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Gossip

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When one is trying to quantify which is the more annoying coworker; the tattler or the gossiper, one first has to determine which can be more damaging.

In the grand scheme of things, the tattler is trying to make a coworker look less than perfect while trying to make themselves look good. In actuality, the tattler is merely exploiting their unease toward another person's abilities, those that are usually driven by some sort of jealousy. The tattler never seems to tattle on those they personally deem inferior.

Depending on a person's level of tolerance, one can often take the tattler lightly. A tattler is far more damaging to themselves than to anyone else. If a coworker is perpetually seeking out a superior in an effort to try and damage another person's reputation in work ethics, they only go so far as accomplishing two things: they exploit insecurities they have by trying to make everyone seem less than sufficient; and, they cry wolf. The person who speaks most is the one least heard. The tattler will very quickly establish a reputation that will precede them and can even be shoved out of any friendly loop because of it.

For the person who becomes the victim of the tattler, the complaint will most likely be for some mundane, trivial issue. If the complaint goes anywhere at all, it should end in a superior's office and not trickle out into the masses for further evaluation by those you work with.

With a gossiper, the extent of the overall damage is far more reaching and can be more severe to the person who has found themselves in the spotlight. Nothing, barring a runaway train, moves faster than a gossip chain, because of the large number people contained within such close proximity. A work environment is the perfect stagnant breeding ground for chatter.

The false reputations that can develop because of a coworker's need to tell stories (those that are typically unsubstantiated at that) can be significantly damaging not only to the person who became victim of the gossip, but to those that person also works with. By the time a story reaches the masses, it will undoubtedly have changed again and again from its original buzz. While it might not have started out to be anything more than a simple scandal, it runs the risk of bringing others to the heresy party too. While the quip began with one person, another who is passing the story along might be blamed for it, and thus another work relationship becomes damaged in the process.

Gossip becomes very personal very quickly, and one doesn't have to do anything to encourage its movement. A story of gossip develops a life all of its own and by the time it reaches the one most affected, every one of the coworkers is well informed and the star of the show is affected emotionally. Falling victim to gossip causes a person to feel like hiding from the rest of the clan. They might become paranoid, feel banished, and might even go so far as alienating themselves to avoid any potential ridicule.

Gossipers never seem to consider the emotional damage their meddling can cause. Because the effects of gossiping are far beyond that of a tattler, the gossiper can be considered more damaging, therefore, far more annoying.

Learn more about this author, Andi Bryant.
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