Business Speak I never want to hear again!

Cherubs:

There's something happening to our language concerning the way we communicate in the world of work, here in America. The words are moving away from the humanity, there's a distancing and an objectification that's happening. It bothers me immensely. I'll attempt to use a little humor here, but consider the following phrases:

"Think outside the box" -- People who still say this are decidedly inside the box. It's become a tired phrase that attempts to conjure creativity, but instead succeeds only in conjuring eye rolling on the part of the listener, if indeed, the listener is still listening. How about "think creatively about" or "think beyond the obvious" what's wrong with that?

"It is what it is". -- I do not know who coined this phrase but if ever a more empty, defeatist, negative phrase existed I don't know what it is. If the good side of this is to invoke pragmatism, there must be a better way to do it. How about "let us accept those things which can't be changed and work together to improve those which can"? Oops, maybe that's too many words?

"Take this offline" -- This is an attempt to pretend that you don't want to bother people in the larger meeting which the details of a particular matter. But what it really means is that you actually want private time with the person disagreeing with you in order to brow beat them into submission with impunity and without witnesses. And by the way, when we're sitting in a meeting are we "on line"? I know some of us are pounding away on our blackberries and not paying any attention to the meeting in the first place, and I know that some of us are so unfortunate as to have had to call into the meeting which allows those present in the meeting room to snicker at us without being detected, but I was not aware that we were "on line". So why are we taking things "off line"? Things in English are really weird in corporate America.

"Circle back with" -- OK this is a weird one. What this means is that you can't answer a question, so you need to speak with the person who has the answer. Why you can't just "speak" with them as opposed to "circling back" with them is beyond me. It kind of reminds me of the old cowboys and Indian games, where the cowboys "circle the wagons" (which by the way, never really happened but it made for a nice movie shot).

"Reach out and touch" -- Okay I think the political types use this one more than the corporate types, but I've heard it both places. What it means is to contact somebody, talk to somebody, speak with somebody, telephone somebody, or otherwise attempt to communicate. There was an old television ad I believe that had a jingle "reach out, reach out and touch someone". Perhaps that old ad is what spawned this phrase, but I actually would posit a different theory. My theory is that "reach out and touch" gives the feeling of distance and "speak with" gives the feeling of closeness. When faced with the choice of distance or nearness, most corporate speakers will choose distance. Distance is safer. Also, I think "reach out and touch" implies that you're doing something more than you're doing. Corporate speakers always want you to think that they're working harder than they really are.

"We" -- "We" almost always equals "I" or even more often "you". People choose to say "we" because they think it sounds more egalitarian than "I/you", and protects them from being exposed as a bully, which is what they're really usually doing, bullying you into doing it their way. Consider the following sentence: "I'm not sure we should be taking that approach". What this means is "you stupid idiot, just do it my way and get it right next time, ya hear?" Enough said.

"Resources" -- "Resources" = "money". There are no exceptions to that equation. It's just that we don't say the bad, bad money word. The money word is bad, very, very bad. Even if "resources" = "people", "people" cost money. And the money word is bad, very, very bad. Don't say that word, okay?

"Throw him/her/them under the bus" -- This frighteningly violent phrase has to do with pointing out that somebody on one's team, or elsewhere in the company, might be responsible for doing something less than helpful. "I don't want to throw anybody under the bus but didn't that gaff in the newsletter originate with the editing team?" It can also mean that you intend to assign somebody a painful, difficult and thoroughly awful project and then you name the name of the person to whom this dreadful and thoroughly awful project will be assigned. Then you end with some iteration of the bus phrase. "Not to throw Julie under the bus, but she'd be very good at sorting out all the widgets into the special widget drawers and then reporting the contents of each drawer in 20 different memos to senior management, twice weekly." In other words, when you state you don't want to throw somebody under the bus, that's exactly what you end up doing. Look both ways before crossing anywhere in corporate America folks.

"The bottom line is" -- See above under "Resources".

"Bandwidth" -- This is an adoption of a computer measurement of memory or disk space which is being applied to people's "time". "Time" is almost as bad "money" in the corporate world. Don't say these words okay? Again, I'm seeing a depersonalization of people -- they don't have "time" they have bandwidth, they are not people, they are computers. They are not people who have time and who cost money. They are people who have/don't have bandwidth and are worth/not worth resources. Yikes!

"Do the math" -- You do the math! Okay, I'll do the math! Doing the math refers to figuring something out. I actually don't mind this phrase quite so much if it is not used to brow beat somebody. "Everybody knows that the editing team (not to throw them under the bus) has made at least 25 errors this year. I mean, you do the math!" There is one most dreadful iteration of this and that is, dare I say it, the conversion of the word "math" from a noun to a verb. Yes, it's the now commonplace assumption that we don't have enough verbs in English and so therefore, we have to use perfectly good nouns and convert them to verbs. People "gift" each other now, so I guess, the verb "to give" is just not okay anymore. But when people "math" things out, I have to put my foot down all. I really can't stomach that.

And I guess that brings me to the end of this blog entry with a plea for a return to humanity in the workplace. Let's close up the distance and communicate with one another in such a way that acknowledges our human worth and makes us less like commodities and more like people. I dare say we'll get more done, make more "money" and have more "time" to ourselves. You do the math!

All my love, Margaret