If you've got two or more people working for you then you've got an informal network - a grapevine or a gossip corner, where people come together (physically or on-line) to have a nitter-natter.
"Have you heard ..........?" and "oooo they didn't, did they?" type conversations. This network has an entirely different chain of command, often with more junior people taking a leading role.
As the boss you're not part of it, but you're going to be one of the subjects of the discussion. There will be the gossip mongers who trade juicy snippets of real or imagined information, and those who just hang on to every word and push the stories along. The stories may well be embellished to make them yet more juicy. But gossip is life.
There's nothing you can do to curtail the activities of the informal network, and you shouldn't try. In my view it's a sign of a healthy organisation when people speculate, deliberate, commiserate, postulate and enumerate about your business. Because they care. They may moan, but that's what people do, even when they're satisfied.
"How was your day?"
"Not too bad under the circumstances!"
And that's a good day.
Don't try to influence your grapevine - let it be. If things get out of hand, then correct them publicly at the next town meeting, without attributing where they came from. But sit above the noise and let the nitter-natter chitter-chatter.
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