On March 8, Jack Hirschfeld commented that, "the gossip mill is often the
only venue in organizations for genuine dialogue, which is then
contaminated by the gossip and the habits of gossip."
Bill Weber's response talks rightly about the problem of gossip that it
generally focusses on an absent third party, setting up a Drama Triangle.
I would add that the 'ground rules' of gossip encourage participants to
create and reinforce generalizations, to form negative attributions about
those generalizations, and to position absent third parties within them.
They also discourage participants from testing the generalizations and
assumptions of the speaker.
I pose this question to the list: Which is more similar -- gossip and
dialogue or team meetings and dialogue? Why?
Marilyn Darling
mdarling@warren.med.harvard.edu