We all get distracted form our work now and again, chatting about last night’s soaps or our plans for the weekend. But what do we like to chat about and are some people more prone to gossiping than others?
Mars Drinks Office Connections conducted a study of 2,000 employees gossiping habits at work. They found that 34 per cent of office workers have discussed private matters with a colleague, but staff members in a Human Resources (HR) role were more likely to divulge private matters than any other department.
Topics that were popular amongst gossipers were family, relationships, celebrities, television programmes, the weather, money, and health matters. On average people spend 29 minutes a day chatting about non-work related issues, whether it is in person, via email or over the telephone.
The study also revealed that although people could simply sit at their desk and have the choice to ring or email a colleague to chat, one in six people still preferred a face-to-face chat.
“While emails, phone calls and even social media are certainly common ways for people to communicate with each other in the office, it’s encouraging to see that staff are taking the time to step away from their desks and engage with their colleagues in a more personal way.
“Not only is this great for nurturing working relationships, but it can also help make us more productive and create a much more positive and happy office environment,” Jenni Morgan, Trade Marketing Manager for the researchers said.
What is acceptable when sending emails around the office? 75 per cent of those surveyed thought that emotions, such as smiley faces were acceptable to include in emails. Whilst 54 per cent believe that including kisses at the end of a work related email was also okay. But using words like babe, love and pet were deemed unacceptable by 75 per cent of respondents.
Do you spend around 29 minutes a day gossiping in the office? Do you prefer to chat face-to-face or do you prefer to email so you can add smiley faces and kisses to the end?
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