1/20/2024 0 Comments Office chitchat![]() ![]() Perhaps, rarely before have we thought about chit-chat functions in the academic environment. How do we define chit-chat? Chit-chat, much like small talk, has been viewed as phatic communication, which is free and aimless to connect socially rather than deliver content (Methot et al. Oh, how we now long for chit-chat by the department coffee pot or following a staff meeting. Chit-chat seems to be an occurrence of the past, a not much thought about lost (p)art of our work-life culture: It has become nearly extinct. While these seemingly insignificant, occasional, and spontaneous hallway encounters may have taken up a relatively small part of our days, the chit-chat in higher education has suddenly vanished, become elusive, and is nowhere to be found in the back-to-back Zoom or Teams meetings. Do you remember having these interactions with colleagues and students on our campuses? You may not, as these chit-chats often occurred before the pandemic forced most of us to work from home. Buffering broadband and clunky videocall technology make impossible the rapid creative exchanges between colleagues used to chatting round a table.Remember the “good ol’ days?” How often did you walk down a hallway of your academic unit and pass a student, faculty or staff member, or administrator and have a short conversation about the new course you were teaching, asked for advice about applying to graduate school, talked about the upcoming faculty-staff-student barbeque, or discussed a pending sporting event between rivals? We have all taken part in these chit-chats, whether distracting or welcoming. There is a reason, though, why companies are trying to replicate the experience of staff who normally work side by side. Whatever happens when the pandemic recedes, companies will operate mixed teams of remote and office or factory workers. Some successful communities observed in the latest study were entirely virtual. Many teams have discovered they function as well remotely as they used to in the workplace. Prof Dunbar’s number applies to online networks, not just primitive tribes or army battalions. What happens if face-to-face contact becomes harder is largely speculation. The trade-off, Prof Dunbar told me, is between “allowing flexibility at the coalface, which gives you your creativity, and having enough control of all these various units so they all pull in the same direction, rather than behaving chaotically”. Top-downers and bottom-uppers agree hierarchy emerges naturally, indeed becomes essential, when teams reach a certain size. The latest paper dovetails neatly with top-down theories about “span of control”, the ideal number of direct reports for any manager. ![]() (There was a “covert” management structure, though: smaller groups of men, who took all the decisions.) In another study, Prof Dunbar found traditional Hutterite farming communities, which still persist in North America, could expand their democratic, self-governing gatherings until they were 100 or 150-strong. When such networks reach roughly 40 members, though, they start to need more formal management and as they grow larger, their meetings become less frequent. Ms Webber, a coach and consultant, says on her blog that smaller communities create camaraderie, “add to a positive experience in the workplace” and, anecdotally, seem to have “a positive effect on recruitment and retention”. These are the groups of shared interest that often spring - or sprang - from water-cooler chit-chat. In a new peer-reviewed paper, Prof Dunbar teams up with Emily Webber to show that the same age-old hunter-gatherer structures apply to professional “communities of practice”. ![]()
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