An Employee Who Engages in Harmful Gossip (Managing Essentials™ Series)

New Just-In-Time Performance Management Tool! You have an employee who engages in harmful gossip on the job. What do you do? There are four steps you can take to help the situation while clearly setting organizational expectations.

State the problem using specific examples of how and why this kind of behavior is harmful. Ask the employee to give their viewpoint and listen. Get agreement that problems have resulted from the gossip. Tell the employee clearly that you expect no more negative comments or gossip about others. This includes innuendoes either spoken or inferred by a facial expression, body language, or tone of voice. Then get a commitment that the behavior will stop.