Sorry if this sounds political, but I got a feeling that it does affect performance and progression.

1. How do you deal with colleagues who spread rumours and report unjustified things about you to your RO?

2. Will ROs give lower performance grades (since performance and progression largely depends on ROs during ranking) upon hearing these talks/rumours (without concrete evidence)?

I am asking this because as mentioned previously, ROs are ultimately still humans; some of them might still be easily swayed by others, no?