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" I Can't Really Sit Here And Listen To This. "

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20:10 / 20.05.04

A thread for discussing examples of the above, so links to company websites, annecdotes and personal experiences.

Ever get the sense you've woken up in the middle of a dream involving turkey basters, apes and your intimate anatomy, only to realise you've dozed off for a sec in a meeting at work ? Ever sat there and felt like a cold, dead hand was playing your spine like a keyboard, while leafing through a company's promotional literature ? Ever not sure, when faced with the latest example of big business thinking, if you haven't at some point relocated to Mars ? If so... Let's go !

20:46 / 20.05.04

"That's how you IT support training, you have to push them off the ledge, but be there to support them when they fall."

Less searchable M0rd4nt

22:38 / 20.05.04

[Voice of Evil] Kill them, Alex... kill them allll... pick up youu staple remover and go for the jugular... kill... killlllll... KIIIILLLLLLL...[/Voice of Evil]

pointless and uncalled for

07:31 / 21.05.04

I love messing with the jargonistas when they come to my office. My favourite ploy is to press them for a tangible interpretation of their new found language. It's nice to cut off their lines of response one by one until they are forced to face the fact that they haven't said anything at all and then admit it. On one such occasion I then asked how much someone was paid to come up with this type of crap to which her mumbled reply was along the lines of "probably too much". Sadly still within earshot of the passing centre director.

I wasn't present at the time but I am told that when some drastic staffing cuts were made, her head was one of the first to roll. I like to think that I can take some responsibility.

Of course if the jargonista can turn up a tangible element then you know that you have a formidable opponent and the games can begin.

09:36 / 21.05.04

The thing is if you are the person throwing the jargon about it can be quite fun. Or if the jargon being thrown about doesn't damage your life in anyway...then no biggie.

ONLY NICE THINGS

09:54 / 21.05.04

All true. The one that *really* upsets me is leverage (used as a verb to mean, in effect "take advantage of"), because it feels like such a surrender. People using "utilise" when they mean "use" makes me sad, because they are doing it only because tey have heard other people doing it to sound impressive, but "leverage" is the killer. Apart from anything else, because "leverage" as a verb already *has* a meaning - to employ debt in addition to equity within a capital structure, making the usage not only awful but actually second-generation awful.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:09 / 21.05.04

Nope... Haus, I can outdo you. "leveraging". Hear that? That's the English language being bent backwards until its spine breaks. And I've seen that one written down in fucking newspapers.

New ones I've heard... "inboxing"... unless it's filthy, that's just plain stupid.

And I swear... next time I hear the phrase "roll out", meaning "introduce" or even "start"... the thing that'll be rolling out will have a couple of eyes and a nose. And it won't be mine.

There was a comedy moment at my work at about 5 this morning though... a friend of mine came up to me and say "(insert name here) just said HOLE IN ONE!!! I didn't want to ask... it's taken me ten minutes to realise that he meant the fax we were having trouble with has finally gone through..."

where's the tower, where's the gun? where's the tower, where's the gun?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:12 / 21.05.04

Oh, and just for the record (sorry, Barbelith people, I'm just venting randomly now, which is why I didn't ask to add this to my last post but just let it fly) I. DO. NOT. LIAISE. WITH. ANYONE. Talking to people, yeah, I'm fine with that.

Sorry. "Inboxing" is still making my skin crawl. I feel it crawling. I see it crawling. Soon it will crawl right off my body, and "roll out" its bloody revenge.

Liaise with that, motherfuckers!

10:27 / 21.05.04

You kids are too uptight. Jargon is fun. You should start playing with language and different forms of expression.

pointless and uncalled for

10:32 / 21.05.04

I liase with people. This is one of the few jargonised words that I use because of it's specific meaning. Talking to people is open, honest a frank. Liasing with people is different. It implies a set of rules about what and how you say things and that a certain amount of reading between the lines.

This is important, particularly in my line of work. It means that things won't be recorded, so peoples asses are covered and if you misunderstand and fuck up, on your head be it because you should have known it meant something different when you were liasing rather than discussing.

Discussing is another thing altogether.

I will admit that liase is horribly misused by marketing idiots.

Touch base, is my hate-phrase. Followed by process mapping.

10:38 / 21.05.04

Liaising, pah - how about interfacing with people? I know someone who talks about interfacing with her own Mum.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:39 / 21.05.04

Oh, apparently we're only supposed to send stuff out to clients who are "hot".

We don't get photos.

How the fuck are we supposed to know?

pointless and uncalled for

10:47 / 21.05.04

Interfacing is another different way of talking to people. It has it's own set of rules.

1) Anything said must be on-message.
2) Nothing commital may be entered into.
3) Only marketing and sales persons may interface.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:59 / 21.05.04

Christ.

You just said "on message".

I despair.

Why not just use plain English the whole fucking time. Be completely honest the whole fucking time. And if not, say to someone, "this goes no further"...

By the way, I don't hate neologisms on principle... just the ugly ones. And "inboxing", "jargonese" and fucking "LEVERAGING" are just plain ugly. I speak not as a linguistic aesthete- just someone who can hear the plaintive cries of a language in agony. And believe me, every time one of these fuckers uses one of these words, it screams. Like a kitten. A tiny little kitten. In pain.

Is that what you want?

11:02 / 21.05.04

Is this jargon? I'm not sure, but I always find it funny when corporate types use 'myself' for 'me', and 'yourself' for 'you'.

I think they do it to look important and official. But unless you've already used 'me','you' or 'I' in the sentence, it just makes you look illiterate.

Hattie's Kitchen

11:05 / 21.05.04

Let's grease the poo magnet, people!

Sorry.

I was asked by my boss a while back whether I'd be interested in participating in a working group to conceptualise a new IT system.

Why not just ask if I want to go to a meeting about new computers? Conceptualise? What the fuck?

On a related note, I'm in the middle of summarising an investment magazine, all about launching asset-backed bond securities. What's so wrong with secured loan, for fuck's sake?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

11:10 / 21.05.04

[off-topic] Ah, HK... I think you know who I'm talking about that's currently stood above a chained and gagged English language with a red-hot poker and a box of Scrabble... [end off-topicness. ("Off-topicness?"... for fuck's sake...)]

pointless and uncalled for

11:10 / 21.05.04

The use of on-message, and commital for that matter, might have been a little tongue in cheek.

If you say "this goes no further" then someone can say, "X said this and told me that it goes no further."

You can't be quoted on something you didn't say. It's a sad state of affairs but liasing means you're talking to someone about private stuff but you can't trust them.

Another few for you:

Harmonising Objectives
Rationalisation Period

and the grand evil of all time,

cover your eyes if you are scared

SYNERGY

if that doesn't induce banshee sized screaming then nothing will.

11:12 / 21.05.04

Personal favs/hates:

Lets "touch base".

I physically cringe whenever anyone uses that phrase.

"Energise" the call centre/office/etc

Since when were we on the Enterprise? Picard what? I actually pulled my boss up on that one and asked him what the hell did "energise" mean and how would I implement it (there's another one), to which he didn't actually have an answer.
I wandered around slapping everyone's backs and chatting to my mates. It energised me if nothing else.

My current companies managing director speaks in nothing but jargon and for that I hate him and everything he ever utters. How can people speak in wall-to-wall bs and sleep at night?

Hattie's Kitchen

11:14 / 21.05.04

(off-topic) Ah, yes, Stoatie, it, wouldn't, be, the, amazing, Comma-Man, would, it? (off-topic)

11:14 / 21.05.04

I like synergy... but I see it in my minds eye as SINergy, [sarcasm]aren't I subversive?[/sarcasm]

11:19 / 21.05.04

I know someone who talks about interfacing with her own Mum.

Kinky.

pointless and uncalled for

11:22 / 21.05.04

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong

11:23 / 21.05.04

I've been a bit out the loop on office jargon lately, so I need to be brought up to speed on this, asap.

But, " Singing from the same hymn sheet, " as in " I think we are... "

And, " Throwing his toys around, " as in so-and-so is.

pointless and uncalled for

11:26 / 21.05.04

Singing from the same hymn sheet is a variant of the reading from the same page reference but I'm willing to bet it has been lifted directly from an evangelical sermon.

Look for the boss who is a fervent christian.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

11:33 / 21.05.04

(HK... yes, it, is,,,,,,,,,,,,)

And I'm sorry, but most people EAT lunch. Or HAVE lunch.

Surely DOING lunch is a matter for specialist videos...

And where I come from, yes, lunch can be a verb... but it means "take lots of drugs and pass out" rather than "pretend to eat lunch and discuss business".

Different strokes, I guess...

"WHAT YOU TALKIN' ABOUT, WILLIS?"

I think my enthusiasm for the booze project may have coloured my A1-ness for structuralisation, sentence-wise. I'll clink glasses with you on this one later. I currently feel I should go and out-loop myself for a few hours... closage of eyes may be a goer, and lying-downage probably has to be actioned ITIF.

11:36 / 21.05.04

A few years ago a certain local authority restructured its housing department. The first step they took was to re-write all the job descriptions of all members of staff, and they did so by basically removing many of the tasks that staff actually performed and replacing them with meaningless aspirational jargon relating to the ethos of the local authority. They then declared all staff potentially redundant as none of them matched their existing job descriptions and they had to apply for jobs in the new structure; they were interviewed on their ability to make some sort of sense of the job descriptions of the posts they thought they were applying for. So, for example, a person who was previously processing applications from homeless persons would attend interview to be asked one question about housing legislation and 6 questions about the "Transforming [Name of Local Authority] Agenda," "outcome focussed performance management initiatives" and other such bullshit. Members of staff who were made redundant under the restructure then took the council to the Employment Tribunal and after an 18 day hearing were found to have been unfairly dismissed, in part because testing someone on practically meaningless jargon is not a fair way to assess a potentially redundant person's ability to do a job.

It's not a stretch to say that here jargon played a part in flushing over £200,000 of community charge payer's money down the toilet.

11:55 / 21.05.04

Okay - this is coming from something I have just written with my own hands: "They further state that this is primarily a training role for the volunteers concerned and that their input will not significantly affect the project output". Now, do I deserve to die?

Mitagating factor - I've been proofreading the document all morning. it should have taken me 5 minutes, but I'm been wanking around and staring idlly into space.

In a stunning burst of unprofessionalism, this is from the docuement I'm writing about "a portfolio of specialised ***** competencies". Now, what the fuck does that mean?

12:00 / 21.05.04

as much as i admired alex's initial vision statement, subsequent posts have lacked the necessary joined up thinking required to meet our current business model. as a potential quick win scenario, may i suggest some vigorous hotdesking across departments, to win those hearts and minds.

pointless and uncalled for

12:08 / 21.05.04

Vigourous hotdesking is symptomatic of poor vision management. A proper resolution pathway would be to engage in a forum based enhanced target objective with peripheral corrolorarys.

12:15 / 21.05.04

No rest for the wicked, eh?

Hur, hur

12:27 / 21.05.04

It's no good guys - this threads in danger of leaving the zone. Let's visulise our value based strategies and get back in there!

Corporate wank bingo.

A fall of geckos

12:27 / 21.05.04

I used to hate corporate meetings at my old company - I worked fairly closely with the PR & media deparment, who for some reason seemed to be among the worst offenders when it came to corporate-asshole jargon.

Then someone in my deparment brought one of these in.

It's amazing how much a meeting is transformed when someone answers a question like "now is that really thinking outside the box?" by shouting BINGO at the top of their voice.

12:52 / 21.05.04

I think a word should be said in defence of critical path analysis. It's not jargon, it's a useful technique.

pointless and uncalled for

12:58 / 21.05.04

The technique is useful, critical path analysis is the jargon way of refering to it.

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