Through the grape vine

Organizations thrive based on personal connections; you want to get Rob your buddy in IT to do something or wait in the queue for days. You need to get the purchase order cleared for a vendor sooner than usual call Jane in finance. Organizations where informal channels are clearer with fewer hurdles strewn around than the formal ones are often more efficient and productive. An organizational culture of informal channels needs a people who know each other well and over long periods of time, additionally the structures need the support from appropriate reward systems for establishing and fostering such networks.

It’s not without risks for informal communication channels. It gets rough when the grape vine starts to evolve into the official channel. By our very nature we develop compensating behaviors to make life easy and grape vines can be funny. Communication is a complicated process particularly because we say what we mean but interpret it based on our background. I have always believed that communication through the grape vine is analogous to translating a proverb through an automated language translator into another language and then taking the translation and translating it back into the original language.

http://translate.google.com/
Where there is a will there is a way
donde hay voluntad de a hay una manera

donde hay voluntad de a hay una manera
where there is will of a is a way