Confidential Gossip and Organization Studies

Ziyun Fan,Christopher Grey,Dan Kärreman

doi:10.1177/0170840620954016

Ziyun Fan, Christopher Grey + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840620954016

Copy DOI

Abstract

This essay sets out the case for regarding confidential gossip as a significant concept in the study of organizations. It develops the more general concept of gossip by combining it with concepts of organizational secrecy in order to propose confidential gossip as a distinctive communicative practice. As a communicative practice, it is to be understood as playing a particular role within the communicative constitution of organizations. That particularity arises from the special nature of any communication regarded as secret, which includes the fact that such communication is liable to be regarded as containing the ‘real truth’ or ‘insider knowledge’. Thus it may be regarded as more than ‘just gossip’ and also as more significant than formal communication. This role is explored, as well as the methodological and ethical challenges of studying confidential gossip empirically.

Highlights

In everyday organizational life people informally tell, are told, or ask for all kinds of information
We suggest that since confidential gossip, like gossip in general, is a form of communication in organizations, the way to understand its significance is by engagement with the idea that communication is constitutive of organizations, known as the communicative constitution of organizations (CCO) perspective (e.g. Ashcraft, Kuhn, & Cooren, 2009; Schoeneborn, Kuhn, & Kärreman, 2019)
We develop the argument that confidential gossip is important for organizations and their study because of its particular role within the communicative constitution of organizations

Summary

Introduction

In everyday organizational life people informally tell, are told, or ask for all kinds of information. Keywords communicative constitution of organizations (CCO), confidential gossip, ethics, gossip, secrecy We suggest that since confidential gossip, like gossip in general, is a form of communication in organizations, the way to understand its significance is by engagement with the idea that communication is constitutive of organizations, known as the CCO perspective (e.g. Ashcraft, Kuhn, & Cooren, 2009; Schoeneborn, Kuhn, & Kärreman, 2019).

Results

Conclusion