“Did you hear that the new Team Lead is flirting with the boss? ”; “Oh! he is getting divorced!”; “Her wallet got wacked from her bag!!” .W ho doesn’t like the juicy gossips and if it’s at the work place, the more the merrier! There were few people in my previous office, who were also known as ‘Mr. Know It All’ as they knew everthing about the workplace and people. However, office gossip is always regarded as vicious and hurting for the employees. People believe that it can hamper the productivity and can create physical and mental problems for the victims.
On the other hand we feel there definitely is a brighter side to office gossip. Gossip can be a great source of information (apart from fun and humour!). You can get useful pieces of information from gossip about hints of lay-offs, impending policy changes, who is doing what, strategies for the customers, growth prospects, promotions in the team, news about clients and business etc. So don’t be uncomfortable with the idea of gossip, in fact consider it as a positive, informal communication system.
Workplace gossip can be healthy and beneficial for your career. Just remember to follow a few simple rules, listed below:
1. Filter: Being the silent listener helps. Extract the useful information and filter out the rest. You may not be interested in knowing about personal history of a colleague, but who is preparing the promotion list and on what basis, can be useful information for you.
2. Utilize: You can use the information in many useful ways. Like if you got to know that your boss likes doing social work a lot then you also can discuss your ideas and experience on the same. So that you could be in the good books of your boss.
3. Promote: At informal team meetings, smoke breaks with the boss, or at other conventional gossip places you can make people aware about your achievement or your efficiency at work that might have gone unnoticed otherwise.
4. Trust: In a professional work environment, you may not get the chance to know and understand your colleagues. By spending some informal time with them, you can mingle with your peers, understand them and build a constructive relationship.
5. Unwind: In a competitive and stress inducing work environment if you can enjoy a light moment with your peers, it will refresh you.
I feel, nothing is really bad or harmful; it depends on how we act upon it. We need to see from a positive viewpoint. We should know that even useless junk can be useful in building a castle!
Message From: sunil_1981dec
Total Posts: 2
Join Date: 07/07/2009
Rank: Beginner
Post Date: 23/11/2009 05:31:31
Points: 10
Location: India
office gossip is Good at some time and Bad at some time.. it depends upon the situations.. But one think is sure Gossip is done only when peoples are free and they dont have lots of free time. So to avoid Gossip opeople should be given a some extra work
Message From: Roshi
Total Posts: 21
Join Date: 07/07/2009
Rank: Executive
Post Date: 23/11/2009 07:40:06
Points: 105
Location: India
Hello,
Yes I agree that Office Gossip has got postive side too, if its filtered. But the problem is people just take it as it is and do not try to filter what has been said to get the facts. Here the problem arises. Just Blindly trusting on what has been gossiped about can sometimes be very harmful for Employees and for Employer as well.
Regards
Roshi
Message From: devally
Total Posts: 2
Join Date: 07/07/2009
Rank: Beginner
Post Date: 09/02/2010 16:31:48
Points: 10
Location: India
Gossiping is done by individuals whom have nothing better to occupy their minds!!!!
Therefore occupy their minds & no doubt the gossip will stop.
