Easy ways to identify and avoid people who gossip at work

Office gossip has a tendency to cause strife in the workplace. People who aren't careful may find themselves amidst a sea of gossip. This can cause irrevocable damage to one's personal or professional life. Once getting actively involved in the rumor mill, it is often hard to pull away from the perpetrators of gossip. The best way to avoid getting caught up in workplace gossip is to stay clear of it in the first place.

If you're starting a new job and want to avoid being caught up in the messes that can be created by office gossip, it is a good idea to know what kinds of signs to look for in people who tend to thrive in spreading stories around the workplace. After you can identify who these people are, you can make a concentrated effort to be careful when dealing with them. Traits to look for to identify gossipers include:

The attention-seeker

The office gossip will likely say most anything to draw attention. They'll present information that tends to undermine others while attempting to make themselves as a positive in the center of the conversation. These gossips often perceive that if they tell a good story, people will rally around them and give them undivided attention.

This may be due to low self-esteem and the need to put others down in order to boost and/or soothe their own egos. Either way, if someone is actively looking to spread any kind of story which draws attention, this is someone you want to watch your back with. Which leads us to...

The backstabber

If your colleague is talking on and on about someone else, chances are they are already, or will soon be, doing it to you behind your back too. Definitive signs of being a backstabber include being two-faced. For instance, smiling to someone's face and then bad-talking, making gestures or rolling eyes behind their back.

If you see someone exhibiting these signals, it is a strong sign something is wrong. You want to be careful around this kind of person at work. A person who shows signs of being two-faced is probably your backstabber. These story spreaders are typically pretty savvy and have a way of attracting everyone to entrust them with information they can use for their own purposes.

If you don't want to find yourself the center of the next juicy story going around the office, watch what you say about yourself or anyone else who hands out with the backstabber. They'll pretend to be a friend while underneath that cloak of comradeship, is truly a foe.

The nosybody

A co-worker who has significantly more interest in yours, or your other colleagues' personal lives, and tends to chat more about this than work issues, this person is likely a gossip. It's one thing to be friendly and want to talk about things other than work, but it's another entirely when a person hones in on and seems to latch onto information about life off-the-clock and with the intent to share it with others. For an office gossip, this kind of chatting is compulsory and for some, an obsession.

The pot-stirrer

This type of office gossip tends to take snippets of information that may cause discord and use them to gently begin to stir the proverbial pot to cause friction. Sometimes this behavior is underlying and harder to detect, but other times may be more blatant. If you notice co-workers who seem to thrive on controversy, be careful, you may find yourself the center of the next big story.

Gossip tends to lead to many problems in the workplace. It can cause:

• Misunderstandings
• Resentment
• Preconceived and untrue notions
• Damaged reputations
• Stress
• Other types of conflict

It's best to avoid the gossip trap and stay away from these kinds of discussions wherever possible. Keep in mind, this doesn't mean you need to be anti-social or avoid talking to your colleagues, but it is wise to exercise due care with those who appear to be inclined to gossip. If you get caught up in the center of the rumor mill you could end up causing permanent damage to your professional reputation.