favorite / least favorites buzzwords from work

[BTravlin]

Meme

Not sure if it is a workplace buzzword or not since I've never worked for MegaCorp but I sure am tired of hearing it in the real world.

 

[chilkoot]

What are some of you favorite (or least favorite) buzzwords from work?

Proactive
Work smarter, not harder

I remember an e-mail that was sent out a few years back, introducing a new executive. It included a notice that she would "office" (used as a verb) in a particular location. Luckily this didn't seem to catch on.

 

[steelyman]

[I remember an e-mail that was sent out a few years back, introducing a new executive. It included a notice that she would "office" (used as a verb) in a particular location. Luckily this didn't seem to catch on.

I never heard that one.

Maybe when I resigned, I should have said, "I think I'll go office somewhere else for a while".

 

[MRG]

Shrimps
Who DAT
YAT
Geet (did you eat yet)

heh heh heh - posting near lunch time. Rosedale BBQ or Louisiana Kitchen.

Rosedale, or the gas station.
MRG

 

[Sarah in SC]

So, mine is "bandwidth". Had a CEO a few jobs ago who loved that one.

Count me among the folks who use "so" a lot in my speech and casual (among friends) email/text conversations. Laziness, true.

 

[Marita40]

"Diversity--overused to the extent that it has become all but meaningless
"I don't have a dog in that fight/horse in that race"--I heard this twice this week in two separate meetings.
"We at [name of my university] are a family"--yeah, a big dysfunctional family I guess.

 

[H2ODude]

Threads like this bring a big smile to me. You've hit all I can think of already. Ahhh, retirement.

 

[robnplunder]

"Stay on top of ..." - depends on what's at the bottom.
"Stays in this room ..." - the most oft broken agreement, and pretty quickly
"Are we having fun yet?" - outdated. I am having so much fun that I could die (or FIRE).
"How was your weekend?" - on Mondays and Tuesdays (sometimes).

 

[aja8888]

My supervisor in a past consulting firm I worked for always used the phrase "expand the envelope" (aka.. suck more projects out of the client).

Another term he like to use was a good client is a "base load client"...keeps us busy....

 

[mickeyd]

VP: This is new Client Jones. He served in Vietnam too.

Me: So?

later on...

VP: You could have been a lot more enthused with that guy.

Me: So?

 

[RunningBum]

I feel like starting a sentence with "So" is like clearing your throat to get attention. I subconsciously use it sometimes, but I think it's because if I start right in, my listener(s) don't catch the first part of what I'm saying, and I have to repeat it. Instead, by the time I get "So" out with a short pause, they are listening. It's also a way to introduce a new topic. If I'm talking with people at a party, or on a group run, and one conversation tails off, I might start with "So" to indicate this is something new, and not a delayed continuation of the last conversation. YMMV.

Thankfully I've been out of the workplace long enough that I've forgotten most of the buzzwords that annoyed me, though "paradigm" lasted way too long.

 

[utrecht]

"Stay on problem"

 

[target2019]

Disruptive technology

Business Buzzwords Generator http://on.wsj.com/1kxUVaM

Sent from my Nexus 10 using Early Retirement Forum mobile app

 

[David1961]

Once when someone asked me what paradigms are, I said "20 cents".

 

[LoneAspen]

"How was your weekend?"

This one's always annoyed me, because nobody really cares. None of my coworkers care what I did over the weekend, any more than I care what they did.

I've gotten to the point when somebody asks me how my weekend was, I just reply I spent all weekend doing laundry, or some other mundane boring task. They must all think by now I sit around washing the car, vacuuming, or watching paint peel.

I also learned long ago not to reciprocate and ask them how their weekend was, because so many people have kids, they launch into a diatribe on all the family stuff they did, and that just bores me to tears (I don't have kids).

I guess I'm just becoming a grumpy old man the older I get. Now get off my lawn!

 

[Khan]

Paradigm shift
Get our ducks in a row
Eat your own dogfood
Excellance (yes, spelled wrong in a presentation on excellence)

 

[Calico]

"Best practices" - my new supervisor uses this AT LEAST three times a day.

It drives us crazy, so we are seriously considering leveraging our spirit of teamwork and drilling down to the core mission of our organization to refocus our energy outside the box until we find a way to utilize our resources to their maximum output and resolve the problem.

Translation: we frequently daydream about "leveraging" said supervisor off the nearest bridge.

 

[rjohnla]

Very funny and you all covered a lot of them. Seems the bigger the company the more buzzwords we have. Here's a few:

1. Modalities (one VP started, others picked up) This is not a business term I've ever heard. Crossword puzzle maybe. It was used in place of Business Units under Divisions.

2. Nexus

3. Lessons Learned (Ok, I must confess, sometimes for fun, I start using a word/phrase and see if it catches on. This lasted almost 3 years, slides, etc.) Reason I did it? Was assigned a project that I knew would be a disaster so we didn't fail we learned lessons.

3. PMP = Performance Management Program, has objectives, like MBO's.

4. Behavior Modification (really, good luck)

5. Strategic Planner Meetings, nothing strategic here, I made a spreadsheet up in 2007 to list tasks people were working on. Just gave it that name to make it sound important.

There's more, but also seems I'm a culprit to, but it's a game for me.

 

[aja8888]

"utilize"..........that sucker is all over the place anymore. Doesn't anyone just USE stuff anymore?

 

[sanfanciscotreat]

I hate it when people use the word "like" many times in a series of sentences, as: "like I was going to the store to like buy some aspirin.

 

[aja8888]

I hate it when people use the word "like" many times in a series of sentences, as: "like I was going to the store to like buy some aspirin.

You left out the uhs. ("Uhh, like I was uhh, going to the store to uhh, like buy...).

 

[gauss]

1) 110%
2) "learnings" as a noun

-gauss

 

[MRG]

'You're a chicken you can't speak, only pigs can speak in this meeting'.

'It's a stand up, don't sit down. This will be over in ten minutes'..... hour later they're still talking.

 

[FireBug]

Socialize...." Document is ready to be socialized"
Hall pass...." I'll give you a hall pass on that" (as in... let me slide)

Ones I like ... see above "let me slide"

 

[scrabbler1]

One annoying one from my working days was the overuse of the term, "empowerment."

On the plus side, a favorite one I liked to use was the phrase, "in the galaxy" which referred to some data my staff was reviewing as being within the range of possibility or reasonableness.