Malicious or delicious are office gossip sessions

Those huddled gossip sessions near the coffee vending machine or drifting by corridors might not be that wrong a deed after all, for if they are well-taken they can lead to positive feedback and help you too.

For marketing executive Minal Mody, she grabbed every chance to rally around her colleagues and complain about a pesky senior who was also a pevert. “He kept calling my number after work hours and I didn’t know what to do. I felt secure when I went to my friends during short breaks and our ‘gossip’ sessions emotionally empowered me,” she admits. 

Chartered accountant Samir Desai maintains that he actually benefited from overhearing his staffers at office once day. “I was in the next room and heard a group of junior trainees laughing nearby. One of them said I had the table manners of a rhinoceros. At first I was aghast but then I couldn’t help laughing too and realised that I was probably making way too much noise with my cutlery while eating; something my wife reminded me of too. That day on I just changed my habits.”

Psychotherapist Deepti Makhija says both men and women gossip equally. “It’s a sign of power; a subtle form of aggression too and people do it to get back at each other,” she says. “Tea time as now the official gossip time, it has become a deep-rooted part of organsational culture. Find something beneficial to talk about so that your gossip is positive.”

But what is one man’s meat is definitely another man’s poison, and what might provide a lark to some might actually do damage to another. Like advertising trainee Nisha Philips recalls, “I had just started working and was getting to know people but I found three girls who giggled and whispered something to each other when I passed by; it made me feel so bad that I just quit working there.”

So where lies the demarcation? Clinical psychologist Seema Hingorrany sorts it out. “Gossiping is innate to humans; it really amounts to venting out what you feel and is thus quite unavoidable at work. It can be beneficial if taken in the right spirit, but I have had clients who are sensitive and have suffered deep anxiety due to being gossip ‘targets’. So you have to be careful of what you say or it can harm one’s self-esteem. If you must do it, avoid deep, personal matters,” she advises.

So the next time you have to get onto the grapevine, do a re-think. If it’s healthy and helps someone go right ahead, or then think again.

(names changed to protect privacy)