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Bad Office Habits: What annoys UK workers the most
Working in an office can be challenging at times. Not just because of a busy workload or difficult boss, but because of the people around you. Ricky Gervais captured a lot of these pet peeves and annoyances in his hit comedy “The Office”. Find out all about the bad office habits annoying workers.
We surveyed 1,028 people on what were the worst office habits. We also asked them about their most hated traits in co-workers and if they’d had a colleague steal from them! Read all our findings as we provide a comprehensive look into what’s grinding our gears in the modern day office.
What Are The Worst Office Habits?
Our study found that 65% of UK workers believe that having poor hygiene is the worst office habit and that figure rose to 72% for women.
With many people now choosing to eat at their desks, it’s perhaps not surprising to see that 39% voted eating smelly food as a bad office habit.
Interestingly, using bad language in the office was seen by more than one in three as an annoying office habit and this received more votes than sucking up to your boss (31%) which has so often been mentioned whenever an office worker is talking about what winds them up in the workplace.
When you consider how many hours we share alongside colleagues it’s no surprise conversations can sometimes involve sharing information. Our study though, found that almost one in five of us could do without being involved in such conversations!
(The above quotes are actual responses from our study)
The Traits We Hate In Office Workers
Our study looked to find out what traits in other office workers Brits found annoying. Coming out on top was dishonesty with a whopping 66% stating that this was the worst trait in an office worker. Not following too far behind was laziness with half of us picking this out a bad trait in a fellow worker.
The below quotes are taken from actual responses in our study.
Perhaps in keeping with how sweary workers had proven to be such a bugbear with those in the office, 42% of our respondents were unimpressed with bad manners. The fact that over a quarter of us hate lateness as a character trait can be said not just for the workplace.
UK Office Theft Statistics
We wanted to gauge how common theft in the office was. Also, we wanted to see how this can contribute to a poor workplace environment. Our research found that:
- More than one in seven people have had a colleague steal from them
- Men are more likely to have been stolen from than women (16% versus 12%)
It might seem a minor thing to pinch a pen or to borrow stationery and never give it back. However, that’s exactly the kind of thing that can rub people up the wrong way. Worryingly, a high proportion of those who said they’d had a co-worker steal from them told us money was taken. This can destroy trust amongst a workforce and the negativity could impact on departmental performance and/or the overall business.
Doncaster Council was in the news in June 2019 after it tweeted a picture of a padlocked milk bottle! The image, which was soon deleted, raised questions about whether it was accepted as “one of those things” for items to be stolen. This comes off the back of a YouGov survey in 2018 that found that one in eight employers consider the theft of minor office stationery like pens and pencils a “very serious” matter. The below chart illustrates YouGov’s findings from November 2018.
“I don’t like Mondays”
It perhaps comes as no surprise to learn our respondents voted Monday as their least favourite day of the week. One in 10 men seem to have the hump with “hump day” after nominating Wednesday as their worst day.
How do UK workers deal with colleagues behaviour?
When it comes to trying to cope with annoying office habits, UK workers are more inclined to ignore co-worker’s behaviour. This is backed by 48% telling us one of the ways they’d try and deal with it would be to ignore it versus 44% opting to tell the person annoying them to change their behaviour.
There’s a bigger split between ignoring and confronting people when you compare male and female responses to our study. Our results show that 54% of women would ignore what was bothering them compared to 46% of men. Only 32% of female respondents said they’d tell a colleague to stop doing what it was that was annoying them. We found that women were far more likely to talk to fellow co-workers about someone’s annoying habits than men (17% of women versus 10% of men).
Despite the number of bad habits named in our survey, running to management to complain isn’t a course of action our respondents are very likely to take with only 5% saying they’d complain to their boss. Alarmingly, 4% would take the drastic step to look for another job just to get away from a co-worker’s behaviour.
Responding to the Study
“Our study has uncovered some revealing insights into what’s annoying UK office workers. As many use the start of a new year to evaluate where they are in their career, it’s important for business owners to ensure that something that may be viewed as just a small annoyance, doesn’t become the reason why a member of staff leaves. Through communicating to employees and making sure that there’s an environment where colleagues can talk to each other honestly and most importantly, respectfully, you can go a long way to making sure that some of the bad office habits mentioned by our respondents don’t become a big issue.
“We find it alarming the number of workers who have had a colleague steal from them. This is unacceptable and can be a massive contributor to a toxic working environment!” – Cartridge People spokesperson.
Information For Journalists
The dataset from our study is also available on request.
About Cartridge People
At Cartridge People, we stock a wide range of office accessories and supplies, including a wide range of toner and ink cartridges, stationery, and much more.
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