MANAGEMENT
Rumour is a pipe, blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures, (Shakespeare- Henry IV).
Backbiting is the edifice upon which is built, all gossip. It there are no hearer’s there can be no back biting. So the back biters being dependent on others to spread the fire and venom of gossip have as their motto of the gossiper’s club, ‘…. Romans lend me your ears’. No gossiper, would admit, knowledge of the potential of an adequate reaction to gossip. What chatters to you, will sooner than expected, chat about you.
Gossipers, sneak into every nook, corner and corridor of the organisation, snooping for information. And to my personal amazement such a lot has a great ‘sense of smell’ they know exactly what is cooking, where in the organisation. Like the emergency services of say, fire brigade or ambulance, they reach the site where the smoke is perceived, in no time, and his is without even dialling corporate 999 services!
Those who engage and indulge in gossiping are mostly opportunists. Their job is to spread information, within the rank and file. The information, so cascaded vertically, horizontally, and diagonally across; the established hierarchy is mostly untrue, but on occasions it can actually be correct and forthright information. Regardless of the nature of the information in terms of its truthfulness and veracity, the intentions to transmit are never noble!
The gossipers group, essentially is a confluence of the deceitful, the negatively likeminded and the corporate vultures. The group’s formation is invariably, informal. They have no registered office or a definite geographic space allotted within the precincts of the organisation. They in today’s IT parlance, have existence in ‘cloud’. This group cunningly cuts across geographic limitations. Having worked in a multinational financial institution, I say with complete authority, that gossip is freely traded across defined national boundaries too. Not just local corporates, but also the MNC’s are guilty of promoting a culture of rumour mongering and gossips, the society of gossipers, have objectives too. Similar to corporate objectives which must have complete buy-in of all staff for its successful accomplishment, so also, this society has common and shared objectives. The group includes individuals who are broadcasters and have specialisation in creating sensationalism.
The common lunch room or the exclusive executive dining lounge are the most preferred spots to do both acquire and spread, true or false news. An unaided question like, “so what’s new? Hey any breaking news for today? Or, so what’s the grapevine saying these days?” are all lead-on to betray possession of any confidential information. To do a ‘corporate leak’ (potentially as serious as the Panama leaks) a supervisor can prompt slowly baked information. Such act is done to gauge any new action service or product would evoke. The ‘leak’ is put on the burner to simmer. Some supervisors, innocently claim, ‘I am not part of any grapevine (while in reality the person could be the CEO of the Rumour Factory), so, pray tell me what is agitating colleagues these days?’
The gossip can relate to the trivia and the important. As a regular part of their unalterable agenda, this society of gossipers would keep a very close tab on transfers, postings, increments, compensation packages and promotions.
Not all are invited to become members of this association or society of gossipers; only a select few gain entry. The membership to this association; is acquired through hard fight. The candidate is properly and fully scrutinised, firstly to protect against the ‘et tu brutus’ category and secondly the candidates have to satisfy that they meet all the skills and credibility criteria to be active members. It is only upon assurance of certain minimum traits and characteristics like, must have a keen eye and ear (in fact very keen); their signal picking antennas must be found fully functional. All members have to excel in the art and science of ‘eaves dropping’. Since the group has no legal recognition, it remains informal and therefore has ‘informally’ elected office bearers with no statutory limitations on the tenor of holding the office- in fact the more backbiting and spreading venom done is a great justification for life-time, presidency.
I had a senior colleague who in his quest for information would quietly go behind the managers’ chair and open the filing cabinets to indicate as if he was searching some file but actually his sole objective used to be to get something ‘new’ from the manager. He did so with confidence and impunity.
There is a class of gossipers who indulge into it with a very innocent face. They are ‘pretenders’. Gossipers effectively divide the institution and create dissension. They love to ring corporate alarm bells with the singular objective of ensuring that uncertainty becomes popular. These are mostly cynics who can never see anything positive in people or processes.
Gossiping and lying go together. They are inseparable. Common fame is seldom to blame. ‘They say so….’ is a half lie. Those who develop the habit of continuously speaking ill of others would find that in doing so they burn their own tongues.
Whispering is all about lying. Gossipers speak lavishly. They never economise their speech. They in fact use gossip to make their pygmy bosses look like the giant in the ‘Jack and the Bean stalk’, cartoon and comics. The group has room for specialists like the one who can with speed read the memo’s or letters lying on the manager’s table.
A whisper in the ear of a man is often heard a hundred miles away. No gossipers accept this as a matter of absolute truth.
Another colleague who to my astonished amusement would walk across to my table and while settling comfortably, his heaviness, would start to fiddle with the papers on my desk; in fact, he would ‘read’ them; out of sheer modesty and loads of shyness I could never stop him from this uncouth behaviour. I am certain he used to be looking for leads. Three may help keep a secret only if the two of them are dead. Gossip needs no vehicle to travel, it is mostly self-propelling machine.
As against a falsely held view that the female gender indulges in gossip, rumour and backbiting and do so more than men; I unashamedly admit that men are worse at it; they are more indulgently involved in this corporate sin. Women gossip on petty issues of ‘affairs’, extra marital relations and how ugly other women are (call it innocent gossip) while men are deadly in their gossip objectives- their intent could range from making a career or completely destroying it.
Gossip can lead towards establishment of clandestine power groups who lobby for their own selves and also in extreme situations, they self-destruct themselves. Gossipers have a common language; they use it to make admission to the club and to gain the confidence of the members of the ‘gossip grapevine’ tavern. If the Nile knows the heart, the desert would know of it in no time.
Gossip is the corporate weapon that is freely used by the learned and civilised men.
The writer is a senior banker and freelance columnist