As the women on Whisper say, and American Apparel’s Dov Charney proves, sexual harassment is alive and flourishing.

I mention that in case you are from off-planet.

But sexual harassment comes in another package; one that’s strictly hands-off.

It’s called gossip.

Because gossip usually revolves around looks, shape, weight and body characteristics, along with who someone is seeing and what they are doing.

Discussion of any of these subjects in the workplace will create a hostile environment.

Hostile environments lower worker focus, engagement and productivity.

Which many bosses don’t seem too concerned about, since they are often active/passive gossip participants.

They would care more if they had the ability to understand cause and effect, which seems to be a disappearing brain function (but that’s another post).

So in the name of better workplaces I’ll spell it out in easily understandable terms.

Gossip contributes to hostile, as well as just plain crappy, work environments.

Bosses who participate, facilitate or benignly neglect gossip will see the effect in employee turnover.

They will feel the effect in their own lowered compensation.

And they definitely deserve both.

Flickr image credit: John Haslam 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 29th, 2014 at 1:15 am and is filed under Culture, Ducks In A Row. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Tags: consequences, diversity, engaged employees, management approach, sex at work, women
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