How to Avoid Negative Talks

As far as recognizing who is lying or what is negative, I follow my gut feeling (intuition). As far as "how many kinds of negative talk?" basic common sense should prevail.

A few ways to avoid negative work place conversation:

State positive aspects with regards to the topic (if there are any).

State that you are uncomfortable with the direction that the conversation is going.

Change the subject.

Excuse yourself and walk away.

It is pretty simple to avoid.

IS the message congruent / aligned with your company's mission and vision?

Does it protect and serve the interest of those it is about or for?

If the answer to both of these is yes, it will not be a 'negative talk.'

One way to recognize lying is when the person talking is not your immediate supervisor, and then looks over their shoulders before saying "Can you keep a secret" or "Don't pass this around but I just heard ..." or anything like that.

In my experience, I found it quite helpful to never believe any rumor that I had not started myself...

The best way to deal with these kinds of things is to just ask the following simple question cheerfully and with great anticipation of the answer :

"How does what you just said help us meet our strategic plan? Our mission?"

The liars and rumormongers HATE IT when you do that to them. They will leave you alone.

There are more sophisticated and nuanced ways of dealing with this, but the above will serve you well.

Milo