Goodness knows I've been known to talk on planes. I've met some great people and one good friend by accidents of seating. Today, I learned how incredibly...well...stupid supposedly smart people can be.

Seated a row behind me on the flight from DC to NYC today was a woman maybe in her late thirties and a male companion whom I guessed to be a coworker. Throughout the flight, she loudly declaimed that "That guy is an a--hole" and that so and so "should be investigated by the SEC" and that she "piled boxes across the entrance of her cubicle to keep the idiots out" and that a school she went to (an excellent technical college with which I happen to be quite familiar) "was a waste in the middle of nowhere." All of this was said in a loud enough voice that people seated across the aisle from me were rolling their eyes. Now, amid all of this were liberally sprinked company names, bosses' names, coworkers' names, and information like "all the numbers were wrong so we just made up a bunch of sh-t."

Now, I'm no longer a hiring manager, but I was thinking, "Ma'am, if you were to cross my threshold looking for a job, I would have secuity escort you from the building."

The saying is that "loose lips sink ships" but they can sink careers, too.

- Mind your manners
- Remember where you are
- Think about this: I might be someone in your company you haven't met
- Think about this even more: I might be one of your competitors
- Think about this yet again more: I might be one of your customers (!)
- Think about this even more than that: I might be from the SEC or another regulatory authority

Have a good flight!