10 Office Faux Pas by Catherine Clifford
Beware of these blunders unless you want to be the coworker everyone loves to hate
You’ve got a job. Good. Now keep yourself off a potential-layoff list by avoiding bad office behavior. Here are 10 horror stories straight from the trenches.
1. Don’t! Be the Office Downer.
You don’t want to be such a buzz kill that people arrange their desks away from you.
That’s what Caroline Melville, owner of virtual administrative service VirtuallySorted.com, had to do after hiring an accountant to work with her small team.
In the mornings, when Melville asked how he was doing, he would respond with a deadpan, “I am not dead yet.”
2. Don’t! Microwave Fish in the Office.
Tuna sandwiches are banned from some offices, but fish dishes in the microwave are absolutely off limits.
3. Don’t! Go Barefoot
4. Don’t! Set Your Ring Tone to the Jonas Brothers
Keep your phone on vibrate. Your officemates notice your ring tone — especially if it’s particularly loud and annoying.
5. Do! Save Smiley Faces for Mom
Sherry Kerr, the owner of a small public relations agency, hired a recent college graduate to be her assistant and was confronted with an acute case of smiley face overload.
They were on the picture frame, clock, mouse pad, screen saver and a decoy on the monitor. “The desk space itself was really dreadful,” says Kerr.She also put smiley faces next to her initials and every single place she signed her name — including the company’s tax forms.
Kerr eventually had to let her go, for unrelated reasons, but, Kerr says, “I have to confess that I was happy about not seeing smiley faces anymore.”
6. Don’t! Be the Boss’ New BFF
“People who are worried about being laid off end up going overboard to prove that they are indispensable, and that ends up making them seem so obnoxious to people,” says Tina Lewis Rowe, a professional development coach.
7. Don’t! Read Your Emails Out Loud
Keep a lid on it, neighbor. One wife complained — on her husband’s behalf — about a coworker who reads her emails out loud. And listens to her voicemails on speakerphone. Seriously.
Now her husband has to take any serious reading home and do it at night because he can’t concentrate in the office.
8. Don’t! Give Yourself a Mani/Pedi
“I had a boss who would clip his nails at his desk,” says Michelle Poteet.
“It would be one thing if you waited until there was background noise, but it always seemed to me that people, would do this when it was dead silence. Getting rid of a hang nail would be fine.”
9. Don’t! Steal Food
One anonymous reporter out in the field says that her Lean Cuisines disappear from the freezer on a regular basis.
10. Don’t! Crank the Russian Folk Music
Headphones, people.
“We had one person who was playing Russian folk music all day long,” says Megan Slabinski, executive director of The Creative Group, a California-based staffing agency.
Oddly, management was reluctant to address the issue, reports Slabinski.
“Ultimately, we encouraged them to say, could you please put on a pair of headphones?”
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source: http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/107646/10-office-faux-pas.html
