ARMY INSTITUTE OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

[ARMY IBA]

TERM PAPER ON
How To Deal With Rumours on The Grapevine in
Corporate World of Bangladesh

Submitted by: Md Raisul Islam Rizvi

ID No: M1020007
Business Communication (BUS 5101)
Submitted to: Major Tariqul Islam Mazumder psc. G
(retd)
Head of HR
Date of Submission: 07/12/2020
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 ABSTRACT

Inevitable state for the advancement of any organization is their fetch of leading their staff.
Grapevine is the most fruitful task in the hands of the guiding authorities with which they
can have principle hand over their employees without having a sardonic figure. Grapevine is
that temper of expression which pull the community away from the unseen frame of draft
and law. It take steps an substitute path of contrary fact without similar the exhausting path
which involves regular sentiment. The paper sum up the deal with rumours on the
grapevine in the corporate world of Bangladesh and its impression at every respective aim.
The restriction or drawbacks of grapevine is also taken into a swift turn up.
Hints: Grapevine, communication, organization, attitude.

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 INTRODUCTION
Introduction
1. Communication is the axis of any embody firm. It is expression that assume a short group
of people to handle thousands of people and that too practically. The mode and form of
communication vary from person to person and place to place. The way in which we convey
with our leaders differs purely with the way we do with our follower. Mostly their persuade
a ritual communication between a person at a superior authority and at a subordinate
surname. But the continuity is just converse while in case of people at the same appellation.
So here appear the need of identify the term Grapevine. “Grapevine communication is
defined as unstructured and Informal network formed on social relationship rather than
organizational charts or job descriptions. It is actually an informal vehicle through which
message flows throughout the organization.”
2. Grapevine is a way through which the original communication between diverse forces of
the organization turn up and set out the aimed payoff. Since it is unstructured and not
under complete control of management, it step via the organization in every channel .
3.It moves upwards, downward, and diagonally, within and without chains of command,
between workers and leaders, and even with and without a company. It gives out an idea
that grapevine is not a form of communication which follows structural path. It footstep in
all the direction that is up, down and even diagonally.

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AIM
Aim
4. Aim for this paper is to describe the informal communication benefit in corporate world
of Bangladesh as well as effects of grapevine in corporate world and how to control negative
impact of informal way of communication.

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SCOPE
Scope of the study
5. Origin of informal way of communication

Negative impact of Grapevine

Outcomes of informal communication
Parties involves in spreading rumours
Grapevine causes and effects in corporate world

Conditional Influencers: When and where communication happens

6. Grapevine arises from social interaction, it is as fickle dynamic and varied as people are. It
is the exercise of their freedom of speech and is a natural activity. It is the inevitable part of
business life. American Management Association estimating that fully 70% of all
organizational communication emanates through the grapevine, Grapevine communication
based on the spoken word such as the ‘water cooler talks'
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7. The main hazard of grapevine communication in the workplace is that much of the
information that gets spread through the grapevine is not confirmed. Repeatedly such
information is complex, if not impossible, to track. When communication via formal and
informal channels is not consistent, employees may loose trust in their employers and
leaders. When talking about informal means of communication that is not documented,
employees often hear or remember only parts of the messages which often results in the
spread of non-reliable, false information. Misinformation in the workplace, information
overload, maintaining secrecy In grapevine communication, communication is made by
open discussions.
Contextual Influencers: What is communicated
8. No way to sort out or stop grapevine communication in the workplace. However,
there are ways to better understand it, control it, and eliminate the negative sides
grapevine. best way to prevent or reduce grapevine communication is to always
provide credible and easily approachable creation of important information. As the
communication ecosystem in the workplace has become extremely complex,
companies are struggling to streamline the information flow in their workplaces.
9. Result in, employees often feel confused, left out, they miss out on important
information, and they are less productive while wasting their time looking for the
information they need, putting relevant and important information at their employees’
fingertips. As mentioned earlier, trust in the workplace has a big
impact on employees' motivation, engagement and, consequently, their productivity
and success The study also showed that when leadership and grapevine messages
were conflicting, 47% of people will believe the grapevine, 42% will believe senior
management and the remaining 11% are undecided.

Conceptual Influencers: Why communication occurs

10. Sometimes, it can be extremely hard to filter through that information and
consume only the content that comes from credible sources. In this information
chaos, grapevine communication will happen no matter what. Therefore, it is the
employer's duty and responsibility to share the most relevant information from
credible sources with the employees. This, however, is not an easy job at all.
11. Hierarchical companies with closed company cultures are much more likely to
experience the negative sides of grapevine communications. Within such
organizations, employees don’t feel like they are free to share their voice, raise
questions and talk about their needs and concerns. build a company culture of
honest and open communication where employees feel safe to speak up, a culture
where two-way communication comes before one-way communication. If you have
an internal communications solution that tracks likes, shares, and other engagement
metrics, it can be pretty simple to spot and identify those internal influencers.
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Control Mutuality:
12. Using various formal communications channels has made communication in the
workplace very complex, resulting in more conversations via grapevine
communication than via formal communication channels. When employees are
unable to find the information they need to do their jobs successfully, or when they
feel like they are left out of the important company updates and conversations, the
natural thing to happen is for them to turn to their peers sitting next them.
13. Modern employee communication solutions enable organizations to connect all
the communication channels into a single platform within which they are sure to
reach every employee with the relevant content that they will actually consume.
Employers are the ones who should, with the right set of tools, technology and the
right internal communications strategy in place, create healthier working
environments that support open, honest and transparent employee communications.
Inform your employees in a timely manner .Enhance two-way communication in the
workplace. Successfully share critical and urgent information with your employees in
times of a crisis.
Employee-Organization Communication
14. Engage your employees with your content
Personal conversation and gossip: Unofficial discussion, Spontaneous advice and
suggestion, Facial expression, Body movement, Silence, etc. Informal
communication, being unofficial and personal, promotes a social relationship among
the participants, flow of information is fast and is suitable for emergencies, new
ideas, suggestions, opinions may come out through such communication as people
can express their feelings without fear. It can create an atmosphere congenial for
work as the relationship between the managers and the employees improves.
Inaccurate, incomplete and half true information’s are spread through informal
communication as everybody interprets it in his/her own way;
Feature of Grapevine
15. Huge Influence: A large number of employees in an organization depends on the
grapevine because they consider this as the primary source of information as well as
the reliable channel to communicate about the facts and events within the firm.
Comprehensive: Grapevine links the whole organization very quickly. From top to
bottom of an organization, nobody is left from the touch of grapevine. That's why
sometimes grapevine communication is considered very effective communication.
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Elasticity: It is more flexible than formal channels because formal channels require
various formalities whereas grapevine is free from those formalities. Gossiping,
sharing moments or conversation are enough to create a grapevine.
Swiftness: Information moves very quickly through the grapevine. Grapevine runs
faster than the wind.
Alteration: Information spreading through grapevine is like to be distorted as it
moves point to point, terminal to terminal or person to person. e.g. Mr. X got
married recently such information can be distorted as Mr. X got married outside of
his country two years ago.
Oral Way: Grapevine uses oral techniques more rather than written or non-verbal
techniques. As oral communication involves less time, grapevine is likely to be
Kinds of Grapevine :
16. Single Strand Chain -Single Strand Chains are those which follow single chain
transmission. For example, A tells to B, who tells it to C & so on. The longer the
strand, the more is the distortion and filtering effects. For example, if any employee
is at the verge to be declared as the new team leader, then this message travels in a
single chain.
17.Gossip chains– Gossip chains are those in which Group of people gather up to
discuss matters of mutual interest. These chains are generally considered to be slow
in passing the information. For example, a message of ‘not-on-job’ is passed through
this type of chain.
18. Probability Chain- probability chains are those chains in which information may
move from anybody to anybody. It is found when information is somewhat
interesting but not really significant. And in this chain it is observed that only some
people in the organization get to know the information.
19. Cluster Chain – in this type of chain, people tell something to a few selected
individuals and then some of these individuals tell some other selected individuals.

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It is observed that individual communicates with only those individuals he/she
trusts. Most of the informal messages flow through this chain.

Exercise of Grapevine
20. The use of grapevine varies from place to place and from person to person. At an
organizational level, the use of grapevine varies from level to level and from name to
name. For example the type of conversation at the worker level is entirely different
from the type of conversation at the manager level. Some of the cases of the use of
grapevine are: At the higher post-In an organization, there always exist certain facts
that are officially not meant for the employees at lower level. These confidential facts
are leaked by certain intermediate employees by the channel of grapevine. For
example, suppose the profit amount of a company is known. Rumours is spread that
this much profit is there and on that basis bonus is declared. At an intermediate
level-At this level, the use of grapevine differ from that at the high level. Here
grapevine serves as a channel to travel personal information of the employees. For
example, the chances of promotion, any attempted fraud, some personal affairs etc.
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Advantage of Grapevine
21. Spreads Rapidly-Being a channel free from documentation and hierarchal barriers,
grapevine serves as the fastest medium of exchanging thoughts and information within and
outside an organization. Feedback is Quick-Every action has an equal and opposite reaction,,
and in the case of grapevine it is quick too. The feedback of the rumour reaches in no time
back to the person from where the rumour originated. Group Cohesiveness– Gossips, which
is a form of grapevine often becomes the main reason for bringing people closer and making
them friendly. Gossip increases interaction between the employees which directly increases
workability of any organization Signals that Problems/Good news exist-One of the most
important benefit of grapevine communication is that it keeps the employees updated. Any
news, good or bad reaches everyone and allows them to respond according to it. Substitute
for formal channel of communication-As we all know that formal communication is time
consuming as it is full of formalities.
Drawbacks of Grapevine
22. The grapevine is not faithful always as it doesn’t follow formal path of
communication and is spread more by gossips and unconfirmed report. The
information is untrue most of the times as quite often the rumours are made just to
pretend that any individual is full of information about any particular firm. Being a
form of oral communication. Only a part of the information is transmitted which
keeps on reducing with the advancement of chain. It hampers the goodwill of the
organization or any particular individual.
Peer-To-Peer Communication
23. In most cases it is pathological and full of feeling which can change its meaning,
no one can be held responsible as it is not possible to find out the supplier of wrong
information in the case on an enquiry, it is not reliable. The managers cannot depend
upon such information as it does not follow any norm and is too loose a system. No
decision can be taken depending upon such communication. It spreads rumours and
endangers consolidation and unity of the organisation. It creates conflicts between
groups by spreading rumours against them and reducing their mental strength. The
managers should keep a watchful eye on the leaders who spread rumours and keep
them well-informed about the actual situation. The managers should
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Recommendation

24. The Recommendations are as follows:

• Since grapevine activity increases during times of uncertainty, management

must provide information through formal system of communication about key
issues & events that affect employees.
• Management should supply employees with steady flow of accurate, timely
information; so to minimize the potential damage caused by the grapevine.
• The grapevine can be controlled with prompt, clear & accurate information on
the issues important to the employees.
• Direct memos, large group announcements & intercom systems should be
used.
• A company can appoint expert persons in the HR Department to listen to the
grievances of the employees on prompt basis before the rumour mill gets
momentum.
• The top management should try to gather all the possible information or
rather facts regarding the rumours.
• If there is an external rumour, it is generally left to journalists, reporters or
media. At such situations, the company should prepare a formal response
depending upon the situation.

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Conclusion

25. Dealing practically with the grapevine is a challenge that will always be a part of a
leaders job. Those who are able to understand the power of the grapevine will be
better prepared to utilize it to provide stability & authenticity in the work
environment. Thus, office grapevine is a part & parcel of any organization. The only
thing is the skill of a manager who utilizes this informal type of communication for
achieving the organizational goals. The grapevine communication among the
employees and employers cannot be stopped even though the upper level of
management put an effort on it. Communication is after all, a natural human activity.
There are several ways on how to deal with grapevine communication and next it can
be used as a medium channel between the employer and employee in the
organization. The organization should not eliminate the grapevine communication
because it can help the employees in doing their work.

Reference
www.linkedin.com
www.Wikipedia.com
www.smallbusiness.chron.com

Kumar S (2013) Grapevine Communication (Informal Business Communication)

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