Depends on the other person, but "gets hit by a bus or abducted by aliens" or some other (movie) trope doesn't sound too bad if it's an informal discussion.
"Abducted by an alien" is so absurd, it takes away all that and replaces it with something potentially fun and an experience of a lifetime.
I also very much prefer the lottery example, and the fact that someone on HN would still do a handover doesn't change that fact.
While it might be uncomfortable to be reminded of, it is in most cases true.
The company isn’t your family or your friends, and most managers adhere to the doctrine that the single important responsibility of the company is to create value for the stock holders.
Life and death metaphors are my right to enjoy and share irreverently as the mortal being I am.
And before you ask, yes I enjoy being overly graphic like this on the pseudonumoyous internet to exaggerate my points but I wouldn't do this irl. That is hypocritical of me.
from a more practical perspective: No, because you're replacing a well-understood metaphor with something that is unknown, juvenile and stupid, removing the value we get from shared language constructs.
But i could imagine someone who states that it's his "right" to be as irreverent as he likes to whomever he wants to is not open to the concept of other people's perspective.
And just to be clear, I wasn't saying that you should use my example instead. :D
If it makes you feel any better I have given your perspective what I consider to be a fair consideration.
It just happens to violate my reward function.
And of course it's a strawman exaggerated version of the common "hit by a bus" idiom.
For me this sort of signaling isn't a sign of aggressive anticooperation, but a sign to me you see through bullshit, will point out wrongdoings, and will be candid. It doesn't evoke disgust or discomfort. It feels honest and friendly.
In the opposite case, bussiness casual english feels cold and disingenuous to me. Like reading apologies by GPT. I feel it as annoying insincerity. (I give a pass to anyone over 40, and usually find in private they are actually human after all.)
Different strokes.
Take it like this to understand that mine was aimed to be constructive criticism:
Stop reminding the people who work at your stupid company, doing all your stupid scrum bs ceremonies that if they died and left the wife and children behind, you would be really worried about Tom needing two days to fix a bug in the iOS watch application, whereas it would take you only two hours. Again, you are free to do whatever you want, but if you keep reminding me that none of this bs what I'm doing here really matters to me, don't be surprised that I quit as soon as possible.
I did have a previous workplace, though, where they couldn't stop yapping about the bus factor and I disliked that phrase because it kept reminding me that one day I die and am wasting one more hour of my living days in a pointless retrospective that will have no positive effect on anything.
So? The company isn't going to let all their employees starve to death out of compassion for the one that did die.
They know you don't give a fuck about what happens after you're dead, but they're still alive, and they have to keep things running so that they can continue eating.
Telling people that you don't care what effect your death has on them is a pretty good way to indicate how selfish you are.
It may not be selfish to feel an emotion giving you a background hint about reality. There are hungry children in the world, Im not selfish just because I dont want to eat fermented soybeans.
I don’t agree that the phrase implies that at all.
An alternative interpretation is "we have to keep doing x and y to earn our living, and it's doubly difficult because not only did you know how to do them but we're all having difficulty coping with your passing".
I had to take a sudden leave the week before, and my coworkers, and boss cared at a personal level. And while most of my tasks were taken care of by them some weren't, and I had to rush Monday morning when I got back.
This talk is not about personal feelings, even though it could include "do a memorial for the lost person", but it's about all the needed work that must go on on any scenario.
You should understand that people should keep going on their lifes once you are not there, and that is good. If they think kindly of you after your passing depends on your relationship during life, not on any company preparation scenario.
Story from this week:
Manager at large-ish IT support company, visibly distraught, tells their manager that one of her direct reports got cancer.
Response: "Oh, and I thought something bad happened, like the direct report quit."
You are reading a lot out of words read on an internet screen. This manager may very well be toxic, they may also just not be able to express emotion in the same way and very well went above and beyond putting everything in place for said employee to receive all the medical support they need, mental and physical.
We don't know and for all we know OP is in a bad space and completely misread the situation.
This whole comment is devil's advocate, you can make the same argument for the exact opposite and of course your personal experience matters but leave the airing of dirty laundry out of public forums and if I do the same I encourage anyone to call me out on it.
That will exactly be the key worry of the management.
We've had team members lost like that - and that was the worry.
They'll still feel sorry, say their condolensces, and might even go to the funeral, but in the end, the work continues - almost immediately.