There are an endless amount of characters in the workplace.

The Gullible One.

If I’ve learned anything over the years, it’s that you should never believe everything a company says. Don’t believe them when they say they don’t expect layoffs (the mere mention of that word suggests they’re on the way). Don’t believe that they’ve offered you the highest salary they can. Don’t believe them when they say they can’t negotiate your raise.

The Groupthinker.

Groupthink is a psychological problem that runs rampant in workplaces. Even more if you’ve got a large population of “longtermers” in a corporation. Groupthink is why technology isn’t updated, why policies are outdated, why there’s no new blood (or ideas) on a team, why you hear the sentence “you can’t do that, that’s not how we’ve always done it!”

The Fearful One.

People do ridiculous things when they’re scared.

Apathetic Guy.

Don’t be the apathetic coworker. The grass isn’t always greener, even though it may appear so.

The Sore Loser.

A sore loser will think you got that deal because you’ve got an important last name. Or that you were hired because your Mom sits in the corner office. Or that you simply got lucky (literally and figuratively).

Malicious Gossiper.

There’s harmless gossip and then there’s malicious gossip.

The Apologizer.

She looked sharp and ready. But then she opened with, “Don’t worry, this isn’t a crappy website that does blah…”

Well shoot. For the remainder of her presentation, I assumed her website was crappy.

Repeat the following statement as many times as you need to before you have an important conversation or make a presentation: Be confident, not cocky.