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THE QUESTION

My workplace seems to be populated with many nosy people who seem intent on forcing their own views on the rest of the world.

One of my colleagues is a fervently religious woman who is not content practising her faith on her own time, but instead interrogates her co-workers in their cubicles and preaches to them. On one occasion she followed me on my lunch break to a shoe store and chastised me for "shopping again."

I don't think she's a bad person, but for some reason she seems to feel it's okay to make her co-workers' personal habits and lives part of her personal crusade. And she's not the only one. I would say her behaviour is the norm rather than the exception. Any tips or advice for dealing with fascism in the workplace?

THE ANSWER

I've heard lots of toxic-office, psychotic-boss and cantankerous-colleague stories. But following you out of the office on your lunch break, stalking you, then pouncing on you in a shoe store and chewing you out for shopping?

That's out there. If someone did that to me, I do believe they would soon find their hindquarters in intimate contact with the business end of a size 13 adidas shell toe.

It's every working stiff's inalienable right to slither out of the office for a little "retail therapy" at lunch, for God's sake. Take that away from us and what have we left? If people stopped slipping out for clandestine shoe-shopping safaris on their lunch breaks, the entire footwear industry would grind to a halt and teeter on the brink of collapse.

And you say her type of behaviour is the "norm" at your office? Yikes.

My first impulse, as a professional advice-giver and distributor of carefully considered, thoughtful counsel, is to grab your lapels, pull your face within an inch of mine, and, with my eyes bugging out like someone in a zombie movie, say: "Run! Run like the wind! Submit your resignation immediately and hightail it as far from that toxic office as your spanking new sexy-yet-practical pumps will take you, and never return!"

But it's too easy to tell people to quit their jobs. I'm going to have to go ahead and assume you've considered this option, and decided against it, for whatever reason. Perhaps you enjoy the work itself. Perhaps it's the only place you can do the work you love.

Or maybe it's just the warm, cozy feeling you get from having a roof over your head and groceries in the fridge.

In any case, why should one unhinged anti-shopping evangelist force you out before you're ready to go?

Now, my advice may seem a little counterintuitive to some. It may even seem a tad unscrupulous, underhanded and Machiavellian. But demented shopping-denouncers call for cloak-and-dagger measures, so here goes: Befriend her.

That's what I always do. The minute I get a new job, I seek out the most obnoxious, annoying, self-obsessed bore in the office and start chatting that person up.

Why? Because they're invariably the ones who know everything and everyone; that know what's about to happen in the company before it happens; whose connections run like an invisible network of veins and arteries throughout the building. That's how they keep their jobs, despite their odious personalities. And that's why you should not go over her head and complain.

I think your instinct is quite right, that if she feels she is allowed to get away with this sort of thing, it's probably because management smiles a warm and beneficent smile upon her zealotry and lack of boundaries.

So don't go upstairs. You could just be shooting yourself in the foot.

"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Never more true than in an office.

Generals, statesmen and presidents have always understood the neutralizing effect of befriending your enemies and potential adversaries.

"Why, madam," Lincoln responded to a woman who chastised him for not calling Southerners enemies in a speech at the height of the Civil War. "Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?"

Likewise, in 1971, after being the target of a failed kidnapping attempt, Henry Kissinger arranged a Saturday meeting with several of the alleged conspirators without informing the Secret Service or the Justice Department.

He totally charmed them. They gave him "Kidnap Kissinger" buttons and one of them remained his friend for years. In fact, colleagues often commented he was nicer to his enemies than his friends.

Because with friends all you have to do is maintain. With enemies you have to convert.

It takes a little work. Spend as much time with your cracked colleague as you can stomach. Learn about her hopes, dreams, aspirations, home life, where she wants to go for vacation.

Don't overdo it. It is possible to "over-befriend" one of these toxic characters; suddenly you're having lunch with her every day and she's trying to persuade you to go on surveillance missions with her.

Befriend her just to the point where she would feel guilty selling you out. Try to ensure the information flows mostly in one direction: from her to you. Usually I find these types of characters love nothing more than to talk about themselves, and aren't really all that interested in anything you might have to say.

Which is good. Slowly accumulate information as you spray a sort of neutralizing foam of friendliness around her, a foam that slowly hardens into an immobilizing acrylic. Information is power.

Meanwhile, as any career counsellor worth the paper his or her card is printed on will tell you, you should always, always, be keeping your resume in circulation, networking and plotting your next move.

There are good offices out there, where you can both do good work and have fun with your colleagues. I've seen them with my own two eyes. You just have to close your eyes, click your heels together and believe.

David Eddie is a screenwriter and the author of Chump Change and Housebroken: Confessions

of a Stay-at-Home Dad.

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