While meetings are undoubtedly the best place to indulge in a game of buzzword bingo, practise your doodling and munch biscuits, the work part itself can be terribly dull. Perhaps that’s why – like trying to suppress the giggles – when grown-ups sit down in a room to talk business, childish behaviour, mishaps and chaos can ensue. Here’s what not to do in a meetings:

Take the slapstick approach. Shine your shoes, turn up on time, shake hands and say something sensible. How hard can it be? One PR who wishes to remain anonymous recalls one of the pitfalls: “I was once part of a team pitching for new business, and after the presentation my colleague managed to lead us all through the wrong door – into a cupboard. We sheepishly removed ourselves from the cupboard, and then the meeting room. We never did win their business.”

Reveal too much. Another source recalls the moment when the managing director sat back down to start a meeting but unfortunately missed his chair. “Before we knew it, he was flat on his back with his legs in the air flashing some very fetching Homer Simpson socks.” Laughing the mishap off was the best and perhaps the only option. “Needless to say, comments and jokes about ‘getting bums on seats’, ‘falling behind’ and ‘making an impact’ cropped up throughout the rest of the meeting.”

Play by the rules. Never blatantly disagree with someone or that person will be deaf to everything you say for the next ten minutes, says Steven Kirkpatrick, the managing director of Adecco Retail and Jonathan Wren, both recruitment consultancies. Then again, there’s always the less measured approach. “I’ve stormed out of a room,” he says. “It was actually with a prospective client [but] I decided that the person was being unreasonable and I was only on this earth once.” Despite being angry, Kirkpatrick allowed himself to be persuaded to go back into the meeting room. “It wasn’t a tactic,” he says. “[But] I got exactly what I wanted.”

Show astonishment. It’s not surprising that Jane Rolls, a regional director at Reed Employment, now disapproves of people showing up to meetings with their breakfast in a noisy paper bag. At the start of her career and desperately keen to win new business from a local council, she turned up to a meeting well prepared – only to find out that her audience was even more prepared. “Halfway through they actually took out a lunch of sandwiches, a flask of soup and serviettes, and started eating. They didn’t speak to me, they listened.” Rolls won the business, but nearly lost her poise. “I was gob-smacked at the complete unprofessionalism.”

Speak without thinking (part I). “I’d been invited to a meeting to discuss diversity and equality,” says Professor Binna Kandola, a senior partner at Pearn Kandola, a business psychology firm. “It actually went well and the chair[man] of the meeting said, ‘this is a really good discussion and we have made good progress, but the nigger in the woodpile is . . .’ Everyone in the room, their mouth dropped open.” When challenged about using the expression, the speaker then proceeded to dig himself in even deeper, before apologising unreservedly. “Oh, no,” he said. “I’ve done it again.”

Speak without thinking (part II). It’s important to be aware of who you are addressing in any meeting. “It tends to be the case that men, in particular, like to use sporting analogies,” Professor Kandola says. Phrases such as “we’re going to have to get the heavy roller out” or “play it with a straight bat” can cause confusion. “People think, what the hell do you mean,” he says. “In a multicultural environment these metaphors may be lost on the audience.”

Hallucinate. It’s embarrassing when someone falls asleep – and if you’re the one in snooze mode, don’t expect your notes to make any sense. “I remember dropping off. I ended up with ‘senior managers must look after their pigeon wings’,” Professor Kandola says.

For future reference. Some meetings are about finding a speedy resolution, others are about proving that you’re a team player, says John Lees, a career coach and author. Judging the tone of the meeting is key if you are to be successful and, as it turns out, if what you really want is to be gently ushered to the exit. “A friend of mine wanted to get early retirement,” Lees says. “He decided that the best way to go about it was to laugh at inappropriate places in meetings. It worked.”

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