...leveraging paradigms?

...to sabotage meetings that turn into Buzzword Bingo hell.

I once got away with "Let's hammer these ideas into the ground and see if the nice dog pisses on them" with only minor injuries.

At the end of the day with the credit crunch causing a lot of companies to do pro-active downsizing I think we all need to be singing from the same hymn sheet and do some blue sky thinking about this. Going forward it is obvious that pushing the envelope by thinking outside of the box is the only way to keep in the loop and keep all our ducks in a row.

I think maybe its time for a new El Reg competition for made up management bullshit.

Mine's the one with the P45 in the pocket

Paris, 'cos I'd like to touch her base...

that most horrible word, almost always used before a lengthy and complex explanation...

'Basically...'

..whether 20% are wrong that using these memes 'has had or would have a positive impact on their career". I know I have used them with dim management types that seem comforted by their familiar sounds.

I think its a just a mistake to use these without people bright enough to understand better.

but I fail to see how 'at the end of the day' or 'all of it' qualify - they're just everyday expressions, and are never in the same paradigm (ah, f*** it) as blue-sky thinking and all that other turd.

Incidentally, this is one article where a comment from amanfrommars would possibly make more sense than the buffling rubbish being spouted in the comments above!

You know how it is - once you've spotted it once, you see it everywhere. "Out turn". As in..."We'll let the project through this gate, and hope it out turns successful deliverables."

...there's no 'I' in team (but there is a 'me')

I've heard so much of this crap and it is about time that people were put down publically for doing it!

People who, sort of, talk in clichés - y'know. Does my 'ead in. You know what I mean? Is it to impress people with their eloquence? Does exactly the opposite. You know what I mean?

El Reg writers are not imune. My pet hate is the word 'leveraging' - crops up all the time! You know what I mean?

Does that mean offering a bribe?

Enquiring minds need to know!

One that I'm currently fighting a losing battle to not use (having picked it up from the people I'm working with on my current contract) is ENGAGE - as in "can we get the database team engaged?", "when will Networks be engaged?", and "you need to get the PM engaged"!

Maddening!

Yes I have been guilty of using these terms at home.

e.g. "How much of that can you eat?" "All of it."

or "Can you assemble this straight away?" "No I need to take it out of the box first."

or "When are you going to bed?" "At the end of the day."

or "Are you considering the new XBox at all?" "No, I wasn't going to engage in any 360 thinking."

I mean I could go on ...

Am I missing some hidden meaning, or strange usage of "All of it" ??

That sounds like perfectly cromulent English to me.

Anything described as "Industry standard": seems to get applied to anything to justify its use.

Anything described as "Best of breed": aaaaargh! It's so meaningless!

(Bill - because he epitomises the "it's industry standard" excuse for second-rate IT).

I can think of another example of buffling; going forward.

Hate that phrase.

TURDSPURT!!!

that word made me spit my tea all over my keyb.

what did it do to yous?

Whenever I hear anyone say "at the end of the day" I immediately interject with "it gets dark". I've had to do it multiple times in separate meetings but do it EVERY time I hear that phrase in the hope that people will eventually get the message that it's irritating and lazy.

My other pet hate is "it's still early doors". EARLY DOORS? What's that all about?

Calling it buffling is just as bad as doing it.

In plain English it's called TALKING BOLLOCKS!

It is normally perpetrated by middle management who no longer have the technical jargon they could fall back on as senior techies, and are missing that ability to bore/baffle people into stupefaction. So they substitute bollocks for English.

It's as bad as someone who punctuates their sentences with "right" or "yeah".

sounds more like a tissue full of ideas to me!

just query it. Great game...

Boss: ..think outside of box....

you...what box?

Boss...run it up the flagpole...

you...where is it?

Boss....what...

you..this flagpole?

or one to really make him look dumb....

Boss...moving forward we need to be pro-active

You....Ok, I'll crack on with getting those future problems fixed.

Boss...great, that's what I like to here.

may explain my lack of promotions...

Personally I don't use any of those terms - at least, I've not noticed it - but I have noticed them in common use more and more often. On a related note, are you sure "buffling" isn't just a typo (intentional or otherwise) of "bluffing"?

"Tasked" as opposed to "Asked" or "Told". As far as I am aware, "Task" is a noun, not a verb. Using Task as a verb is doubleungood.

Many of these phrases are absolutely fine, and I don't find them annoying at all. However, I do find them very annoying when used incorrectly, which is what a lot of management seem to do.

I have a nasty habit of correcting or asking questions about meaningless phrases:

2. Touch base

Thank you, but I don't want to play for the company rounders or baseball team.

3. At the end of the day

It's dark and I'm either asleep or in a pub. Oh, the end of the working day? Ok, I'm going home.

6. Blue sky thinking

Yes, nitrogen scatters blue light, what's that got to do with my job?

7. Out of the box

You want me to unpack the new shiny toys? Cool, lead me to them. Where's the screwdriver?

10. Singing from the same hymn sheet

Is it not rather bad form to bring religious doctrine into a place of work in a mostly secular country?

13. Ducks in a row

Repeats of Terry and June can be found on cable TV. Fortunately, watching them is not in my contract.

14. Brainstorming

I am not troubled by epilepsy at the moment, and my job doesn't require me to know much about it. Why are you talking about it?

16. 360° thinking

Gets you back where you started from. If you're going to just go in circles, can I go home?

18. Pushing the envelope

Bring me the head of Willy the mail boy! He knows he's not supposed to fold, spindle or mutilate!

19. At this moment in time

Do you mean "Now"?

20. In the loop

I don't have one for this, but loop reminds me of rope, which usually means sailors, so I can use the pirate icon. Yarr!

A repulsive line-up, to be sure.

But whatever happened to the obnoxious "step up to the plate" and "bring something new to the table"? Surely much better than "all of it" (is that even a phrase?) and "thought shower" (very Day Todayish, but I've never actually heard it used).

(Jacket because I've more than once said "at the end of the day" in a non-ironic manner and been thoroughly disgusted with myself once I realised).

...that "Take this offline" isn't there (in relation to discussing something outside of a meeting).

That phrase makes my blood boil! A poncey way of saying they don't want to talk about something.

Jolly Roger, as most who like to use this kind of lingo are *** pirates!

I was bleating about this months ago.

http://manfromthezoo.blogspot.com/2008/05/going-forward.html

Paris, because she never thinks outside of her box.

Where's Synergy!? It's quite possibly the worst!

Death to those who promote the use of such shite.

Now write a short story, in total less than 200 words, that includes all these phrases.

In a word, Friday.

I love clichès - without them my head would roll and my dick would be hung, drawn, quartered and minced. I translate. What I translate is corporate and public administration gobble-de-gook - bullshit about bullshit. The thing is, it's cunning bullshit. There's always a hidden agenda - and the emperor's new clothes might look invisible to outsiders, but that's only cos they're stealthed up to hide the real beef. So what is source is subtext under subtext (who's screwing who, who's gonna be screwing who, and who's thought up the whole scam), and this needs to be transferred into target with the last little nuance in place. And the stealth shielding covering it all? Clichés wrapping everything in sticky cling-film. And interpreting is the same thing but in real-time - ear to tongue with no time-consuming detours through the wetware.

So, no clichés - no subtext. No layers of cling-film - way too much of the wrong kind of transparency. And no more politics, diplomacy or business deals as we know and love them.

Translators have a code: if we like someone, we write what they meant to say. If we detest someone, we write what they actually wrote.

Another very useful aspect of clichification is that it means that you can regurgitate the same crap in five years time, but rejargonizated so it feels new. And that's good for us too, cos it means we have to think less, just so long as we didn't bother about changing the old buzzwords in the first place.

So no supercilious holier than thou shit from know-all Regarstards, please! This stuff is Warhol performance art, world-class poetry, and what's more, it's a perpetual motion machine going round and round before our very eyes.

(Paris cos she loves clichés too, and I'd like have her gyrating perpetually over me wearing the fairy-tale emperor's new clothes.)

all I am looking for is a little more clarity on these points, with the aim of escalating these opportunities to the business owner for resolution. If he buys in, we can leverage our other intellectual properties and methdologies and turn them into new business assets. Then we can rapidly monetize those assets and thus deliver an uptick in business value...

Kill me now...