I had a contract with a household name theme park company that is known for treating its employees like disposable widgets. It made headlines a while back by l

I had a contract with a household name theme park company that is known for treating its employees like disposable widgets. It made headlines a while back by laying off tons of people and only keeping some on to train their offshore replacements. That kinda place. So while I was there, there was this one guy in the department who was almost never at work. He was always "working from home." Occasionally he would turn in some work, but there was no way to really justify his position. I came to find out that his wife was having serious medical problems and he had been spending most of the last year at the hospital 24/7. Everyone on the team, including the manager, just picked up the slack and not one word was ever said about him or his (lack of) productivity. I'm not sure I really had a point here, because this isn't about a company's false kumbayas. However, even at a big megacorp people will sometimes take care of one another when the going gets rough.