Gossip can prove costly

Keith McGregor and Andrew Scott-Howman

By JULIE MIDDLETON

An Auckland legal secretary, Bronwyn Sheerin, lost her job because she couldn't keep her mouth shut.

At the Shortland St chambers of law firm Jamieson Castles, she started a rumour late last year that partner Tony Tapsell was having an affair with another secretary.

Tapsell offered Sheerin his partner's phone number in an attempt to stem the flow, but she was unmoved.

Sheerin continued to spread the gossip herself and in email messages, despite the oral and written warnings that followed over the next few months.

Annoyed and out of patience, the company finally sacked Sheerin. The Employment Relations Authority rejected her claim of unjustifiable dismissal in March.

But here's the clincher, from adjudicator Dzintra King: "Even if there had been an affair - and I am satisfied there was not - her behaviour would have been inexcusable and totally unacceptable."

Translation: It doesn't matter whether the gossip you spread is accurate or not - truth is less important than conduct in a workplace setting. Persist in spreading something detrimental to company or colleague and risk the consequences.

That gossip should lead to a court case is extraordinary, Wellington lawyer Andrew Scott-Howman says, and he thinks it may be the first such case in New Zealand.

And this precedent gives bosses encouragement to clamp down on those who don't know the fine line between fluffy chat about, say, who's going where on holiday and derogatory, unsubstantiated rumours harmful to individuals and the business.

It appears that employers should be concerned. A recently released Australian study of 4500 people found that 38 per cent considered workplace gossip to be out of control.

Fifty per cent of those surveyed claimed to have been victims of false workplace gossip. Worse, 12 per cent of women said they had left their job as a result.

Of top-tier staff - CEOs and the like - 67 per cent reported that they had been the target of an untrue rumour.

Gossip was more likely to be a problem among younger staff in communications-oriented companies: 47 per cent of workers aged 25 to 34 said gossip was negatively affecting their office, and those in advertising, sales and marketing suffered most.

However, among the over-55s, just 17 per cent thought gossip was a problem.