Workplace should be free from gossip
Up-to-Date Editor
Being a student and having a job basically go hand-in-hand. Young people usually go to college with a feeling of relief because it’s a fresh start, and all of that immature high school gossip that we all know and dread will stay safely behind them. But does it really? The job you leave high school with will more than likely follow you to college. So although you have a fresh start ahead when it comes to school, work remains the same.
This means that where you work should be a place that makes you feel comfortable, safe, and in a perfect world, free of that childish high school drama. So what is one to do when co-workers, and even managers, get too comfortable with one another to the point where rumors begin to fly and peoples’ feelings start getting hurt?
Just recently, I experienced this where I work. I’ve been working at the same place for over a year and a half, and almost the entire time it has been a place that I look forward to going to. The work itself is fun and the company is pleasant. However, every place has that “one person,” right? They have a way of being manipulative and using your words against you. They are nice to your face, but once you turn your back, things change.
Where I work, this “one person” is a manager and seems to rub almost everyone the wrong way. When it came to a pretty serious rumor regarding me specifically, I felt a line had been severely crossed and I wasted no time going straight to our boss with the issue, hoping something would be done about it. I was told that this manager would be talked to, and he would report back to me with what she had to say for herself. However, it has been two weeks since the incident occurred and no action has been taken.
I asked some other co-workers of mine what they would do in my situation and what they would like to see happen to this manager if they were in my position. Most of them went as far to say that this manager should be demoted or even fired. If you ask me, no matter where you work, it should be a mature, professional environment and authority figures should make sure that these sorts of things do not occur, and if they do, appropriate action should be taken. Everyone should feel safe and welcome where they work, and gossip should not be something that gets in the way of that.
