Gossiping about others destroys your as well as dynamics of your workplace. I try myself keeping away from it, because nothing good comes out of it. Just be sure you avoid the attitude of preaching on the evils of gossip. You’ll make your colleagues resent you. Instead, try subtly changing the subject.

Suppose your co-workers start complaining about the boss. If you join in, it makes you look disloyal to the boss. If you don’t, it looks awkward in the group. What can you do? As with the situation of gossip, try changing the subject by linking the boss to another topic, then talking about that topic instead. Or you could simply respond to your co-workers with a smile and a tongue-in-cheek, “Come on, aren’t we exaggerating? really isn’t THAT bad.” Be careful, though, because it could be taken as an admission by you that the boss is bad. If you do it right, no one will even notice that you’ve moved them away from the gossip.

“One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.” –Elbert Hubbard

Office politics will never go away. It’s a fact of company life. However, destructive office politics can demoralize an organization, hamper productivity. We all have responsibilities and objectives, and those things should receive priority. Nonetheless, if it doesn’t take too much time, being helpful to others can reap benefits for you. At my workplace we work lot of things on Excel worksheets. I try to take care if someone having trouble building complex formulae or macro? If I can help that person, especially without taking too much of time, I benefit myself as well as the other person. By doing these things, you’re building a feel good factor which inculcates loyalty capital. In doing so, you reduce the chances that you will be the victim of political intrigue at least from this fellow.