EPISODE 46 (50) TRASH TALKER - bad mouthing may boomerang back and leave a nasty taste

Rudeness pervades organisations, reports Andrew in this week's podcast on Trash Talking. More than half the employees (57%) in a Fortune 500 survey reported trash-talking happening every month in their organisation.

Trash talking used to mean slagging off competitors. Now there's a general trend of rudeness and less respectful attitudes towards others. Cultural factors partly explain this change. 

Becoming a victim of someone badmouthing and saying unpleasant things about you is a terrible experience. It may even occur in front of your boss. When it happens, you may lose sleep and dream about revenge. 

Trash-talking victims may become highly motivated to seek revenge but may become less cooperative. So, this kind of behaviour disrupts and reduces performance, especially when tasks need creativity and divergent thinking. 

Trash-talking is competitive incivility. It includes boastful comments about oneself or insulting someone else. If you want to succeed at work, avoid this sort of rudeness. 

Once you start trash talking, others may soon view you as a rival. You may even be unwittingly promoting the use of unethical behaviour. 

With a genuine opponent, trash-talk may prompt them to perform better. But if you make uncivil remarks to a teammate, you may cause them to perform worse.  The point is you never really know the impact such talking sets in motion.

Manipulative language comes in many guises.  It can sometimes appear harmless. Yet it can be dangerous and further perpetuate the oppression of women and the disadvantaged. It is just another form of racism.

Trash-talking now pervades social media. Nasty postings have an uncomfortably long-life span and may return to haunt you.

If trash-talking is frowned upon in your organisation, it's certainly not going to boost your chances of success. 

If you’re caught bad-mouthing someone, be sure to apologise at once.  Explain that you were venting frustration, and that’s not how you feel about them. Then give two examples of what you like about the person.

And tell a senior person or your team leader what happened before your co-worker does. If they file a complaint, you will have removed the possible source of shock. 

Just tell your senior colleague: “Look, I messed up and didn’t mean it. I have already apologised, but I wanted you to know if it comes up again.”      

If you’re a victim of trash-talking at work, you can’t quickly punish the other person. But you can take steps to tackle it.  If you stay silent, you may make the

Can't wait for Series 2 to run its course? Then buy Andrew's new book, published on Amazon, and there's also an Audio version.

Further reading and videos: Andrew recommends some useful follow-through material which you can find for each episode at

www.myhappinessatwork.com/reading/categories/research-reading

and

www.myhappinessatwork.com/watch.

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Dip in and out and take what seems helpful.

www.myhappinessatwork.com/book