Every schoolyard has a few “difficult” kids whose misbehavior ruins playtime for everyone else. Office life isn’t much different. Standard issue with the stapler and the paper clips come certain workplace types who didn’t get the how-to-behave memo (or, more likely, made a paper airplane out of it). These coworkers can interfere with your productivity, offend your sensibilities, derail your career, and, worse, prevent you from leaving on time.

Much as you might like to crawl into your cubicle and ignore troublesome coworkers, at some point confronting them may be your only option. But first be sure the situation really requires a draw-a-line-in-the-sand discussion. If it does, speak to the person in private, and remember that your goal should be to improve things for the whole office. And try to keep your emotions in check so that you can have a reasonable, productive discussion.

There are nine aggravating workplace personalities on the following pages, with tips from etiquette and workplace experts on managing them. See anyone you know?

The Clueless Overling

How He Disrupts Your Day: He uses smoke and mirrors to look productive, but everyone knows he doesn’t do anything — except cause mini-emergencies with his meddling. Your productivity suffers, too, because you’re constantly performing triage.

Best Way to Finesse: The only job you need to salvage in this situation is your own. “Let (his self-sabotaging behavior) take its course,” says etiquette expert Margo Howard, author of Slate’s Dear Prudence column (www.slate.com). The boss’s follies will eventually attract the attention of top people at the company, and with luck they’ll make a change. But if things are unbearable and a change seems far off, you may have to seek out a boss in another department or even another workplace. “If this person is that clueless and you’re on his or her coattails, your career could be in danger,” says career coach Marjorie Brody, author of Career MAGIC: A Woman’s Guide to Reward & Recognition (Career Skills Press, $25, www.amazon.com).