Psst….Positive Gossip

The Luton and Bedfordshire Senior Psychological Therapies team tested ‘positive gossip’ as part of their Enjoying Work project.  The team was feeling very stretched and wanted a creative way to support each other.

Two types of communication were included in the definition of ‘positive gossip’:

1. Saying something positive about somebody to someone else, e.g. about work someone did well
2. Passing that compliment back to the original person so they know others have been saying good things about what they did. For example:

The team says it has been amazingly positive for their morale and team bonding, and they are enjoying doing it for others outside their team now too.  For example, they gossiped about the trust comms team’s heroic efforts in Covid-19!

Through ideas like this and a going home checklist (examples here), the team saw a sustained improvement in their good day measure from average 55% to 89% having a good day, with 84% of the team completing the measure on average:

Figure: Chart of the good day measure for the Luton and Bedfordshire Senior Psychological Therapies team

You can see a video of them talking about their project here:

The team’s project poster is also available here >>

Thanks for an inspiring idea that we think is worth spreading! 😉