How to Deal With Talkative Employee at Workplace
Small chit chats around the water cooler or near the coffee machine once a while is fine as they help employee relief themselves from work stress. These way employees get to interact on a personal level leading to better teamwork, cooperation and compromise. But if someone takes this a bit too far and distracts others from their work, the real trouble begins. Business owners are expected to keep the staff focused and therefore need to deal with this hiccup without hurting feelings.
Identifying Talkative Employees
Talkative employees have a different identify. They express themselves differently and a few of which includes:
- The personal ones: Another group will be the one who loves to share a bit too much personal information with extensive details.
- The friendly ones: There will always be a section that are friendly and enjoys talking with different people.
- The complaining ones: They are never happy with anything going around. They are always complaining to their coworkers and disrupt the work environment.
- The lazy ones: They spent most of the times on social media or personal calls and break the work flow.
- The attention seekers: These are the argumentative and challenging lot. They are always in search of interrupting others only to hog the limelight.
- The loud ones: This section speaks loud and is most annoying of all as they break concentration.
Dealing with Talkative Employees
As employers you must be proactive when it comes to handling talkative employees. Below are a few ideas to help you with the process:
- Review if the talkative nature is affecting the employee’s work report. If the answer to no, give them more responsibilities as they may be bored with their current ones or are fast doers. Engage them more so that they bring all the more output.
- Approach with a positive attitude. You need to deal with them in a way that they do not feel cold and at the same time increase your productivity as well. Set a goal for them and come up with strategies as to how to implement those.
- Talk with about this issue with employees as parents. Discuss about what will help them in controlling their talkative nature. Engage them in discussions and workshops.
- Try to land on a common interest to make working together more tolerable. At least one common interest will do the tick and keep you on the role.
- Deal with talkative employees with kindness. Do not start bullying just because he/she is a gossiper. And make sure to stay away from arguments or debates. Your smile should never fade away.
If they still do not get your point, approach your manager for an intervention and use this last resort to get everything fixed.