好英语网如果宠物死了 员工应该获准休假吗？
Katie Adkins’ five-year-old corgi, Goliath, had a name that didn’t really fit.
阿德金斯（Katie Adkins）5岁的柯基犬有个不太相称的名字：小巨人。
“It was kind of a joke at first, because he was so short,” Adkins says of her dog. “But he certainly thought he was Goliath-sized. He was so full of energy and so smart.”
阿德金斯谈到爱犬时说：“一开始只是开玩笑，因为他太矮了，但他肯定认为自己身型高大。小巨人总是精力充沛，而且聪明机灵。”
When Goliath unexpectedly died, Adkins says it was “like losing a best friend”.
当爱犬意外去世时，阿德金斯说，感觉像是“失去了最好的朋友”。
“Goliath was the first dog I ever truly called my own. He’d been with me through a lot: friends, roommates, moves. He was there when I bought my first house.”
“小巨人是第一只真正属于我的狗。他陪我经历了很多：朋友、室友、搬家。我买第一套房子时他也在。”
So, when Adkins’ employer let her take two days off to mourn Goliath, she was incredibly grateful. Her boss “was very sympathetic. She immediately told me not to worry about anything work-related and to take as much time as I needed.”
所以，当老板准她两天假来悼念小巨人时，她非常感激。她的老板“深表同情。当即告诉我不要担心任何与工作相关的事情，需要请几天假就请几天。”
Most bosses are not so generous – such a request might be met with surprise at many workplaces.
这么慷慨的老板并不多，许多会对这样的要求感到惊讶。
But as pets become more popular in the office and at home, and as people spend more money on their furry friends, it raises the question: should we get time off if a pet dies?
但是，随着人们越来越喜欢在办公室或家里养宠物，在毛茸茸的朋友身上花费也越来越多时，就产生了一个问题——如果宠物死了，我们应该获准休假吗？
Pets as office fixtures
宠物成为办公室常客
According to GfK, Germany's largest market research firm, over half of people in the world kept at least one type of pet, such as dog, cat, fish or bird, in 2016.
德国最大的市场研究公司GfK的数据显示，2016年，世界上超过一半的人至少饲养了一种宠物，如狗、猫、鱼或鸟。
“The proliferation of [pets] and how they impact our lives have really exploded in the last five or ten years,” says Dan Ryan, a recruiting expert at the US Society for Human Resource Management.
美国人力资源管理学会的招聘专家瑞恩（Dan Ryan）表示：“在过去的5到10年间，宠物的普及以及对人们生活的影响确实出现了爆炸式增长。”
He points to things like pet chemotherapy, pet antidepressants and joint replacement surgeries for pets that have become increasingly popular. Pet care is big business – last year, according to Euromonitor International, the industry reached $110 billion globally.
他指出，给宠物化疗、宠物用抗抑郁药和给宠物进行关节置换手术等等越来越常见。宠物护理是笔大生意，去年，欧睿信息咨询公司（Euromonitor International）的数据显示，全球宠物护理业的规模达到了1100亿美元。
That popularity is being seen in the workplace, as more offices offer perks like ‘Bring your Dog to Work Day’. Others have enshrined it into their daily culture: the offices of Silicon Valley behemoths like Google and Amazon are filled with dogs, ice cream company Ben & Jerry’s welcomes its employees’ “K9-5ers”, and Ferray, a Tokyo-based IT firm, doubles as a home to its staff’s cats.
越来越多的公司提供“带狗上班日”这样的特别福利，由此可见宠物在办公场所受欢迎的程度。还有将宠物融入公司日常文化的。比如，硅谷巨头谷歌和亚马逊的办公室里就有很多狗。冰淇淋公司本杰瑞（Ben & Jerry's）欢迎员工带爱犬来，并称狗狗们为“K9-5ers”。而总部位于东京的科技公司费雷（Ferray），如果算上公司里员工们的猫主子，成员就翻了一倍。
One marketing firm in the US state of Minneapolis even offers “fur-ternity leave”, which gives staff the opportunity to take time off to spend with a new pet.
美国明尼阿波利斯市（Minneapolis）的一家营销公司甚至提供“宠物产假”，让员工能够迎接新宠物的降生。
Still, embracing pooches at the company HQ is one thing. But when tragedy strikes and we have to say goodbye to our animal companions… will management be as supportive?
不过，在公司总部抱抱小狗是一回事。当悲剧降临，我们不得不和动物伙伴告别时，管理层也会这么支持吗？
Adkins works in Tennessee as a digital brand specialist at Mars PetCare, the largest pet food firm in America.
阿德金斯在田纳西州（Tennessee）任职于美国最大的宠物食品公司玛氏宠物护理（Mars PetCare），是一位电子营销专员。
While it seems obvious that a pet goods company would be quick to grant workers time off after the death of a pet, even at Mars PetCare workers aren’t allocated specific pet bereavement days – each case is treated individually.
宠物用品公司在宠物死后马上给员工休假看起来似乎理所当然，但即使是在玛氏宠物护理，员工也没有专门悼念宠物的假期——每个案例都是单独处理的。
But could this change?
这种情况会改变吗？
Should you be allowed to take time off for a pet’s death?
宠物死了，老板该给你放假吗？
I put this question to Susan Stehlik, director of the management communications programme at New York University. “My immediate reaction, from an HR perspective, is no,” she says, and that many of her colleagues rolled their eyes when she canvassed their own opinions.
我向美国纽约大学（New York University）管理交流项目主任斯特利克（Susan Stehlik）提出了这个问题。“从人力资源的角度来看，我的第一反应是否定的，”她说，而且她的许多同事在被问到时都翻了个白眼。
But the more she thought about it, the more it made sense. Stehlik says from a human perspective, managers need to show compassion: “You have to honour how people put love in their life,” she says. “The day a manager doesn’t show compassion, then the worker turns around and says, ‘this is a hostile work environment.’”
但是，她越想越觉得该放假。斯特利克说，从人的角度来看，管理者需要表现出同情心。“你必须尊重人们在生活中表达爱的方式。当管理层没有表现出同情心时，员工转身就会抱怨说‘这个工作环境恶劣无爱’。”
Turning down such requests can create unproductive workers, adds Cary Cooper, a professor of organisational psychology at the University of Manchester. Without proper leave to mourn, a bereaved employee’s “body is there, but they deliver no added value.”
英国曼彻斯特大学（University of Manchester）组织心理学教授库珀（Cary Cooper）补充称，拒绝这样的请求可能会导致员工工作效率低下。如果不能休假哀悼，一个失去心爱宠物的员工只会“身在心不在，无法创造额外价值”。
A note from the vet?
兽医的证明？
Pet bereavement leave could be easier to abuse than policies for people, Ryan says. “How can you prove they really had a dog?”
瑞恩说：“与亲属过世的丧假相比，宠物丧假可能更容易被滥用。怎么证明员工真的养了狗？”
“Are you going to get a note from your veterinarian saying your dog died? It becomes challenging to implement.”
“你要从兽医那里拿张字条证明你的狗死了吗？这实施起来很有难度。”
Ryan isn’t singling out pet owners as opportunists looking exploit generous bosses. Rather, “some people are always looking for an opportunity to exploit a rule or a policy within the workplace.”
瑞恩并不是在说宠物主人想占老板便宜、投机取巧，而是说，“有些人总是想方设法地利用公司规则或政策。”
Cooper thinks that people abusing the benefit would actually be quite rare. He says job security isn’t what it used to be – “jobs are no longer for life” – and he reckons shady behaviour would leave an unsavoury trail for HR if it ever came time to cut costs.
库珀认为，会滥用这种福利的人其实很少。他说，职业安全感已经与往日不同，“工作不再是一辈子都不换”。 他认为，如果需要裁员，滥用福利这种见不得人的行为会在人力资源部门留下不良印象。
“There’s a psychological contract between them and the employer” when an employee benefit exists, Cooper says. “They have to honour their part of the contract, which is to deliver added value.”
库珀说：“当员工享受福利时，他们和雇主之间有一种心理契约，必须履行自己在合同中应尽的责任，即创造额外价值。”
Do we grieve for pets as much as we do people?
宠物和人离世，我们的伤感一样吗？
Coming up with a clear definition of a “pet” can complicate matters, says John Bradshaw, is the foundation director of the Anthrozoology Institute at the University of Bristol in the UK, who has long studied the relationship between pets and humans.
英国布里斯托大学（University of Bristol）人类与动物关系学研究所（Anthrozoology Institute）的基金会主任布拉德肖（John Bradshaw）长期研究宠物和人类之间的关系，他认为给“宠物”下一个明确的定义可能会使问题更复杂。
“I don't think it's feasible for employers to offer days off for the loss of a pet,” he says. “Not because the owner's grief may not be genuine, but because it's difficult to produce a hard-edged definition for ‘pet’.”
他说：“我认为，对于雇主来说，给宠物离世的员工休几天假是不可行的。并非因为宠物主人不是真的悲伤，而是我们很难给‘宠物’一个明确的定义。”
For example, while owners may consider fish and reptiles as pets, the American Veterinary Medical Association includes only dogs, cats, cage birds and horses as ‘companion animals’.
比如说，有人会把鱼和爬行动物当作宠物，但美国兽医协会（American Veterinary Medical Association）认为只有狗、猫、养在笼子里的鸟，还有马算是“伴侣动物”。
“I can see difficulties in deciding who should be entitled to time off, and who shouldn't,” Bradshaw says. HR expert Ryan agrees, and that if a company were to roll out such a policy, it needs to be as black-and-white as possible.
布拉德肖说：“在决定谁有权休假谁不该休假时会有难度。”人力资源专家瑞安对此表示赞同，他还表示，如果公司要推出宠物丧假政策，就必须尽可能详尽明确。
Bradshaw also argues that there are “subtle differences between the grief felt for pets and that felt for close, human relatives”: that, for example, many pet owners get a new pet within a few months, whereas grief lasts for many years when a close family member dies.
布拉德肖还认为，“人们对宠物的悲伤和对近亲的悲伤有着微妙的区别”。例如，许多人几个月内就有了新宠物，而近亲去世后，悲伤会持续很多年。
“It's commonplace for owners to speak of their pets as ‘one of the family’, but this may be no more than a convenient way to describe them,” Bradshaw adds.
布拉德肖补充说：“主人常常把宠物说成是‘家庭中的一员’，但这可能不过是一种更方便的描述方式而已。”
However companies decide to accommodate the changing needs of their workforce, and as pet ownership is so widespread – 68% of families in the US, for example – the topic of employee pet care is unlikely to go away.
无论公司如何应对员工不断变化的需求，由于饲养宠物非常普遍（美国68%的家庭都有宠物），员工宠物护理的话题不太可能消失。
“You can’t ignore the numbers,” Stehlik says. “So if the majority of the population is experiencing this, then companies need to get with the programme.”
“你不能忽视这些数据，”斯特利克说。“如果大多数人都有这种情况，那么企业就需要配合。”