feel like that will never happen again.

• My first manager out of school. I worked for a rough manager during my internship year in school and he really soiled managers for me. But then I got lucky, I had the most wonderful kindest manager, both fair, and caring that gave me a chance and encouraged me as I rose. I was a contract employee and she kept extending me, tried to make me permanent but it couldn’t get approved. When I went for other roles, she met with me and said I will not stop you from any progress, you tell me what you’re applying for and I’ll help. I remember she’d say, I know you’re much smarter than this job, you can do well here. When I was taking continuing education courses at UofT, she found out I had an exam the next day and told me to take the day off with pay. I had no vacation days, I wanted a week off after a year to go on a trip, she gave me the week with pay and said tell no one. One time on a hard Friday, you could tell everyone’s brains were cooked. It was 3pm, she told us all to go home. She did not have an easy role, she was a quality director and fought a lot of battles daily. She was also in a male dominated industry and that was not easy. We both left that company, but I really felt like those were some golden years. Great team.

• First week on the job and I started to fall asleep at my boss’ desk during a review of month end process. This was after working late the prior three nights. She just nicely asked if I needed a coffee and some fresh air. Didn’t make a big deal of it, never mentioned it again. Just acknowledged it and moved on.

• I had a boss who was good at acknowledging that people working on flashy projects and people who were good at self-promotion got an oversized amount of recognition (and promotions). I was the team lead at the time, and the two of us worked together to ensure that people who showed up every day and did the work that no one else wanted but benefitted customers got recognized, not just within the team but also in the area as a whole. We changed the way we tracked accomplishments so that we had metrics to get the introverted hard workers promotions. People chose to work for him for years because he was seen as equitable and defended his team.

These stories show that kindness at work doesn’t belong to a particular title or role. It can come from a manager, a colleague, a teammate, or even someone who barely knows you. What matters is the choice to notice when someone is struggling and step in when you can. Because a good team isn’t just a group of people working toward the same goal. It’s a group of people who make sure no one has to face the difficult moments alone.