The impact of negative workplace gossip on frontline employees’ proactive service performance

We conducted two studies to explore the impact of negative workplace gossip on frontline employees’ proactive service performance and its mechanisms. Study 1 (N = 334) involved a multiwave survey and Study 2 (N = 205) comprised a situational experiment. The results showed that negative gossip had a significant negative impact on frontline employees’ proactive service performance. Emotional rumination and organizational trust played mediating roles in this relationship. We also found that proactive personality weakened the negative impact of workplace gossip on employees’ proactive service performance. This study expands research on the mechanisms of the impact of negative workplace gossip, and provides insights for managers, suggesting that the negative effects of workplace gossip can be reduced by building organizational trust or helping employees to break the cycle of negative emotions.