₦airaland Forum

adeaks:
The account balanced finally.

Can't find your number. Too many unknown phone numbers on my call list. Give me the last two figures of the phone number.

How did you get my number sef? The same person who gave you mine, will give me yours.

Hahahaha
S/He won't!
The last two numbers is 53.

A Rejoinder On Office Gossip

Ken works as a cleaner in BBC Group. He's been working there for over four years now. He's seen different boards steer the ship of the company. He's watched employees come and go, he's seen many rise and fall. To some, he's just an ordinary cleaner who doesn't deserve recognition. You can't count the number of times he's greeted some staff with a smile and they never even as little as a nod replied his greeting.

But there are some nonetheless who go as far as stopping to ask how he's doing. One of such people is Ms. Hannah. Ms. Hannah has a way of reaching out to others no matter their background. Unfortunately though, Ms. Hannah has a bad habit that plagues her. And it is lateness! She's never punctual at her place of work and recently her bosses have began to see it as something they cannot put up with. One Monday morning as they sat to discuss general issues, Ms. Hannah's name was mentioned. They began deliberating on the next line of action to take. After a while they unanimously agreed to watch her for another two weeks before placing her on suspension.

Ken got wind of the decision and related it to Hannah when she got to work that day. She knew then that she was sitting on a timebomb. To save her job she had to restrategize. From that day on, she put extra effort to preparing and getting to work right on time. Last three weeks she was recognized with an award as the Most Punctual Employee of the Month

Office gossip serves a purpose. In fact, in this clime, it is one tool you need to gain mastery of. Listen to rumours and gossip - Don't comment on it, don't pass it on, don't believe it completely. But know it! Listen to it. Let me shock you with a discovery. Do you know that office assistants and support staff know so much about the organization than most of the staff do? Talk to the company driver you'll be shocked! They eavesdrop on every conversation. They've bumped into discussions they were not supposed to have heard anything about. They've been privy to some key information about the office where you work. The sad thing is a lot of us look down on them. The bitter truth is they know who is secretly winning your employer's heart and is about to get a raise. They know who is next to be laid off. They know the staff on danger zone. They know the colleague who most likely is backstabbing you.

Funny thing is, sometimes the gossip starts among them before it starts spreading. Like they say, there's no smoke without fire. Rather than act all reserved, aloof and shrug it off as nothing, be aware of it.

You call it gossip, I like to call it grapevine. Leave it or take it, it is an informal communication network in every organization. Embrace it! While everyone is looking down on support staff, you can move up easily if you treat them nicely and accord them the respect and admiration they deserve. They typically know the written and unwritten rules that can help you navigate the terrain and don't forget to share the glory with them.

Master this game early on and watch your career soar to greater heights.
Have a Fabulous Friday!

EmmyDe25:
I"d be here for my line of thought tomorrow. Got some questions to ask, hope you'd be willing to provide answers.

Oh, tomorrow?
That's fine. I'll be more than willing to provide answers the best way I can and if need be, employ the help of some very helpful friends here to provide further answers where clarity is lacking.

adeaks:
Call ke? How? When? Lol @ not having slept in years.

*modified

Don't tell me you'r the lady with the "titillating" voice who called me one evening last week I think.

I was reading when that call came in. Actually in my head I was trying to balance one stubborn account while also following the conversation. I just chalked it up to a wrong number.

Why didn't you just introduce yourself though? Let me go and root for that phone number if I can still find it

I doubt you'll find the number. Hope the account balanced in the end?
I'll call again on your next birthday

lashout1:
It's a book i read on office politics.

maybe u will that a shot.

The Mafia Manager... seen the review.
I'll see if I can get a copy anytime soon.
Thanks.

lashout1:
when i saw this thread, the first thing that struck my mind is "Mafian manager"

Why is that?

austinosita:
You are right on point! I so love this thread and I'm following!
BTW, I was a victim! office politics made me lose 3 jobs consecutively! "if I try to learn from my mistake.......another one(different) crops up"
I figured I can't play it

Can you share your experience with us? We'll love to learn.

The great philosopher Plato said and I quote,
"Those who think they are too smart for office politics will be ruled by those who are dumber"

I clearly understand how most people feel about the word 'politics'. It's connotative meaning has been bastardized by those who have played the game to the detriment of others. Those who play the game without conscience have messed up the game for the rest of us but like Plato said, if you shy away from it,be prepared to stay under the powers of those who know less. Look, in this game, if you have to shower praises on your superiors, do it. If you have to volunteer for the arduous task that everyone else is running away from, do it! By all means do the do! That's a step in the right direction.

Those who always give excuses and verbally say out loud, "that's not my job!" will soon have no job to call their own because even the one you call yours may be taken from you while you go about sipping tea during working hours feeling like Mr/Ms. Indispensable!

Polycarp has been busy doing nothing for the past five weeks on his job except for 'supervising'. When he assumed supervisory role is what no one could place a finger on. Ever since an intern was assigned to his work station he's done nothing other than give out commands. At every weekly meeting he'd come out in front and defend projects before the management board. He'd take credit for all the work done and smile whenever his bosses commended him for a presentation well done. Until a day came! Like a day will always come and catch you unawares. When you are doing the wrong thing when no one is watching, so came that day for Polycarp. He was supposed to work on a report having the deadline in view, Mr. Poly traveled out of town after reporting at work that morning, only to fly out of Lagos to see a friend in Jos with hopes of returning that same day but nemesis caught up with him. His return flight was cancelled.

The graduate intern who was now the go-to guy got the report completed. When it was time for presentation, Polycarp was no where to be found. The bosses got upset and in a fit of irritation, were about to decide the fate of the unserious employee who was about to cause the company a major loss (client-wise and income wise) when the intern got up with a beautifully completed report and presented same brilliantly with the skill of someone who was very knowledgeable since he had come to learn by experience. Everyone in the room marveled!
'For how long have you been doing this?' One of the managing partners asked.
His response revealed the secret. Right there and then, he was welcome on board as a full staff.

Mr. Polycarp returned to clear his table. He did a 'good' job at moulding his successor and making himself non relevant.

I just hope someone out there reading this is not sabotaging himself. Play your card right.
Don't hate the Player, Don't hate the game as well
Have a terrific Thursday!

Proffdada:
I don't like working with someone because I'm so easy to work with, I do all the job, get all the blame and get the least pay. Just because of my modesty

Not too good.
Watch this space, you'll need to learn how to be a little 'immodest'. Twill pay more

genpriest:
Nice post.....buh the word 'politics' means a whole different thing in some places. For example...a case where one becomes promoted over another cus he/she plays her cards well or knows higher Pple in the establishment. IMO, I think the title should have been...Good office ethics, office and colleges relationship or tenets of an office work.

All the same....very useful information.
Nice one

You reminded me of something now. I'll talk about it soon but office politics is a subject a lot of us shy away from, maybe because the politics isn't replaced with ethics. The reason for the thread is to give us a paradigm shift in the way we have hitherto viewed the subject.

Thanks for joining the discussion.
Thanks to everyone who is following.
More updates coming up.
Good morning.

adeaks:
Amicable!!!!


What's up? Been a while.

I called you Ade when I saw you were away for too long but you sounded like you had not slept in years

I've been good.
You?

karleone:
Thanks. Nice thread. #following

#FollowingBack.
Thanks.

Talking boy, your post is hidden. Hope you haven't been banned from commenting on this section?
Your contribution is welcome.

karleone:
Adeaks' diary. Cool.

Oh! Ok. All the best!

*smiling into thread*
I have an unfinished business here

I must finish this project!
Let me go and have a cup of ginger drink.

Those following, don't give up
Stay in touch.

Once upon a time in an office employed a young lady of 24. She was a graduate from a repute private university with big prospects of building a career in the manufacturing sector as a financial analyst. Ignorant of the dynamics of office politics she dived in without first studying her environment as a new recruit into Capitol Bottle Manufacturers in Abuja and three weeks into the job she got fired.

This is a true life story of a friend who got employed a couple of months ago, now relieved of her duties in her place of work. We were still congratulating her when she changed her DP on her profile to a quote by a sage. You could tell she was grieving. By reason of our closeness and friendship she confided in me as she broke down in tears. She didn't even last one month on the job before she exited the building.

'What happened?' I managed to ask.
She began narrating her ordeal with some colleagues how she joined them to bad mouth their boss. She said a lot of incriminating things and because they were all in the mood to blab, she thought they were on the same page. She talked and talked until she said "that's why she's not even married sef!"

What all the other people in the gossip group with her said no longer mattered. It was that one statement that showed her out the door. Her boss, of course like most women won't take such comment lightly from anyone above her, let alone have it come out from a subordinate's mouth!

How did her boss hear it? You ask.
But if you ask me, na who I go ask?

It was a sage who said "Gossip dies when it hits a wise person's ear"
Be wise. Watch your words.
Have a winsome Wednesday!

karleone:
I knew it that Amicable will create something out of that diary update. Nice one Nne!
Are you the lady I saw reading in a Molue bus this evening along Oshodi- Apapa exp? I actually felt that lady read that diary, when I saw her.

An encouraging diary update @Adeaks

Diary update?
Which one Karl? Can't remember which.

Lol @ the lady you saw yesterday. No, it wasn't me. I didn't ply that route yesterday.
How are you finding your new place BTW?

Let me start first by saying every office is political. And Politics is not a dirty word!

In this part of the world where every problem stems from a suspected enemy of progress and how some may be inclined to going the voodoo way, I'm here to say politics can be played without involving a babalawo or onye dibia . Take your mind off carrying a talisman to work please.


Now that we've established this fact, can we have some real talk Mr/Ms career cruiser? Navigating the murky waters of office politics can be either disastrous or delightful. I have watched and observed with keen interest every time a person gets employed into an organization, there is an advise that the fellow will never escape from friends and family members and it is 'BEWARE OF OFFICE POLITICS!'. Prior to this time, I thought it meant stay away from every bad company in the office. Don't join the bandwagon. Don't be a party to rumour mongering and all those kind of stuff but today right on a bus ride I learnt something new. I understood the concept better and a particular chapter caught my eye. I'll tell you about it.

While on a bus this morning, I met with a lady I had boarded the same bus with last week and with smile on our faces, I greeted my acquaintance good morning. Excitedly, she opened her bag and pulled out a book mischievously and handed it over to me. I laughed. All the other passengers looked at us with an unknowing look wondering what both ladies who just met themselves on a public bus could possibly be giggling about. What they failed to see was the spirit. We had met a week before and even though it was my first time seeing her in the bus, her book drew me to her, when I requested to see the cover page and she handed it to me, I almost begged a total stranger to 'dash' me her book! . I wanted it. The title alone was to die for! So this morning, she didn't wait for me to ask before she surrendered the book . Isn't she lovely?

I learnt a great deal from that book and it prompted me to start a discussion here.
Politics I have learnt is not always noxious. It is simply knowing how to accomplish things within the organization. In every office, you'll have to deal with petty games, you'll have to deal with gossip (spicy and juicy ones *winks), there is also the power struggle and turf wars among others. You see? Whether you love politics or not, the game has to be played. Loosing is not even an option as winning is the only way to go.

There are some colleagues you'll have who may thrive in hoarding vital information. You may have a boss who nitpicks on everything you do. You may also have to battle with trust issues in your place of work if you have some conniving 'slicks' around you. Let me make you laugh with this one. You may also have to get along in some way with that colleague who derives pleasure in bathing inside his bottle of perfume every morning and evening at work.

Navigating office politics requires common sense, courtesy and compromise. When you have a colleague who gossip a lot and is neither here nor there, always looking for words from your mouth to take to the next person or who's always trying to paint your work bad in the eyes of your boss, you need to watch it. Learn when to shut up and how to leave. I'll leave you with the words of Will Rogers who said;

"Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip."

Chew these words until I come with another lesson on how to be your boss' pet cos yours truly is striving to be one.
Happy Career Cruise!

*Don't forget to hint us on how you are navigating through yours, I'll love to hear*

wroskian:
Waiting to receive you with a warm embrace... That bag must be waterproof because the rain might just dissolve things

It's not only waterproof, it is bulletproof

ElDeeVee:
It's just a line in a song; nothing out of the ordinary.

I have not said anything about it being extra ordinary. I like it that's all I said. And well, I also mentioned dialing a number but that's nothing cos you know how to dial numbers when you are eating .

Hope you had a good day?
It's Friday. Any plans?

wroskian:
The Bible told me to be at peace with all men.

Btw, na who e-fight and e-enemies don epp? If you want to fight me, locate me.

Lol
I am heading straight to no 17 ****** street, off Adeleke Abayomi crescent, ******.


Expect me soon with my bag of trouble

PETRUCE:
Jus kidding

Oh! I see...

PETRUCE:
Welcome dear....

Lol. I don't think I know you plus I don't seem to grab the 'welcome'.
Where or what are you welcoming me into?

Hi tollar90.

Howdy?
I see you have plans to jump rope daily. I love skipping. We can work out something in a way. We can even be friends here .

I'm constantly striving to make new friends.
We can begin the journey here.

Fresh graduate?
We seem to have sth in common.

ElDeeVee:
Just show me one.

Lol. I will source for 'them'.
Uhm... noticed your siggy just changed *winks* I like this one . Oya leave NL and dial her number.

ElDeeVee:
Attacks on you
Show me one of the.'attacks' biko

Those ones you attach photos to.