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Wed 10 Mar, 2004 07:02 pm
You know those words or phrases that people use in business to sound more professional? Like "getting all your ducks in a row" or "leveraging our strategies"? This is so annoying to me, and where I work there are so many people who use them.
And sometimes they even make words up, which is even worse! Yesterday I heard someone say "I'll be officing in . . ." THAT'S NOT A F*CKING WORD! Why do people do that? Are they trying to hide the fact that they don't know what the hell they are talking about!?
There. Rant over. Thanks for listening.
Sounds like you'd be excellent in Bullsh!t Bingo at a meeting, kicky, but I gotta tell ya, you're right.
Strangely enough, in public relations the first thing they tell you is to avoid all such language. Sometimes it's a little hard to get businesses to speak plain English, but there's a reason for the rule.
Kickycan, run that by me again!
Re: Buzzwords piss me off
kickycan wrote: Are they trying to hide the fact that they don't know what the hell they are talking about!?
Yes.
I have been known to laugh out loud when "hot button issues", "synergies", "think outside the box", etc., are used during a presentation/meeting. I was in a meeting the other day and a "side-bar" item came up when a manager said to me "let's talk about this off-line". Now I knew he meant let's get together later to talk about it, not hold up the meeting with this discussion ... but since when am I a cell-phone or a computer? Off-line? Why couldn't he tell me we'd talk about it after the meeting? I hear this beaut all the time and it drives me nuts.
I like to give the business elite quite a few Homer Simpson "Doh!" moments. When speaking of "networking" i use the correct term of venerable age, reticulation. If someone says they may need to downsize, i loudly ask them: "Oh, you mean you're going to lay people off of work?" It doesn't take long for people to realize their best bet is to speak plain English to me.
I hate the word "Utilize"
It sprang from business jargon, takes longer to say than "use" while meaning the same thing, and sounds dumb.
My professors use it all the time - it drives me nuts.
Another thing I can't stand is when people use nouns as verbs. Like for instance Solution. I know many people use this as a verb. Let's solution the problem rather than Let's find a solution.
In the office I also see many monkey see monkey do on buzz words. For example the Sr. VP uses certain buzz words, within a week, the VP follows suit and so forth down the line. It annoys the h*ll out of me. At least be original.
Yeah, that kiss-ass BS pisses me off to no end as well.
I'm so glad I'm not a business person - all this stuff would drive me crazy.
Of course, the artworld also has plenty of vices.
Portal that stuff drives me crazy. I like the business/financial world because I have the right mind for it - I am more logical and like things that make sense. I detest the other side of business. Trying to look better than the other person, the politics, etc. I prefer to be upfront and say, this is who I am rather than all this phony crap.
In that respect I make an awful business person because I am so likely to say something out loud when the office politics start up. I had a client call me a stupid B once (and much worse) so I hung up on her. When she complained about me to my boss, I told him he could fire me if he liked but I wouldn't take abuse from anyone, even a client. I'm pretty known for speaking my mind if someone crosses the line with me. I think some people probably can't stand me but what do I care? - my stress level is lower than theirs is. And if I DO get fired, ah well, que sera sera. I'll SUE their asses!
I think A2K is overdue for a paradigm shift.