How to trigger an epidemic of good – the power of positive gossip
Last week when chatting with a customer who’s had tremendous success in accelerating adoption of ECM across her organization, she said something that really captured my attention. “We start all our meetings with positive gossip.” In other words, they start each meeting by sharing anecdotes and stories of what’s working.
The key was that the anecdotes & stories were positive.
Why does positive gossip matter? According to Tribal Leadership “Your organization shifts in the direction of the stories within it. If the stories are negative or about the problems, it shifts to the negative. If the stories are positive and about solutions, it shifts to the positive.”
In other words, when the gossip, stories, and anecdotes circulating are all about “life sucks” our mood, the mood of the team, and the mood of the corporate culture becomes one where “life sucks.”
Another way to think of positive gossip is that it’s about finding and sharing stories about the bright spots. The bright-spot philosophy outlined by Dan & Chip Health in Switch asks “What’s working, and how can we do more of it?” In the real world, we hardly ever ask this question. Instead, we focus on “What’s broken, and how do we fix it”?
This ties into recent research showing that our brains are fundamentally social and that emotions are contagious. Language and emotion can, in fact, trigger epidemics.
An example of a city wide epidemic of good was the I Love NY campaign described in the Chief Culture Officer. The campaign was launched to encourage tourism and raise the spirits of New Yorkers in the days when NY looked to people like a city in “irreversible decline.” It made people reassess the world and the assumptions with which they understand it.
Maybe it’s time to look at a new approach to change.
One that starts with spreading positive gossip.
One that looks for the bright spots.
One that can trigger an epidemic of good.
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5 Responses to “How to trigger an epidemic of good – the power of positive gossip”
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Interesting! I’m sure that approach must help – I’m also guessing it can be quite difficult to do in some cultures.
(I’m reminded of my own approach when in a less-than-perfect job: I decided to ditch my day-by-day Dilbert calendar because it always put me in a clightly cynical mood…)
A great read for first thing in the morning before my back to back meetings.
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Gossip for good? A sentiment I can get behind! I do listen more attentively to a personality driven presentation.
Thanks Joyce for sharing our “positive gossip” approach. Our previous general manager began doing it and although, yes it has sometimes taken a little more effort to find the good, it really has had a positive, uplifting impact at our company – not just with our Livelink user adoption – and even though the affect was sometimes short-lived. Let’s face it – there is always something good to be found/said. The positive gossip about Livelink makes the entire Livelink program team smile.
Hi Monique,
Thanks for the comment! How else did you use positive gossip? Any chance you could share a few examples of positive gossip from your experience?
Joyce