Buzz-off Buzzwords

It’s been an interesting few months. I’ve travelled from one end of the planet to the other 3 times (soon to be 4), visited with family and friends, met loads of new people, worked with some amazingly talented individuals and had what can only be described as an overabundance of stimulating conversation. 

Some of those conversations have included more than their fair share of buzzwords. It’s reminded me just how widely buzzwords, phrases and consulting speak are used. The fact they’re used isn't really an issue. It’s how, when and why they’re used that causes problems.

Why can't people just use plain language? Why do they have go populating everything with vacuous words that actually add no value to the sentence let alone the conversation?

No doubt you’ve heard about Buzzword Bingo. It’s usually played by people who are bored. Bored of hearing the same rubbish. Bored of listening to others pepper their presentations and conversations with meaningless phrases and terms because information and ideas are limited or there's an attempt to cover for a lack of knowledge. While Buzzword Bingo helps alleviate the boredom and it makes us laugh, there’s a far more serious message coming out of its use.

As leaders and managers we want people to comprehend our intention and expectations from the words we speak. For this to happen we’ve got to use words and phrases that are clear and make sense. We can start rectifying this in ourselves by listening closely to others and observing the body language of the audience. As the audience shifts in their seats and roll their eyes it’s pretty clear they’re not listening let alone interested in what it is they might be asked to do.

For example... Management can achieve more by talking less about “empowerment” and letting people get on with what it is they’ve been hired to do. If you rely heavily on buzzwords in conversation and documentation, take an objective look at why you use them. Are they communicating your intent? Do they make any sense in the overall context of your message? Did your audience go away any more informed than when they arrived? 

Here are some examples I’ve come across recently. I even own up to using some of them; perhaps more to make a point than any other reason. No doubt you’ll recognise a few…

Socialise

One team

Herding Cats

Best Practice

Heads up

At the end of the day

Moving forward

Blue sky thinking

Touchbase

Pain points

Green fields

Agile

Lean

Synergy

Touch point

Buy-in

Sustainable

Voice of the customer

The Cloud

Bespoke

Low hanging fruit

Traffic lights

Governance

Out of the box

Let’s take this offline

Vanilla

Business Case is underway but go ahead

On the same page

Gap analysis

Strawman

You are SO right!

The A Team

Choose your attitude

Yes I am listening

It won’t happen overnight but it will happen

Some are funny, many are used as slang or to parody other people, most of them are used with double meaning. Let’s say buzz-off to buzzwords. Let's make a conscious effort towards buzzword free discussions, presentations and documents. In the meantime, join in, have a rant about the buzzwords you hear and while you’re at it, add your favourites to the list.