Rethinking gossip and scandal in healthcare organizations

Area of Science:

• Organizational Communication
• Healthcare Management
• Knowledge Management

Background:

• Gossip is commonly viewed as negative workplace talk.
• Mainstream management often discourages gossip, overlooking its potential benefits.
• Healthcare organizations face challenges with systemic failures and poor practices.

Purpose of the Study:

• To re-frame gossip as a neglected aspect of organizational communication and knowledge.
• To highlight gossip as an under-utilized management resource in healthcare.
• To challenge prevailing negative assumptions about workplace gossip.

Main Methods:

• Conceptual paper challenging mainstream managerial assumptions.
• Re-framing gossip from an individual behavior to an organizational phenomenon.
• Analyzing gossip's role in surfacing relational knowledge about systemic issues.

Main Results:

• Organizational gossip serves as a valuable early warning indicator of risk and failure in healthcare systems.
• Gossip, when attended to, provides insights into professional practice, decision-making, and leadership.
• Re-framing gossip reveals systemic failures and poor practices within healthcare.

Conclusions:

• Gossip is a significant, yet under-used, resource for improving healthcare communication and knowledge.
• Acknowledging and analyzing organizational gossip can enhance patient safety.
• Challenging negative perceptions of gossip offers new strategies for healthcare management and leadership.