Gossiping at the office is something we all partake in, even if we don’t want to admit it. Why, you ask? Because the office is filled with juicy gossip content and material. From the two co-workers you despise, to your demanding AF boss, or even Jihan from HR; the limit literally does not exist.
However, there’s harmless gossip and then there’s gossip that breeds so much melodrama that it, unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your standpoint), leads to termination. This article is about the latter.
I’ve sat down with several people who were part of such adventures, and thankfully for you (and us), they’ve decided to spill the tea.
“There was this guy I used to date at the sister company I also used to work at. We just clicked out of nowhere and started — maybe — acting like we’re in a Nicholas Sparks movie at the office. From holding each other’s hands to other forms of PDA, love — or whatever that was — was in the air. We were smart though, we didn’t tell anyone about it and we always made sure we weren’t overly in love in front of people, until we weren’t. All it took was tell the wrong person until news of our office romance spread like wildfire in the office. My managers at the time confronted me and told me that I need to either break up with him or leave, I decided to quit.” — Amal, PR Account Manager
“I used to be addicted to hash in a way that I would smoke in the office whenever people weren’t around — mostly after hours. One time I mistakenly told someone that I did that. The next day HR asked me about and I confessed to doing so. I was let go of the job, but it served as a wake up call because now I don’t smoke hash anymore.” — Abed, Social Media Manager
“One time I created a funny meme about the CEO of my company at the time to send to my secret work group. When I say secret work group, it was basically our office gossip group where we bitch and nag about everything. The meme I was talking about was never sent to the office gossip group but to the official work group. That was back in the day where you couldn’t delete a WhatsApp message you had sent. You can guess what happened to me.” — Omar, Customer Service Agent
“I found out that my boyfriend was cheating on me with another girl who also works with us at the office. I immediately broke up with him and terminated my contract because I didn’t want to be surrounded by such negativity.” — Menna, Graphic Designer
“A guy who was new to the office at the time used to always be weird with me. Not even cute weird or anything nice weird. It was just weird, maybe even the uncomfortable kind. I never knew why…until I found out from someone at the office that he, for some reason, doesn’t like hijabis and thinks they’re very judgmental — which kind of showed how hypocritical he was. Sadly, it didn’t end with that. I found that he also said not nice things about me and my friends. I reported him instantly to the HR department and he was fired.” — Hend, Event Coordinator
Featured image belongs to Harvard Business Review.
