'Do the rules apply to me?'

With Ann Humphries, ETICON

(CNN) -- Parking in front of your workplace building is reserved for customers, right? Right, except for that one employee who inevitably parks there while everybody else schleps three blocks from the company parking lot.

And everybody cleans up after him- or herself in the break room, right? Right, except for that one co-worker who must imagine that this is a world of janitors and maids, all born to come behind and take care of his or her messes.

Every company has one. Maybe 10. We're talking about workers who never seem to think the rules apply to them -- just to the rest of us.

CNN: We parked right in the middle of the service drive so no deliveries could get in or out -- and we asked ETICON's Ann Humphries what the deal is.

QUICKVOTE OK, you're seeing Ann Humphries' Top 18 list of most-irritating rule-breaking issues in the workplace. Tell us which of these 10 you find the very most annoying. Parking. Interruptions. Trash. Cell phones. Language. Lateness. Boring meetings. Loudness. Not returning calls. Not following appropriate dress codes. View Results

Ann Humphries: Let's start with a list of areas in which some people inevitably seem to think it's OK for them to break the prevailing rules.

•   Parking. Probably the biggest pet peeve. I'm talking about employees who park in the handicapped spaces, people who pull around you to take a spot you've been waiting for, people who stop their cars to talk to people in other cars -- in the middle of a moving lane of traffic, like that service drive you're idling in, blocking everybody else who's trying to get into work or leave for home.

•   Carry-on baggage. Some business travelers seem to think those overhead-bin-or-under-your-seat rules don't apply to them. Along with the two-pieces-per-person regulation.

•   Interruptions. You know the ones -- they barge in, butt in, invade your space. I do think there's something to the theory that women are considered more "interruptible" than men, too.

•   Drivers. All the other ones. They're on the morning commute with you.

•   Trash. The break room pigs already mentioned. And then there are people who simply never see the need to clean up their work spaces. So you have the pleasure of looking at their mounting messes all day.

•   Cell phones. They're ringing in meetings, in elevators, in restaurants, in the office -- and with those fanciful rings, too. Allow us to introduce you to the mercifully silent "vibrate" option on your ringer selection.

•   Language. You know that company policy that warns about using off-color language as a practice that might, in some employees' opinions contribute to a "hostile environment?" And yet, there's always that employee -- sometimes a boss who feels impervious to these things -- whose vernacular could hold its own with that of a few dozen sailors on shore leave in a pool hall.

•   Cutting in line. In the office cafeteria, the Friday morning bagel line, the human-resources office line, the company T-shirt line -- you know who you are, and so do we.

•   Long waits. As in, "Sorry, Mr. BooBoo Jones did make that appointment with you, but he's just gone into another meeting and you'll have to wait half-an-hour."

•   Lateness. Look, everybody's supposed to be at work at a certain time. What's with the perpetual stragglers?

•   Rambling, boring meetings. Your corporate leaders won't believe this, but these snores aren't OK. If you don't have a rule that says meetings start and end on time -- and that they'll be quick, efficient and kept to a minimum in frequency -- then you should try tying up the Friday morning bagel line until you get what you deserve.

•   Loudness. Right there in Cubicle City, in vehicles, on those cell phones -- even raucous laughter when you're surrounded by people trying to concentrate.

•   Not returning phone calls. Especially to co-workers, have you noticed? As if members of your own company don't count?

•   Not following dress codes. Especially provocative or sloppy dressing or grooming.

•   Money. Anything to do with it. Not reporting expenses correctly, trying to cheat, not splitting a tab fairly with co-workers -- there's a walletful of possibility here.

•   Inappropriate affairs. That's office liaisons of the extracurricular kind between married (not to each other) co-workers. And those relationships between bosses and subordinates. We know what we're talking about here, don't we?

•   Ineptitude. People who are cute, funny and charming may also be incompetent, clueless and unashamed -- and they can get away with it if everyone lets them break the rule that says you should be good at what you do for the benefit of the team.

•   Thrill seekers. It's his leg if he breaks it hang-gliding, right? Well, if it knocks him out of work for days and makes him unable to perform his duties fully for six weeks more -- meaning everybody else has to take up the slack -- maybe it becomes everybody else's business. There's such a thing as having a care about what you do on your off-time so it doesn't have a negative impact on your worklife.

AS A RULE ... We tend to get some of our best ideas for "Corporate Class" topics from CNN.com/Career readers. So let us know what issues of career etiquette you'd like to see addressed. Kindly click here for a handy interactive submission form. And thanks.

Now, those are my Top 18 rule-breaking irritations. But let's talk about why people think they can break the rules. Some rules are documented and enforceable by law. Others are unwritten. One reason people break the latter kind is that they tend to change. They either update or disintegrate. Or they're changed weekly by a hyperactive management.

Some people simply don't know the rules. They're oblivious. Maybe they were never taught. On one side, how refreshing. On the other side, this can sometimes jeopardize safety and even others' rights.

One thing that may not be doing us any good in this regard is all these business-shelf books that say "break all the rules." I think that approach is shallow. One thing it can lead to is this trend these days for leaving a job without giving proper notice. People are just quitting -- which leaves their co-workers in the lurch.

The bottom line is that we all need rules to protect us from things, sometimes from ourselves. There really are exceptions in some cases -- special needs, ethical issues, no question.

But in the day-to-day scheme of things, you watch rule-breaking lead to bad events -- someone has to stay late to cover for a co-worker's negligence, someone is distracted from his or her work by rude peers, someone is leaving the place in a mess that everybody else has to put up with.

You can just be glad the rules do apply to you. And to all of us.

South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges has named Ann Humphries, founder and president of ETICON Inc., one of seven South Carolina Women of Achievement. Humphries, who's based in Columbia, is a Certified Professional Consultant to Management. Her clients have included several Fortune 500 companies. She's been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Fortune and Money, and on CNN, CBS and Lifetime TV. You can contact her at www.eticon.com.