London - They are an occupational hazard of the modern world.
Management jargon such as 'thinking outside the box' and 'going forward' are among the worst annoyances for office workers today.
Today a new survey of more than 2,000 managers reveals the most irritating habits of Britain's deskbound staff.
And as well as using management speak such as 'Let's touch base', workers who send you an email despite sitting opposite you, and those who leave a smelly, dirty plate on their desk after eating lunch are ranked among the worst offenders.
The report, from the Institute of Leadership & Management, found ‘the nightmare colleague’ commits a long list of crimes.
They arrive late in the mornings and for meetings, take regular cigarette breaks and come into work when they are ill when they should have stayed in bed.
They gossip excessively about other workers, openly discuss confidential work matters and they bring their children into the office.
Other offences include the use of ‘management speak’, which many managers described as a ‘pointless irritation’ which few people understand.
The worst examples of jargon are ‘thinking outside the box’, ‘going forward’ and ‘let’s touch base.’
The tea round is also a source of fury among workers, with many becoming resentful that their manager never goes to buy the teas and coffees for them.
But the winner is poor time-keeping. Nearly two-thirds of managers said they found their colleagues arriving late in the morning or for meetings as ‘their number one irritation’.
Another big bugbear was workers who send an email, rather than talking to them, ‘despite sitting opposite’, an irritation shared by 56 percent of managers.
And office outfits are also a problem, with revealing outfits and flip flops a common source of problems.
Charles Elvin, chief executive of the Institute of Leadership & Management, said: ‘When office-based teams work in close proximity for long periods of time, we see that seemingly trivial issues can grow disproportionately, if left unchecked.
‘They can begin to cause upset and resentment.’
The report urges people to change their annoying habits in order to become model colleagues.
One top tip is to avoid using email for some communication. It said they can be ‘impersonal and unclear’, and that many matters can be better dealt with on the telephone.
Professor Cary Cooper, from Lancaster University Management School, said colleagues’ habits are increasingly irritating as Britons spend so much time in the office.
He said: ‘The office is our first home, and then we have a place that we go to sleep and wake up to have breakfast with the kids for 20 minutes in the morning.
‘Millions of workers spend more of their waking hours at work than they do at home.’
The problem is growing as the traditional 9-5 day is replaced by a much longer one, with many workers starting earlier and leaving later every day.
The Institute of Leadership & Management’s research was based an online survey of 2,165 managers in the UK who work in both the private and public sector. - Daily Mail