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Corporate Culture Shock: Working the Buzz

By Dan King

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You say you're "thinking outside of the box?” That’s great!

And you've "aligned" your "core competencies" with your company's "evolving paradigm?” Wonderful!

But did you "benchmark" your "actionables" against industry "best practices" and assess the "synergies" in your "critical path?"

Wow! I think you're ready to "put some pants on it and pitch it to the suits."

Ugh! Somebody please hit control-alt-delete! Our workplaces have become jungles of jargon. As savvy corporate citizens, we're communicating in catchphrases and clichés more than ever. Much like the slang we used in school, buzzwords make us feel that we belong, that we're one of the cool people, that we're "on the same page" as everyone else.

According to Max Messner, chairman of Accountemps, "buzzwords and industry jargon are a form of shorthand used by people within a particular company or profession, but they can be confusing or even seem exclusionary to individuals outside of that field."

In a national poll conducted by Accountemps, over 150 executives and managers were asked: “What is the most annoying or overused phrase or buzzword in the workplace today?” Their responses included such axioms as "value-added," "customer-centric" and "accountability management." Usage: "Our products are value-added due to our customer-centric philosophy and strong accountability management tools. "Huh?

One of the more common buzz-wordsmithing techniques is called "verbing," in which a perfectly good noun is turned into a verb, sometimes with the added suffix, "ize," for extra punch. Examples include such terms as "partnering," "proceduralizing" and "potentializing." Usage: "If we partner with marketing to proceduralize our plan, we can potentialize our strategy." Verbing has the effect of making something sound much more complicated than it really is.

Paul McFedries, author of "Word Spy, The Word Lover's Guide to Modern Culture," practices what he calls lexpionage, the sleuthing of new words and phrases that have appeared multiple times in the media.

While use of buzzwords can enhance the perception of you as someone who has a "hand on the pulse" of corporate life, McFedries warns us to be alert to signals that our vocabulary has passed from "cachet-to-cliché," a process in which a particular word or phrase initially gains wide currency, only to be followed by a vicious backlash. Remember "Information Superhighway?"

Scott Adams, creator of "human capital" Dilbert, has heightened our sensitivity to cubicle culture and language. Along with Wally, Alice and the pointy-haired boss, Dilbert has shown us not only the silliness, but also the significance of learning the lingo. Failure to develop "multi-lingo" skills is considered a CLM (short for Career Limiting Move), meaning an ill-advised activity. Example: "Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a serious CLM."

If you would like to learn how to better "work the talk," here are a few buzzword basics (with appropriate usage) to help you initialize:

Blamestorming: Sitting around in a group discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed and who was responsible. Usage: "To maximize our take-aways, let's whiteboard our blamestorming process."

Bobbleheading: The mass nod of agreement by participants in a meeting to comments made by the boss even though most have no idea what he just said. Usage: "Based on all the bobbleheading, it appears that whiteboarding our blamestorming process is a brilliant idea."

Ghost Work: After a round of layoffs or firings, the work that used to be done by the former employees that must now be handled by the remaining staff. Usage: "Casper has been tasked with most of the ghost work since the roll-out of the rightsizing initiative."

Percussive Maintenance: The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again. Usage: "I called Tech Support over two hours ago but they're saddled with a lot of ghost work, so I had to do some percussive maintenance."

Geeksploitation: Inducing young computer programmers to work long hours by taking advantage of their enthusiasm and high energy levels. Usage: "Our geeksploitation strategy is reaping huge value-adds in productivity."

Rat Race Equilibrium: A workplace balance in which an employee's willingness to work long hours for possible promotion is equal to an employer's belief that working long hours merits promotion. Usage: "If we proceduralize our geeksploitation plan, we can achieve a comfortable level of rat race equilibrium."

China Syndrome: Current business-speak for relocating manufacturing operations to China to reduce labor costs. Baby-Boomers, however, may remember it's also the term for a nuclear reactor meltdown. Usage: "If we don't get our warm-chair attrition under control, we may have to initialize a China Syndrome solution.

Mucus Trooper: An employee with a cold or the flu who insists on showing up for work. Usage: "You can always count on Terry to be here because she's a real mucus trooper."

Presenteeism: The feeling that one must show up for work even if one is too sick, stressed or distracted to be productive. Usage: "Because Terry is such a mucus trooper, she has an outstanding presenteeism rate."

Watercooler Effect: Buzz created by news or an event (generally non-work related) that sweeps through an office, distracting the employees and bringing all work to a crawl. Example: "Did you hear that Terry landed in the hospital?"

So, should you participate in this buzz? Some people would consider it pure "assmosis," a process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss.

But if you want to "potentialize" your career, you'd be smart to heed the old adage, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” To speak the language is to respect the culture. “At the end of the day," it may help you avoid a critical CLM!

*Note: Many thanks to Accountemps (www.accountemps.com), Word Spy (www.wordspy.com), BuzzWhack (www.buzzwhack.com), and of course, Dilbert, (www.dilbert.com) for the value-adds.