Grapevine is an informal channel of business communication.
It is called so because it stretches throughout the organization in all directions irrespective of the authority levels. Despite existence of formal channels in an organization, the informal channels tend to develop when he interacts with other people in organization. Grapevine generally develops due to various reasons. One of them is that when an organization is facing recession, the employees sense uncertainty. Also, at times employees do not have self-confidence due to which they form unions. Sometimes the managers show preferential treatment and favour some employees giving a segregated feeling to other employees. Thus, when employees sense a need to exchange their views, they go for grapevine network as they cannot use the formal channel of communication in that case.
Advantages of Grapevine Communication
1. Grapevine channels carry information rapidly. As soon as an employee gets to know some confidential information, he becomes inquisitive and passes the details then to his closest friend who in turn passes it to other. Thus, it spreads hastily. The managers get to know the reactions of their subordinates on their policies. Thus, the feedback obtained is quick compared to formal channel of communication.
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Disadvantages of Grapevine Communication
1. 2. The grapevine carries partial information at times as it is more based on rumours. Thus, it does not clearly depicts the complete state of affairs. The grapevine is not trustworthy always as it does not follows official path of communication and is spread more by gossips and unconfirmed report.