Can Someone Translate This For Me, Please?
If you want to lob a few thought grenades across the office, be careful they don't detonate too close to you. Why? Because a session of "blamestorming" could follow. Does all that sound like gobbledegook? You see, I'm told these are the latest lines in workplace lingo. A "thought grenade" is an explosively good idea. This phrase became fashionable among office staff last year, as did the expression "Let's sunset that", which refers to unsuitable ideas that must never be mentioned again. Every worker knows the pain of recriminations after a project goes wrong. Now it has a name - "blamestorming", which means debating why a deadline was missed and who was responsible.
FOOTNOTE: Lingo star.
11 comments:
Thought grenades get thrown out of think-tanks, presumably...
nice one...
Love it, the phrases that people come up with! I have been out of an office environment for a few years now, so have missed these gems.
I suppose you could call it a "thinkbomb"...that is if it was odorous and foul! My career choice led not to offices but radios and backroads...I'm sure that was a lucky choice after this insightful post!
Sandi
An interesting concept that hasn't made it to Wyoming yet. I just might start this trend myself! LOL
Hmm, they should introduce courses in Blamestorming in the b-schools
Back when I worked in the corporate world, I despised "synergy" and "global footprint." Every time someone would use those words/terms, I would just cringe.
Hello David,
LOL I laughed a lot. I didn't know any of this, and I hope you don't mind my taking notes of these "Working class mantras" - they are great!
My favourite is "Let's sunset that" - brilliant!
Cheers
Having left the workplace some years back I don't know the current lingo, but I suppose it differs from country to country. I haven't heard any of these, "pushing the envelope", and "Pro-active" were big when I was working......and they are still being used today. Brainstorming is what we used, and I think they still call it that. Alhtough I am sure new euphemisms pop up all the time.
"bobbleheading "agreeing nodding up and down to everything the boss says in a meeting -my favorite
Another round of flavour of the month corporate gobbledegook?
Soory.....I have an allergy to jargon.
In South Africa it is rife. Every problem is a "challenge" - that can mean "overcoming obstacles", "dealing with gross incompetence", "coping with poor service delivery" etc. Couch it in the "right term" and you give it credibility. For example a "power outage" really means "Eskoms failure to generate sufficient energy to meet the contry's power requiremeents, though gross incompence"
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