Hey guys, don’t you just hate it when you can’t focus on work because there is so much office drama going on? Well it happens to the best of us, but here are 4 tips to effectively avoid all this drama and focus on yourself and your work!
Don’t Ever Vent (Personal or Professional) Frustrations to Someone You Don’t 100% Trust
The easiest way to get sucked into an inappropriate conversation with a colleague is when they find out about something because someone else told them gossip about you.
The gossip starts when you start sharing your thoughts on people in the office, the rumor you heard about someone, or even your personal life.
Whatever you share with people, it has a chance of coming back and biting you in the face, as the famous saying goes “the walls have ears”, and sometimes the person you are sharing with cannot keep secrets as well.
Keep your personal thoughts to yourself, to your non-work friends, or to your closest and most trusted colleague.
If you are speaking to a co-worker you do not know that well, stick to non-controversial topics only.
It is important to be extremely selective about who you share anything with while you are on the clock and at work.
Venting to the wrong person can lead to unnecessary workplace drama, and you don’t need that kind of negativity in your life.
Learn To Identify Trigger Situations and Topics
Whenever you are about to share some information that you don’t wish for others to know, start off by saying something like “I’m going to tell you something between the two of us, you can’t tell anyone.”
When the trusted person gives you their consent, then you can allow yourself to vent as much as possible, because we all need someone to vent to.
It is extremely beneficial for you to train your ear to hear when gossip is about to come your way so that you can be better prepared to avoid it.
Think back to any of the times you were on the receiving (or delivering) end of this conversation, what were the common intro tactics?
Be alert for these so that you can be ready to divert it.
If a colleague comes at you and says the same line of “I’m going to tell you something, but you can’t tell anyone else” and you don’t want to hear it, just say “you shouldn’t tell me, I’m not good at keeping secrets.”
Change The Subject Smoothly
Sometimes, it is best to change the topic of the conversation so you do not have to deal with the drama.
When your colleague comes at you about some gossip, it is rude to cut them off mid sentence but you can divert their attention to something else.
For example,
Colleague : “Hey did you see Ah Chan yesterday during the company dinner? Wah he drink so much wei! He was so drunk sia!”
Me : “Ya I think the drinks yesterday was very kao. Eh speaking of yesterday, the band they hired dam good wei. A lot of their songs were dam chill, you remember what they were called ah?”
When you start doing that, you realize the gossip will become less and less and you slowly become immune to it as you deflect the topic into something else!
Never Repeat Anything That Shouldn’t Be Repeated
Sometimes, even when you do everything mentioned above, the gossip will still come.
When this happens, try your best to just keep it to yourself, don’t repeat something that should not be repeated.
Gossip is like a chain line, if you are part of the line, you can do your best to break that chain.
So with these tips in mind, we wish you the best at a stress free, gossip free, drama free working environment where you can focus on your task at hand instead of these kinds of matters that waste your time, emotions and energy!
