Local governments banned from using business jargon

[Wryel]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7948894.stm

I'm sad to see 'touching base' isn't in there. I hate that expression. A lot. Almost as much as when you squish your finger and get a bruise under your nail. Or when you bang your leg and hop around in agony and someone says 'are you alright?' Of course I'm not you ****, weren't you watching?

[Flibster]

Now that just blue sky thinking with vanilla reasoning. :D

I hate stuff like that. At my previous employer, one of the managers had a habit of using all possible jargon he could. We created some Management Bull**** Bingo cards and distributed them before any meeting that he was in. :D

[NokkonWud]

Really annoys me.

Singing from the same song sheet, grease the wheels, touching base and blue sky thinking are 3 I hate so much. In fact, next person I hear say them gets a punch in the larynx.

[Mark]

It's frightening just how many of those I use at work. I feel unclean. :o

[Fayshun]

Singing from the same song sheet, grease the wheels, touching base and blue sky thinking are 3 I hate so much.

That's 4 :confused:

[Slinwagh]

Time to push the envelope.

[Rich_L]

Strange how when local government suggests removing pointless things like apostrophes from signs it's 'dumbing down' yet removing phrases from usage is a good thing - the vast majority of 'management speak' is often a more precise term than the 'common' phrase it replaces, it's just not understood as well by stupid people.

i.e.
benchmark - measuring
procure - buy
tranche - slice

Why are we catering to stupid people?

[NokkonWud]

That's 4 :confused:

Just testing ya!

[NokkonWud]

i.e.
benchmark - measuring
procure - buy
tranche - slice

Why are we catering to stupid people?

In all 3 of those instances you could quite easily just use the regular word, or even an alternative word more suited to conversation though.

[Rich_L]

Not necessarily, to use the examples there:

Benchmark - implies that you are comparing against a set level, measuring - no comparison being undertaken

A tranche is specifically to do with paying a large financial sum in instalments, a slice is something you do to a cake (lol).

Also, procuring might not necessarily mean buying, the former means bringing something about whereas the latter means acquiring something, usually with money - two different meanings.

Surely a more desirable solution would be, if you don't understand, how about making the effort to look the word up rather than catering to the lowest common denominator.

I appreciate that, by over-use and appearing to 'look clever', some terms are incorrectly used as management speak, but equally, words shouldn't be taken out of the lexicon (or language, I should perhaps say) simply because the average person doesn't understand them.

[Zirax]

Fully agree with Rich-L there. I do hate management speak for the sake of confusing people, however it does have its place.
Baselined plans, Close of Business (COB), Close of Play (COP) etc. There are probably loads more that I use. However they are established ones in common use. However I work in a private company.

When I go into a public office to implement something, normally the managers go bananas and try and out "management speak" you. I openly have said to some of the managers "ah thats from chapter X in the prince 2 manual". They normally quieten down then.

edit:- Just read the article again. This appears to be tailored more at letters going out to the public. Which is fair enough.

[Pheebs]

What Rich and Matt's said.

People who are not willing to learn/understand certain terminologies for their line of work are lazy IMO. I can understand the taming of letters to the public as not every Joe Blogg will be able to comprehend nancy pancy unnecessary language and sometimes I think the terminology which can be used can sometimes scare people. It's where I reckon lots of people make errors/miss out on benefits/misunderstand taxation rules etc. But for jobs and personal pursuits, the language shouldn't be dumbed down. I remember being overwhelmed with all the lingo spewed on me when I dipped into my Bobby work... and although a good handful of it was complete codswallop... a lot of it was very useful.

In my line of work I'm fairly down to Earth with my use of language. I've found I seem to be more successful at winning the hearts of clients by being casual and friendly. Only when it comes to talking about wonga things seem to change a little and some of my terminology changes to suit, but I think that's only natural. Although I am friendly I don't want to come over as a walk over nor unprofessional so it's where I demonstrate I'm fairly down the line and know where I want to go with things.

[Garp]

Apart from the fact this is for letters to the public, I would tend towards agreeing with Rich, but for one tiny thing.
Often the "management speak" is used in incorrect places merely because it's the popular slang and the guy is trying to look cool/obfuscate/impress or whatever. I've all too shockingly frequently heard even relatively basic words like benchmark used incorrecly.

[Rich_L]

For sure - it's always entertaining when office-speak is used incorrectly :p

I dunno, I expect my local council to act in a professional manner, not write to me like I'm a primary school child, if I got some dumbed down patronising letter it'd probably be even more likely to go in the bin :p

[Dymetrie]

I never use buzz words like that!

I tend to just call people ****s :D

[Von Smallhausen]

Shame they can't ban Council Tax.

Dick Turpin would be ashamed of them

[Beansprout]

Strange how when local government suggests removing pointless things like apostrophes from signs it's 'dumbing down' yet removing phrases from usage is a good thing - the vast majority of 'management speak' is often a more precise term than the 'common' phrase it replaces, it's just not understood as well by stupid people.

i.e.
benchmark - measuring
procure - buy
tranche - slice

Why are we catering to stupid people?
I'd suspect the problem is the stupid people mis-applying the words and using them completely incorrectly, confusing everyone. That's something I hate more than most other things :D

[AboveTheSalt]

Some years ago on the first day of my MBA course, a lecturer kept talking about paradigms. Bewildered, I asked what a paradigm was - quick as a flash, he replied "A model or method".

When I asked why he didn't use the words model or method, he was not able to provide an answer quite so quickly, or in fact at all.


I went through much the same experience yesterday when someone said that there was a "pressing need to establish a formal protocol to deal with a particular set of circumstances". I asked if she meant a set of guidelines and she agreed that that was exactly what she meant.


Jargon and TLAs are fine if often completely unnecessary, when they are used exclusively within a particular discipline as an aid to effective communication but see what happens when you tell your Granddad to "boot his PC" because it isn't working - he probably will ;D