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As a manager, I know that people get hung up on what they should avoid to keep their jobs. Here's my first thought: if you are thinking along these terms about your current job, then you may want to think about going to get another one someplace else. Don't ever feel trapped in your current work situation. You deserve to be happy at work.

My list:

1) Don't do the job on your job description. Most of the lists you will read for this question come back to this. If I hire you to move bricks, move the bricks. You'll have a lot of latitude about all the other stuff, including flexibility about when you arrive at work.

2) Sabotage others who are trying to do the job. People get hung up on making others look bad in order to make themselves look good. This technique only works well for one day, and then people figure it out. Also, making your teammates angry has consequences.

3) Break your promises. That includes the implied promise that you'll show up and show up on time, participate in the team setting, be present at meetings (and more than just physically present). If you say that you'll move those bricks, move those bricks.

4) Destroy your company's assets. We have all had days where we dropped the rack of glasses, drove the forklift into the gas pipe, or misspelled the word "education" when writing a bulk mailing about the importance of education, but there are people who do these things constantly, and are constantly saying, "Whoops," or worse, "Well, it can't be helped." When you work for any company, bad mouthing your employer, especially to its customers, is an especially stupid thing to do. If you hate the place, get out of there.

5) Harm yourself repeatedly. I knew a woman who used to rivet her thumbs, cut her fingers on cutting machines, staple herself, all kinds of stuff. She worked in a factory. They had to lay her off because she just couldn't get the job done without putting herself in the hospital. If you refuse assistance with your ergonomics as well, you are putting yourself at harm and showing that you care little for yourself as an asset that you are leasing to your employer.

6) Assume that your boss is your mama. I love proselytizing about how I exchange work for pay and benefits. People forget that. Work is supposed to be a place where they get free coffee and can spend hours whining about their personal lives to their colleagues and their boss. I use the metaphor that a car mechanic who goes on and on about how many years he's been a car mechanic is not giving me the service I'm paying for. You are there to work in exchange for a paycheck.

7) Refuse training. Technology in our world changes constantly, and you will create your own obsolescence if you refuse to learn anything new.

8) Talk abut how you could do the job better than anybody your report to. This is not only a personal affront to the person you report to, but a clear sign that you are not leadership material. A good leader follows well first. If you keep thinking, "I oughtta' run this place..." then go start a business of your own.

9) Pick fights. Your excessive need to be right belongs at home or at your therapist's. A corporation is run by a group of people, and most of them know what they're doing. Picking fights removes you from the team.

10) Announce that you're looking for another job. I gotta' tell you, the minute I hear that as a manager, I stop spending money, time and energy on you as an employee, and at some point I start demanding that you fulfill your promise.

Learn more about this author, Marianne Pelletier.
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