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Regularly swearing at work can help boost team spirit among staff, allowing them to express better their feelings as well as develop social relationships, according to a study by researchers.
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Regularly swearing at work can help boost team spirit among staff, allowing them to express better their feelings as well as develop social relationships, according to a study by researchers.
Yehuda Baruch, a professor of management at the University of East Anglia, and graduate Stuart Jenkins studied the use of profanity in the workplace and assessed its implications for managers.
They assessed that swearing would become more common as traditional taboos are broken down, but the key appeared to be knowing when such language was appropriate and when to turn to blind eye.
The pair said swearing in front of senior staff or customers should be seriously discouraged, but in other circumstances it helped foster solidarity among employees and express frustration, stress or other feelings.
Banning swear words and reprimanding staff might represent strong leadership, but could remove key links between staff and impact on morale and motivation, Baruch said.
"We hope that this study will serve not only to acknowledge the part that swearing plays in our work and our lives, but also to indicate that leaders sometimes need to 'think differently'.
"Managers need to understand how their staff feel about swearing. The challenge is to master the 'art' of knowing when to turn a blind eye to communication that does not meet their own standards."
The study, "Swearing at work and permissive leadership culture: when anti-social becomes social and incivility is acceptable", is published in the latest issue of the Leadership and Organisational Development Journal.
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(Agencies)
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一項研究表明，員工在工作中常說說粗話有助于促進團隊精神，因為這可以使他們更真實地表達情緒及建立社會關系。
東安格利亞大學的管理學教授耶胡達?巴魯克和研究生斯圖亞特?詹金斯共同研究了工作場合的“爆粗”現象，并就管理者應如何處理這一問題提出了建議。
研究人員發現，隨著一些傳統禁忌被打破，員工在工作中說粗話會越來越普遍。（而對于管理者來說，）關鍵是要分清員工何時講這樣的話是恰當的，以及在什么情況下可以“充耳不聞”。
兩位研究人員稱，應禁止員工在高級職員及客戶面前說粗話，但在其它情況下，說說粗話有利于促進員工之間的團結與合作，并有助于減輕壓力、發泄不滿或其它情緒。
巴魯克說，一些上司禁止員工說粗話或譴責員工說粗話，這可能會顯得他的領導能力很“強”，但這樣做可能會切斷員工之間的重要聯系，而且會打擊員工的士氣及工作積極性。
“我們希望這一研究不僅能讓人們認識到講粗話是我們工作及生活中的一部分，同時也要讓領導們意識到有時候需要‘換個角度看問題’。”
“管理者應該了解員工說粗話時的感受。領導們面臨的挑戰是知道何時對‘不符合標準’的話語充耳不聞，這也是他們需要掌握的一門‘藝術’。”
該項名為“員工爆粗及領導藝術：當爆粗被接受及能帶來社會效應時”的研究在《領導藝術及組織發展期刊》最新一期上公布。
（英語點津姍姍編輯）
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