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[runeman]

Teachers worst for telling tales, says survey


Debbie Andalo
Thursday May 3, 2007
EducationGuardian.co.uk


Teachers are the worst gossips in the workplace, according to the results of a survey published today.
Some 79% of teachers admit that they have talked about a colleague behind their back - a statistic that puts them top of a poll of 10 professions who gossip the most about their workmates.

Teachers find the need to gossip irresistible, according to the results of the survey.

Nearly a third of those questioned admitted that they gossip about a colleague every week.

Criticising a colleague's performance at work was the most popular topic of gossip amongst teachers, even though 42% of them revealed that they had been at the receiving end of "pettiness and politics" at work.

The results of the survey found teachers top of the gossips ahead of financial services professionals.

People who work in the catering industry were in third place, while emergency service professionals were the least likely of those surveyed to gossip at work.

The survey conclusions were based on the results of online research of 2,000 employees carried out on behalf of events company ICBI, which is organising November's Leaders in London Summit 2007, a conference on business leadership.

The managing director of the conference, Ros Oxley, said: "People tend to pull together, watch each other's backs and operate less fractiously in occupations where there is a common goal and where team work is important, for example in the emergency services.

"In other arenas where individual achievement is key and opportunities for promotion are heavily competed for, people are more inclined to use each other to lever themselves towards the top."

[justme]

Here's an interesting article on the social function of gossip, and how mobile phone messages are playing an increasing role in this...

http://www.sirc.org/publik/gossip.shtml

[dmb]

Before EFL I worked very briefly in the Inland revenue. B*tching there was definitely much more common.... however as I've been management for most of the last decade maybe the b@tching is about me and behind my back. Actually you should here Baba and entrailicus down the pub after a few babychams. We are talking

[tvik]

the only thing worse than being talked about, is not being talked about.