The quickest way to avoid drama? It's simple: stay in your lane.Our 15 year old son recently got his first job working at a local hardware store. He was so proud that he got it on his own and as first jobs go, it is a pretty good setup -- it's close to home, clean, professional and respected, and they usually try to hire drama free, down to earth kids to work there so that they can train them and keep them on staff for a while. In addition to knowing what it is like to earn some money, I figure he's also likely to pick up some practical life skills you can't easily find on Instagram, so it is a win all around in my book.Earlier this week he came home from an afterschool shift and was giving us the recap over dinner. Now, real talk, I usually only politely half listen to his work stories. They can be a bit long, rambling, and mostly end with him saying something like, "but, don't worry, I was okay -- the 12 lb bag of mulch I dropped just spilled on the floor and I had to clean it up." From the pieces I heard, it was pretty a boring day and I think he said spent most of the time stocking shelves. But he recounted that at one point, a bunch of his older, more tenured colleagues had been sitting around the register gossiping about another co-worker and her "poor" attitude. From what I could tell it sounded like my son, who is one of the newer employees there, may have joined in the group bitch session.He then asked my opinion on it. I guess I had other things things on my mind on this particular night, because I'm pretty sure I only quarter listened to his story. I got caught and was put on the spot....I had to quickly come up with something...."Stay in your lane, bro" were the choice words of wisdom I mustered in that moment...and let them hang out there for dramatic effect because I really had nothing else for him right then. Not surprisingly, the response was the patented confused, Huh? look that has only be seen on the faces of high school freshman boys for generations.I reiterated my advice to him and went on to explain that, as a new employee, it was probably best that, next time, he just kept his head down and not engage in the conversation. Nothing good usually comes from getting involved in petty workplace drama, and his words could only come back to bite him on the behind with his bosses (and may get back to his co-worker). Just stay in your lane and do what they need you to do and everything should be fine. I added that determining whether your co-worker may or may not have a bad attitude was probably above his pay grade anyways. Isn't this always the way though? People usually have well defined roles in an organization -- with clear responsibilities and expectations to be managed and met. Yet, for some reason, it's often easy to lose focus, venture outside of those and get involved where maybe we shouldn't or haven't been asked to do so. We all have done it, and it can be with good intentions, but it usually doesn't end well. That's when we inevitably find ourselves sucked into a vortex of BS that derails us and distracts from what we were originally tasked to do in the first place. If we just remind ourselves to stay in our lane, we can stay above the fray and keep ourselves on track.My son thanked me for the valuable insight. He's the one who usually steers clear from drama in his day-to-day anyway, so he appreciated the heads up as he had not thought about the possible ramifications of engaging in office gossip. Now if I could only advise him on how to effectively remove wood glue stains from his "good" work pants....Hope everyone has a GREAT weekend. As usual, some good stuff here for you to check out -- I hope you like it.XOXODave