Surviving the Workday

I have this great link from Shelby about British banning of corporate-speak, and I’ve been trying to remember my favorite phrase of corporate-speak to use as an example. Finally, after a week of trying to retrieve a blocked memory, it is….

 SURFACE ASSUMPTIONS

This is a phrase that I was repeatedly told to use in professional development context (for adults) as a rule for workshop participants to follow. Now, it’s not an adjective and a noun as it might seem (and read). It’s not about assumptions that are on the surface. It’s intended to be a verb and a noun.

My gripes: First of all, it’s a peculiar use of “surface” as a verb. I surface, you surface, he/she surfaces. Whatever. And it’s in the imperative. Surface! Surface! Surface! And second of all, if something is really and truly an  assumption, it’s not going to “surface” all that easily just because the rule is written in the imperative. Surface assumptions! Surface! Oh, wait, wait, my assumptions are surfacing…..no, they’re not. They’re being deeply held on to by my psyche. Sorry.

This particular phrasing drove me crazy throughout the summer of 2006, not one of the workshop participants understood it, and every time I tried to bring up that it didn’t really make sense, I was told I was wrong. But the people who loved the phrase, who needed it used….they were all lovely people. They just didn’t understand that this phrase is not particularly comprehensible to others.

So onward to the banning of buzzwords in British bureaucracy:

British bureaucrats have been warned: no more synergies, stakeholders or sustainable communities.

The body that represents the country’s local authorities has told its members to stop using management buzzwords, saying they confuse people and prevent residents from understanding what local governments do.

The Local Government Association, whose members include hundreds of district, town and county councils in England and Wales, on Friday sent out a list of 100 “non-words” that it said officials should avoid if they want to be understood.

The list includes the popular but vague term “empowerment;” “coterminosity,” a situation in which two organizations oversee the same geographical area; and “synergies,” combinations in which the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Officials were told to ditch the term “revenue stream” for income, as well as the imprecise “sustainable communities.” The association also said councils should stop referring to local residents as “customers” or “stakeholders.”

And there you have it. The problem with corporate jargon and buzzwords is that these words obscure the actual meaning. Most good writing tries not to do that.