He doesn't really cite or give evidence of any American research about profanity in the work place. The first link is to an interview with "Vistage speaker, Cra

He doesn't really cite or give evidence of any American research about profanity in the work place. The first link is to an interview with "Vistage speaker, Craig Weber" which credits authorship to Vistage and Weber consulting. It's an opinion piece. The second link is to a study that consisted of surveying 30 men and 30 women about the efficacy of speeches given to basketball teams by a coach. The speeches were fictional and some included profanity and some did not. Apparently the 30 men had a tendency to rate the speeches with profanity (if they thought the audience was women) as less effective. That's it. It had nothing to do with the workplace or the language used by employees or even team mates. It's primary focus and a lot of the research that study cites has to do with gender roles and profanity. Not really anything to do with what role profanity plays in the work place. It does cite a Dutch study that found profanity makes witnesses more believable in legal proceedings. But again - not really anything about the work place. The English research is a single paper that used case studies. I'm not paying to find out the details but the fact that their press release for the study says, "Prof Baruch said their aim was to challenge leadership styles and suggest ideas for best practice." makes me wonder about the value. That, to me, sounds like they went into the study with a desired outcome. I'm sympathetic with the article from a common sense approach but I think that dressing any of it up as being based on science is a bit of a reach.