Sam Chapman had a problem.
The Chicago public relations CEO thought his employees were merely being chummy. He’d see a few of them huddled together in a corner, talking. Although his firm wasn’t operating as effectively as he wanted, he didn’t raise a hairy eyeball at a bit of personal camaraderie.
“What’s wrong with a group of friends chitchatting in a room by themselves?” he asked himself.
Plenty, he decided, after a personal coach he’d recently hired told him those innocent tête-à-têtes were sure signs he had a gossip problem on his hands — and his business was suffering because of it.
So he issued an edict: From now on, Empower Public Relations would be a “no-gossip zone.”
For many, it’s almost impossible to imagine a workplace without a daily examination of a co-worker’s apparent Tourette’s syndrome, a discussion of the unlikely affair between the CEO and a mailroom hottie or a recantation of Jeff in IT’s oily pervy-ness. To wit, the average worker spends 65 hours a year yammering about the failings of others, according to a study done by Equisys, an electronic document company.
Whether that’s a good or bad thing depends on whom you ask. Some consider office gossip both inevitable and harmless, while others seek to squash it like a bug, saying it undermines a business’ mission and creates tension where none need be. Still others contend that although gossip can have perverse consequences, it also forges friendships, enforces moral codes and disseminates valuable information that can’t be found in the company newsletter.
Chapman knows where he stands.
“I was seeing people congregate behind closed doors when I was fostering an open-door policy,” he says. “There was a missing sense of candor and there was a sense of tightness.”
When he opened his eyes and investigated the problem, he found that workers were bad-mouthing management strategy, and some were discussing forming their own p.r. firm.
The exec held a company-wide meeting. He told employees he would not tolerate gossip — which he defines as “anything negative said outside the presence of the subject” — and said they had to sign on right away or be terminated. Two flacks declined, and they were shown the door, but 98 percent of Empower employees remained, says Chapman.
To eliminate “back channel, backstabbing gossip” at the firm, both the conveyer and receiver of gossip are required to tell the subject of their wrath what’s been said. The folks who’ve been gossiped about usually don’t enjoy the attention, but Chapman says they appreciate the opportunity to clear the air. The policy applies to clients as well as colleagues, but Empower employees are free to talk all they want about Kevin Federline’s bulging belly or Britney’s latest meltdown.
Chapman says the firm’s gossip-free zone has produced the openness he’d sought.
“It’s a huge difference now to be in a meeting and to be able to giggle,” he says. “I think it was appreciated right away.”
Ashley Gonias, a senior publicist at Empower, seconds that emotion.
“Right before the policy [was instituted], it was very tense. Now you don’t have to deal with all the cattiness,” she says. “I think you develop stronger bonds with people.”
Talking the talk
Is gossip really the unadulterated evil Chapman and so many others think it is? Academics who’ve studied the phenomenon say water-cooler conversation can have a positive effect.
“One good thing about gossip — even negative gossip — is that it does create a bond of some sort between people,” says Nicholas DiFonzo, a professor of psychology at the Rochester Institute of Technology who’s studied gossip’s cousin, rumor. “When I share gossip with you, it’s an indication that you’re my friend.”
When you get down to brass tacks, gossip isn’t just malicious hearsay about the liquor on Mickey’s breath at 9 a.m., according to experts. In fact, it’s hard to nail down exactly what constitutes gossip. Technically, it’s defined as any conversation between two people about a third party, says Gary Alan Fine, a professor of sociology at Northwestern University. So commenting on how divine Bertha looks in her new muumuu is just as gossipy as anything coming out of Perez Hilton’s mouth.
“Most gossip is positive. People will say more good things about friends and acquaintances,” says Fine.
Yet even the nasty stuff serves to enforce social norms. If you tell someone about the racial epithets a co-worker constantly bellows, you’re reinforcing the notion that racism is bad, according to Fine. The troubles start when people don’t agree on the norm in question, such as gossip about a boss’s sexuality or what the guy in the next cubicle smokes on weekends.
Gossip also works as an informal information system. That Steve is a no-good, Janus-faced, back-stabbing bastard is not something that will be posted on the office bulletin board, so gossiping about him is the only means for workers to send up a flare to a newbie.
“It’s a way for the community as a whole to detect cheaters,” says DiFonzo. “It serves as a warning.”
Olivia Fox Cabane, an executive coach, says gossip is “essentially nothing but a way to hold the fabric of society together.”
“You transmit key information about the office,” she says. “It’s no better or worse than other forms of information.”
And it can be especially useful in times of economic stress, when one’s employer may be making layoffs or other changes, some note. Office workers polled by the staffing firm Robert Half International recently believed that there was more gossip in their workplace than there was five years ago.
Experts are quick to add that even though negative gossip may have salutary effects, co-workers who traffic in it usually don’t have hearts of gold.
“People often spread gossip for not very nice reasons,” DiFonzo acknowledges.
The first reason is personal entertainment, he says. What better way to spice up a dull workplace than idle speculation about Lois in accounting’s previous career as a professional dominatrix?
The second is strategy. If the boss thinks your rival is spending lunch hours doing Jager shots, then your preference for decaf lattes is going to look a lot better at the annual review.
The third is pure voyeurism. Quick: Picture your CEO being stood up on a blind date.
The fourth is “to feel better about our sins and peccadilloes,” says DiFonzo. You may not be the star of your department, but at least you aren’t the office herpes distributor.
A stubborn foe
In spite of negative gossip’s positive outcomes, experts gave Chapman’s anti-gossip policy a general thumbs-up.
“That sounds mostly pretty good,” says DiFonzo, the psych professor. “It sounds like he’s trying to address legitimate concerns people have. You can’t just spread rumor willy-nilly.”
He’s particularly pleased that the policy applies to clients as well as co-workers.
“That actually would affect the bottom line,” DiFonzo says.
Professor Fine thinks the policy is fine “up to an extent. You want to create an environment where people are supportive of each other,” he says, although he adds that the primary way Chapman would find out about violations of the no-gossip policy is through . . . gossip. It’s not as if the miscreants are going to confess, he notes.
As for Chapman — who’s written a book, “The No Gossip Zone,” in which he dispenses advice on slaying the office gossip beast — he’s not buying any of this beneficial-effects-of-gossip stuff.
“It’s just not a positive force,” he says. “People who defend it are committed trash talkers.”
You may agree or disagree, but it’s unlikely many will contest the view of Rick Gibbs of the HR outsourcing firm Administaff, who notes that workers are likely to completely abandon gossip around the time bees quit making honey.
“Some gossip is always going to be there,” he says. “It’s a natural part of life in an organization.”
What if you’re the one they’re whispering about?
Kibitzing about colleagues may help pass the workday, but it becomes a lot less amusing when you’re the target. Hearing through the grapevine that you have a more intimate relationship with your pets than is considered appropriate in 21st century America is a sure way to a fainting spell, regardless of its veracity.
So what should you do if you find yourself the object of unpleasant office gossip?
The first question you should ask yourself is if the gossip is worth the effort to debunk it, experts say. There’s no reason to go into a tizzy because someone cracked foxy about your shoes.
“If it’s about your quirks, then laugh it off as a way of embracing it,” says Gary Alan Fine, a professor of sociology at Northwestern who studies gossip. “Allowing yourself to be a little bit a figure of fun or amusement — that often works fine.”
If you think the gossip is sufficiently slanderous, you have a few options, depending on whether the rumors are true, experts say.
If they’re faker than a “Rolex” on an Eighth Avenue cardboard box, you could go to HR and tell them what’s what, says Fine.
Rumor expert Nicholas DiFonzo, a psychology professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology, proposes a more informal method of redress. Call on friends and ask them to “spread the facts,” he says.
DiFonzo also counsels folks to look into why the rumor started in the first place.
“You should examine the uncertainties the gossip capitalized on,” he says. So if you’re considered a suck-up, it shouldn’t be a surprise that people are whispering about how you were unworthy of your recent promotion.
In more extreme cases, victims of untrue gossip can sue for slander, though it’s uncommon, says Sarah Wimberley, a partner at Ford & Harrison, a labor and employment law firm.
“You very rarely see a lawsuit that just raises claims of defamation,” she says.
But, she adds, while it’s not common, “it can be a dangerous claim.” Most states don’t cap damages won in libel and slander suits, meaning if you say something untrue and defamatory about, for example, a co-worker’s cocaine habit, you could wind up paying through the nose.
From their mouths to your ear
Workplace gossipers break down into five primary types, according to a breakdown of the genus by the staffing firm Robert Half International. The breeds they identified:
* The Tape Recorder: Takes your private conversations and plays them back to everyone else in the office. This person acts less out of malice than out of a need to feel important.
* The Marathoner: Insists on sharing all the scuttlebutt he’s picked up whether you want to hear it or not. Will corner you at your desk, in the break room, on the way out at night — anywhere he can.
* The Double Agent: Plays both sides. Complains to you about the boss, then turns around and dishes on you to the boss. The rub is, you rarely realize it until you get burned.
* The Scent Hound: When the workplace is buzzing with a rumor, this one will dig and get the dirt.
* The Complainer: Constantly airs grievances about one colleague or another. Shares candid thoughts with anyone who’ll listen.