Dealing with Annoying Coworkers (or Annoying People in General)

We all have them in our lives - the people that just annoy the heck out of you. To be honest, there are quite a few in my life. Some of them I don't even know. I just see them on the elevator or on the bus everyday. If you are the guy that takes the elevator down from the 9th floor to the 8th floor every time I get on the elevator - you annoy me. If you are the guy that holds the elevator door open for people that are not even in the elevator lobby yet (think holding door open for about 45 seconds) - you annoy me. If you're the guy that clips your nails in the cube next to me - you annoy me. Sorry - my list is just getting going.

Fortunately for the easily annoyed (people like me) - there are several websites available that help you deal with these situations. These sites allow you to send anonymous tips to people. Some allow free form text - meaning you can be as friendly or as mean as you choose to be (remember - you get more flies with honey). Others have pre-populated emails that are kind of funny but get your point across.

Probably the most obviously named site in the list, AnnoyingCoworker.com allows you to send emails anonymously. The site publishes some of the funnier/ruder emails on the site (anonymously) - so don't be so mean that your email ends up there. Just remember, you probably had bad breath at some point in your life too.

AnonAdvice.com also allows you to send anonymous emails. Pretty generic/plain input screen but it gets the job done. If you're so nice that you don't want someone to get the email from annoyingcoworker.com (you don't want them to know they annoy you), go here instead.

SendaTip.com is a little different than the other two sites. This site serves the same purpose but does not let you enter the text yourself. It has a menu of annoying habits that it lets you choose from and then it does the rest. Sometimes this works better if you don't know exactly what to say to someone that needs to bathe more often. Let the site handle that part. It does not, however, have ever potential annoyance - so if the thing that bugs you isn't on the list, you're going to have to do the work yourself at one of the first two sites.

I used to work in Memphis with this guy that wore blue jeans EVERY day. This was in a company where the dress code was business casual. We were allowed to wear jeans on Fridays but, for some reason, he just decided that every day was Friday for him. It got to the point that it started driving me crazy. It was great to have a site like this to send him the 'Inappropriate Pants' email - and it did the trick. The next Monday, he showed up in some khakis that looked like he slept in them. I considered sending a 'Get an Iron' email - but decided to let it go.