Michael was worried. Rumors that the current quarter would be even more difficult were spreading so rapidly that he couldn't see any way to deal with them. He turned to face Lou. "Unless we come up with a plausible story, we'll start to lose people in a couple of weeks."
The common metaphors
about rumors are misleading"It has to be more than just a plausible story," Lou replied. "It has to be true. If it isn't true, our credibility will be shot."
Lou is pointing out the First Rule of Rumor Management: Credibility Is Your Most Powerful Tool. If even one of your rumor-squelching stories proves wrong, squelching the next rumor becomes much more difficult.
Two common metaphors for rumor generation and propagation are the "rumor mill" and the "grapevine." Both are misleading.
- The rumor mill
-
The Boott Cotton Mills and Eastern Canal in the Lowell National Historical Park. Photo by Andrew Donovan courtesy the U.S. National Park Service.
- The grapevine
- This metaphor suggests that rumors propagate along a linear path. To listen to rumors, you just plug into the grapevine. The actual rumor propagation medium is a tightly connected network of personal relationships. Rumors propagate far more rapidly over this network than they would over any linear structure.
Cutting the grapevine or shutting down the rumor mill doesn't work, because there is no grapevine and there is no rumor mill. Rumors can pop up anywhere, and spread by hopping along personal relationships, fed mostly by anxiety and worry. Here are five strategies for managing organizational rumors.
- Credibility is your most powerful tool
- Credibility can't quell rumors or limit their formation. But it can launch the Truth. Be clear, be early, and be right.
- Repair your credibility when it gets tattered
- Repairing organizational credibility often requires replacing management or reorganizing responsibilities. If you choose neither, then publicly delegate responsibility to a new high-visibility subordinate of anyone you choose not to replace.
- Be judicious about openness
- Many believe that openness prevents rumors. While secrecy does stimulate rumors, openness limits them only if it reduces anxiety. Openness can even make things worse, if it adds to anxiety.
- Leave no voids
- When people worry, they make up what they don't know. When we say nothing about a topic people are worrying about, we leave a void to be filled by rumors.
- Anticipate anxiety
- If you know of a probable source of anxiety or worry, get out in front of it. Don't wait for rumors to form. Take mitigating actions early, and make those actions known.
Even if you do all this, remember that you're not in charge of what people worry about. People might still worry — it's their choice. They might not believe you, or they might not hear you. Listen for the rumors and use what you learn to adjust your actions. Top
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Related articles
More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:
A Message Is Only a Message
- When we receive messages of disapproval, we sometimes feel bad. And when we do, it can help to remember
that we have the freedom to decide whether or not to accept the messages we receive.
Problem Defining and Problem Solving
- Sometimes problem-solving sessions are difficult because we get started solving a problem before we
know what problem we're solving. Understanding the connection between stakeholders, problem solving,
and problem defining can reduce conflict and produce better solutions.
Why Don't They Believe Me?
- When we want people to believe us, and they don't, it just might be a result of our own actions or demeanor.
How does this happen?
Anticipating Absence: How
- Knowledge workers are professionals who "think for a living." When they suddenly become unavailable
because of the pandemic, we consider substituting someone else. But substitutes need much more than
skills and experience to succeed.
The Self-Explanation Effect
- In the learning context, self-explanation is the act of explaining to oneself what one is learning.
Self-explanation has been shown to increase the rate of acquiring mastery. The mystery is why we don't
structure knowledge work to exploit this phenomenon.
See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness and Effective Communication at Work for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
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And on April 5: The Fallacy of Division
- Errors of reasoning are pervasive in everyday thought in most organizations. One of the more common errors is called the Fallacy of Division, in which we assume that attributes of a class apply to all members of that class. It leads to ridiculous results. Available here and by RSS on April 5.
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