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Overcoming Gossip

The place I work at is a hot bed of gossip. In the past I will admit to taking part in some of it, but lately I have tried to take a different view. When someone says something negative about a co-worker I will say something positive about that person. This is not as easy as it sounds because sometimes the negative comment is true. I try to put myself in the shoes of the person being talked about, how would I feel? Of course this can be made even more difficult when the person making the negative comment is a superior. I will usually just say something noncommital like: "Oh, really, I hadn't noticed." I would just feel terrible if I said something about someone and it got back to that person. I do my best not to gossip, but this is very hard.

Gossip Overcoming

It is wise to take this kind of stance at work especially, because negative comments in the workplace can do more harm than good. I keep my feelings for others very secure when at work but will sometimes divulge these to family and close friends when outside the work environment. I believe you are taking the right approach.

Overcoming Gossip Health & Special Psychology

Haven't you noticed? Sometimes in working environment, say office, taking a part in gossip schemes is another way to socialize with your co-worker. No way am I trying to justify it, it was just one of my observations. Group of colleagues having nothing in common, and obviously suffering from luck of any form of communication suddenly finds a topic to talk about. Atmosphere in the Smoking Room suddenly changes when someone makes a remark concerning pretty secretary, and while everyone realizes that poor girl's private life it is nobody's business, further remarks are welcome. That's another dark side of social behavior, I guess.

Gossip Overcoming

Believe it or not, gossiping is considered an informal channel of communication. Senior management frowns upon it whereas employees use it as a way of investigating anything in the workplace.

Senior management is very selective about what information should be communicated to the employees of the company. However, when employees wish to find out other information, they rely on "the grapevine." Gossiping can be useful to lower level employees since it helps them to understand why senior management are implementing certain procedures or why they are making decisions that they (the employees) do not consider acceptable. However, gossiping can become very dangerous, depending on the individual.

There are two types of gossipers:

1) The individual who prefers to be the one to investigate certain matters and report to others about their findings. These individuals may overhear certain conversations or accidentally stumble upon confidential information and may use it to warn their friends or co-workers.

2) The individual who may overhear a conversation and may use it to his/her advantage, for the sake of creating confusion for others. These individuals should be considered dangerous since they may overhear a private or public conversation and may choose to embellish it and quickly spread the half truths. Or to satisfy their own insecurities, they may use this partially false information, to gain power and (believe it or not) earn a certain amount of respect from others, for "carrying news."

Personally, I do not encourage gossip. When a person tells me something, I may adopt one of the two stances: I may say outright, "That is really none of our business you know!" or I may choose to remain silent and not contribute anything further to the matter. I think the latter is the best approach especially if you work in an office that is full of gossip.

Gossiping can be very personal and hurtful. Most people use gossip as a way of attacking someone in a cowardly fashion, since they do not have the guts to say certain things face to face, to the individual that they dislike. In today's society, gossiping is normally used as a form of entertainment. When people lead very boring lives or have nothing better to do with their time, they indulge in their favourite pastime, that is, gossip. Through gossip, we learn about: what senior management does not want the lower level staff to know; a person's private life; people's insecurities and most importantly, who are our true friends.

Gossip Overcoming

Gossip is a terrible thing and causes everyone undue harm. What surprises me about veteran gossipers is that they don't mind gossiping about someone that may be around or even able to hear it, that's just evil.