Cursing up a storm could be bad news then, too, according to a recent survey by recruiting site TheLadders.com.

About 70% of the managers surveyed said they’d fire an employee for bad office manners. The top offender? Bad language. According to the survey:

• 81% of bosses find workplace profanity “unacceptable”
• 36% have formally disciplined someone for cursing, and
• 6% have fired a workplace potty mouth.

What else is grinding managers’ gears these days? Stealing lunch from the fridge, gossiping about co-workers and wasting paper are also serious offenses.

How about your company? What breaches of etiquette have your managers disciplined folks for? Let us know by dropping us a comment.

Have you ever seen a candidate answer a cell phone during an interview? If so, you’re not alone. According to a recent Vault survey, 26% of recruiters have run into that problem.

Sounds like a big mistake and an automatic deal-breaker, and in many cases it is — 68% of the survey respondents would disqualify someone who answered a phone call. But apparently, that’s not stopping a lot of people.

Overall, the majority (59%) of recruiters said job candidates’ manners have gone downhill over the past few years. Some of the findings:

• 87% said they’d seen candidates dress inappropriately in the interview
• 43% had interviewees who used profanity, and
• 19% had candidates who brought children to the interview.

Door swings both ways

While employers should be on the look out for unprofessional behavior, job candidates are doing the same thing with hiring managers. For example, 56% of employees said they’d been interviewed by someone who interrupted them to take a phone call.

Other examples of bad manners include showing up late, checking and responding to e-mails and eating lunch during the conversation.

Just as candidates need to focus on making a good impression, HR needs to remind hiring managers to avoid behavior that could be a turnoff for a potentially great employee.