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What is your least favorite corporate buzzword/consultant-speak?
Best Answer
- Recommended by:
- Nipun Jethi,
- Thomas Mandell Jr,
- Sean Collins,
- and 1 other
"Loosening the Mayo Jar." I've heard this one the first time today, and it has been used twice by the same person. Not sure the origin of it, but it is worth adding to this list.
- Recommended by:
- Michael Schmier,
- Roger Tung,
- Tiffany McFarland
I'm already sick of "curate." It sounds like your content should be treated like museum specimens.
- Recommended by:
- Thomas Mandell Jr,
- Andi Gutierrez,
- Tiffany McFarland
I don't like when people want to "touch base." Neither did a former admin of mine. "Mr. Zweibel," she'd say, "prefers not to have his base touched. But would you like to leave a message?"
- Recommended by:
- Joe Chernov,
- Jessica Groopman
I'll go with the "izes."
- Operationalize
- Productize
- Monetize
- Incentivize
We live in such an action-oriented culture, we can't even let our nouns remain nouns. They have to become verbs!
- Recommended by:
- Jeff Ogden,
- Lori Janjigian
I really liked Jeff's list on his blog.
The other peeves of mine this year (and thanks for asking -- this is so cathartic!):
* Socialize - as in to think about an idea. "Let me go and socialize your proposal with the rest of the team and I'll get back to you."
* Boiling the Ocean - to not focus. When used with consultants, it means the client doesn't want to spend as much money as you're asking for. When used by your boss, it means that your idea is too big right now. When used by climate activists it means actually boiling the ocean.
* Tactical (meant as a disparaging term), as in "I don't want to get too tactical in how we're going to get bigger than Google this year." Opposite of strategic which means "anything which is virtually unobtainable during this bonus year.
Runner up is any message that is left on voice mail beyond name, phone number and best time to call back, unless it contains urgent medical information or stuff about your kids.
- Recommended by:
- Joe Chernov,
- Tiffany McFarland
A particularly troubling one for me is "open the komono"... this is MBA speak for being transparent with someone.
- Recommended by:
- Sandra Gans
"Ramping up", it makes me think of parking garages.
See my blog comments about Jargon at Work: http://tinyurl.com/263rnak
- Recommended by:
- Brian Phelps,
- Thomas Mandell Jr
4 way tie:
"circle back"
"low hanging fruit"
"on the same page"
"take this offline"
- Recommended by:
- Chris Nordman
Thanks Chris, you're setting a high watermark. Here are the rules-of-the road for today's sprint: I'll be collaborating with Joseph on the deck since Craig's out of pocket today. Michael's heads-down on the preso to monetize the payload. Steve's socializing the top-line revenue generators with the client's C-level. That way, Nipun won't catch us with our pants down when we open the kimono. Ramping it up could be a real hiccup, so Chris, you and Rebecca take it offline and circle back to me via text. Wayne, we're all counting on you to take this to the next level. Oh, Craig, yeah you're right, this could be a real game-changer, so it better be all about ROI.
Love your post, Chris, as is violates every single rule in the book.
Jeff Ogden
www.findnewcustomers.com
I've worked a couple places where they loved to tout their "Work hard, play hard" mentality.
How bout
"taking it to the next level"
heard it the other night over 10 times at a networking event...
I have two phrases that I have come not only to hate because they are over-used, but also to fear because they are usually omens signifying the exact opposite of what they are intended to mean:
1. Game-changer - most things billed as game-changers rarely are.
2. Exciting new direction - this usually means that either the company or you (or both) will be going in a new direction, and it will be exciting, but not in a good way.
- Recommended by:
- Chris Nordman,
- Dawn Gulino
I wrote a popular blog article about this very topic - 16 Marketing Terms to Ban in 2011 http://fearlesscompetitor.net/2010/12/13/16-marketing-terms-to-ban-in-2011/
If you like it, please re-Tweet it or link to it. Also love your comments.
Jeff Ogden, the Fearless Competitor
Find New Customers
http://www.findnewcustomers.com
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Alright guys, we need to figure out how to capitalize on this deal. I would like to see a 30,000 foot plan which we will circle back on later today. I need someone to drill down into our past reports to make sure we are on the same page; we need to be proactive on grabbing all the low hanging fruit and think about more robust plans later down the line. In order to provide an apples to apples comparison with our last deal, I will take a tactical deep dive into the data points. I think we can make this a win-win for all of us, but I don’t want to put too much on your plate before the weekend. I will reach out to a few of my contacts to see if they can push the envelope (assuming they have the bandwidth). I am going to take my action items offline, because I will be out of pocket tomorrow; if I need anything, I may be pinging a few of you tonight. Look, I don’t want to throw anyone under the bus, but if we don’t step up and create a robust solution this week our jobs are going to be on the line. At the end of the day, we don’t need to reinvent the wheel, we just need to get our ducks in a row, make sure we aren’t cannibalizing our resources and be careful there are no serious disconnects.