WORKPLACE JARGON, also known as corporate speak, is the often needless and/or meaningless sentences and phrases used by both managers and colleagues in the workplace instead of plain English. But why do so many people get wrapped up in technical jargon? And how many conversations have you had with colleagues or employers that have been incomprehensible because the language used required the services of a translator? I don’t know about you, but to me, the more an individual uses business jargon, the less likely I am to believe they actually know what they are going on about. It all sounds big and important, but at the end of it, all you are really doing is letting people know how good at the language you are. Business jargon can be useful when speaking to those who speak the same language or are in the same technical line of work, but if you are not one of them, then you are left in the dark. In a way, ambiguous speech has become the official language of business. Go to any office, and you will be in for clichés that don’t seem to mean anything. In fact, reading many official communiqués is like reading into ambiguity itself. Here are a few top-shelf business clichés …and yes, what they actually mean. We think outside the box: What this actually means is; We wouldn’t know about how to do anything innovative if it came up to us. Who’s going to step up to the plate? When your boss poses this question to the group, he is simply saying that one of you should be performing that task, and not him.It’s gone viral. Someone sent a tweet about this. And it was re-tweeted over and over again.We’ll loop you in when we need to: When you hear this from your boss, just know that you are not important enough to know about all the details on the particular subject.
