ALT-1 Office Gossip
Office Gossip
Is it better to be in the loop or out of the loop?
Perceptions
The way that office staff and executives are perceived at the office has just as much to with their promotions and pay raises as their actual job performance. Unfortunate but true. This gives power to the office gossip. Undeserved power. Just as the school yard bully beat up on smaller children, the office gossip beats up the new and less aggressive staff in a different, but just as nasty, way. Often, because they are excluded from the gossip they don't know what is being said about them and can even play into it, unknowingly. Other staff, seeing some new co-worker skewered by untrue and malicious gossip, become fearful of being "out of the loop". How will he or she defend themselves and nip rumors in the bud if they don't even know about them? This creates a vicious cycle that feeds the power of the office gossip.
Self Defense Tactics
In a survey of 3,200 employees across all major Canadian industries, 65% said that they rely largely or wholly on gossip for organizational information. Whether this can be extended to include American workers has yet to be seen, but certainly, it is a widespread practice in American industry. It is unlikely we will ever be able to do away with office gossip so it behooves us to understand it in order to minimize its' negative effects. In the October 2008 Main Line Health Newsletter, published for the Health Industry, the cause of high office chatter or gossip was found to be a lack of good and timely communication by management. When changes are announced but not delineated by managers, this creates a vacuum of anxiety. Nature abhors a vacuum. Something will fill it. Rumors and gossip are the natural result. A management that briefs it's staff frequently and well will greatly minimize the negative impact of rumor mongering and gossip.
Know Before You Cock That Pistol
Always differentiate between office chatter and office gossip. Office chatter is news about staff changes, mergers, etc. Office gossip is an in depth description of the VP Sales latest date or opinions on why the new girl always wears black. Office chatter can be useful and productive. Some executives even use it as a means of running a new idea up the flagpole to see who likes it and who doesn't. Office gossip on the other hand is entirely counterproductive. According to the Health industry's Health Line Newsletter, office gossip results in disenfranchisement, anxiety and poorer health. The bottom line takes an even bigger hit in lost productivity, staff turnover and if the backbiting spills into the customers' perception, lost business. Nothing is more unwelcoming to a customer than an establishment whose staff can't seem to get along. So, before you target someone, make sure it's gossip not chatter, and then don't hold back on that trigger finger.
Perspective
The next time you hear a disgusting rumor about someone you had respected up until then, consider the source. Do they have a motive for making you think less of this person? Is there a promotion at stake? Maybe this is someone whose own work product is questionable and they are spreading rumors about their boss so when their boss makes their poor products known, no-one will listen. There are all kinds of motives. Look, don't listen. Whose actions demonstrate that they care about the company and whose don't. What kind of work quality do these people have? When all is said and done is the productivity and high quality of work product that pays the bills, not someone's quirks. In this economy it's wise to remember the bottom line.
The Control Issue
Since it's not possible to do away with office gossip altogether, let's look at ways to prevent yourself from being involved with it. The more people that refuse to be a part of negative gossip about their co-workers, the less power this gossip has. Every office can take control of this issue by doing the following:
1.Voice an objection. Just say NO. The office gossip can be positioned as the office version of a school yard bully that they are. If they are an "innocent" gossip then their lack of factual evidence versus unfounded opinion can be pointed out and combined with what intended result this gossip has? Is it a good result or a bad result? What must the intention be then?
2. Change the subject. Talk about something positive instead. You can just insert a more positive topic into the conversation and lead it that way. You can be a leader instead of a follower in these situations.
3. Just walk away. Abstinence is always effective.
It's A PR World
When it comes to job security, which a lot of us are looking for these days, the perception that management has about you is everything. If management feels that you are involving yourself in office gossip when you're supposed to lead your staff instead, they will think less of you. This less that they think of you can translate into a pink slip when lay offs come along. This is particularly true for women executives. Correct or not, women are seen as more gossipy than men and all it takes is one instance of a female executive listening to a co-worker gossiping and she can be labeled a "gossip" from then on.
In summary, it's better to stay out of the office gossip loop by any means necessary, but the office chatter loop can be useful. If you're in charge of an office or a group of people than you are in the very best position to minimize rumors and gossip. You can do this by including your people in your plans. Delineate for them what you're planning and how any changes will affect them specifically. The worst thing you can do is to announce a change and then not say how, when and in what way it will specifically affect the people in your charge. This creates the dreaded information vacuum. We know how nature abhors a vacuum. Wild rumors will proliferate and it will be your own fault. All leaders make these choices and either enjoy or suffer the consequences.
