The Dangers of Workplace Gossip

Work is a social environment. It’s very important to maintain good relationships with your coworkers, to be friendly, and to engage them in conversation. But work can also be a hotbed of drama. Conversations can easily turn to gossip, and that is a dangerous place to go.

How do you know the difference between harmless conversation and gossip? Simple: Consider the impact of what is being said.

• Does it cast negative aspersions?
• Does it create rifts?
• Does it exult in the misfortune of others?
• Does it have a negative emotional charge?
• Does it serve to perpetuate conflict or negativity?
• Is it hurtful or damaging?
• Would you say it in front of the person you’re talking about?

Technically, any sharing of trivial or unsubstantiated information can be considered gossip. But you have to consider the sentiment. For example, if it were rumored that a coworker is being promoted, and you discuss it with another coworker, is that gossip?

Well, if the discussion is hurtful, damaging, or negative, then yes, it's gossip. If the story is told with negativity and without good will, then it's gossip. Light conversation is value neutral, while gossip is negative, inflammatory, and/or embarrassing to the person being spoken of.

How gossip hurts

Gossip can increase conflict and decrease morale. It results in strained relationships. It breaks down the trust level within groups. Gossip is the death of teamwork, as the group breaks up into small cliques, and employees start refusing to work with others.

Offices are rife with gossip, but that doesn't make it ok.

Gossip results in the supervisor spending an enormous amount of time trying to figure out who said what to whom. Or, worse, the supervisor struggles to explain to the manager that the on-going conflicts and communication problems within the workgroup are the reason work doesn't get done. Productivity is lost, as are good employees who do not want to work in toxic environments.

Breaking the gossip cycle

Here’s how to get out of the gossip pipeline:

1. Be busy. Gossipmongers want attention. If you're preoccupied with your work, you can't be available to listen to their latest story.

2. Don’t participate. Walk away from the story. Don’t give visual clues that you are interested in listening. If someone passes a juicy story on to you, don't pass it any further. Take personal responsibility to act with integrity.

3. Turn it around by saying something positive. It isn't nearly as much fun to spread negative news if it's spoiled by a complimentary phrase about the person being attacked.

4. Avoid the gossiper. If you notice one person who consistently makes trouble, take the necessary actions to have as little interaction with that person as possible. Avoid him.

5. Keep your private life private. Don't share personal information with coworkers. Remember, it's a two-way street: if they are gossiping about others, they will gossip about you, too. Don't give them ammunition.

Don't give office gossips any attention or ammunition.

6. Choose your friends wisely at work. You spend a good deal of time at work so it's natural for friendships to develop. Share information sparingly until you are sure that you have built up a level of trust.

7. Be direct. If you confront the gossiper and confidently tell him or her that such behavior is making it uncomfortable for you and other coworkers, it's likely to stop.

8. Don't be afraid to go to a superior. Gossiping wastes a lot of company time and hurts morale. A company interested in a healthy work environment will value the opportunity to correct this type of situation.

If you are the target of gossip, learn to let it go.

Now, if you are the target of gossip you have two choices. You can confront the source or make a public statement. Thankfully, gossip has a very short life span. Sometimes, the best thing to do is let it run its (hopefully) short course. Creating a stink sometimes causes more drama than just letting it go.

Put simply: Don’t be a gossip and don’t listen to gossip. Work smart. Keep your focus on the positive and don’t engage.

~

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Coworkers from hell! How to deal with bad apples, gossips, jerks, and other difficult colleagues

The Saboteur. The Demeanor. The Bad Apple. The Gossip. These aren’t costumed Halloween characters; they’re the people you work with.

And they’re not alone. There’s also the Jerk, the Complainer, the Victim, the Micromanager, the Know-It-All, and the Competitor. These are the difficult and obnoxious coworkers who drive you to distraction, impede your productivity, poison the atmosphere, and even hurt your company’s bottom line.

Got an annoying coworker? Here's how to deal with them.

Unlike Halloween, these ghouls won't be gone Nov. 1, so you have to learn to deal with them. Here’s how:

•Use your EQ.

The first thing to do is use your emotional intelligence (EQ) to discern the motivation behind the bad behavior. Some people just like to vent. Some people like to cause trouble and make others miserable. Some are simply stunted emotionally. Others get corrupted by power. Some may be in over their heads, which makes them stressed and fearful.

Still others are replicating behaviors that have made them successful in the past, but which now serve to undermine the workplace. Some are just overly ambitious and are trying to get ahead at any cost. Try to understand the motivation behind the behavior before you do anything.

•Assess, strategize, and act.

Very often, we are terrified to confront others in situations where we really should. In many cases, we enable people to behave poorly by not standing up to them and asking that the behavior stop. This is because most people don’t have an effective model or paradigm for making clear requests and delineating clear boundaries. But dealing with difficult people can usually be handled in just a few minutes using a well thought-out and simple request. The right way to do this to assess, strategize, and act. Here are the steps:

1. Don’t take it personally. Detach yourself emotionally from the situation. Take a walk, calm down, and sort through your emotional landscape until you can look at the situation clearly and objectively.

2. Assess the situation and determine what behavior you want changed or stopped, or whether you can live with it. Ask yourself, What is really bothering me? Why does it bother me? What value of mine is being trampled? What boundary is being crossed? How is this hurting my job or ability to perform my job? Can I ignore the behavior and do my job? Try to pinpoint exactly what you want to change.

3. Explore your contribution to the behavior. How are your actions, opinions, perspectives, or behaviors impacting the situation? Do you gossip, complain, or criticize right along with them? You have to be willing to change your own behavior before you seek to change others. Name your contribution and own it, so that you can change and stop.

Do you encourage or contribute to your coworker's bad behavior?

4. Think about and practice how you will speak to your coworker. You must find a way that will resolve the situation and not perpetuate it. Remember, don’t phrase it personally. You do not want to come across as attacking the person, just seeking change in a behavior. Make the request in a calm, clear, non-personal and unemotional manner. Do not judge or use the word “should.”

5. If you are a manager or supervisor, use business tools to make the request and follow up. This includes memos, e-mails, follow-up meetings, performance reviews, etc. Bring in HR if you have to.

Even with the above tips you may still need help. Here are three books I highly recommend for further study: Working with You Is Killing Me by Katherine Crowley and Kathi Elster; The No Asshole Rule by Robert Sutton; and Crucial Confrontations by Kerry Patterson.

Dealing with difficult coworkers doesn't have to be a nightmare if you understand why someone may be acting the way they are, how it impacts you, and what you can do to change or ignore it. With a little understanding, a little detachment, and some practice, you can figure out the problem, the source, and what to do about it. Good luck!