Security blanket? Human pack instinct? A desparate distraction from lack of substance? Most people cringe at buzzwords, yet they’ve become such a common part of how businesses talk within their walls that it’s spilling over into how they talk to customers, even how they see their customers. “Well the employees seem to love synergy, let’s invade customers’ ears with this meaningless abomination of the english language,” might be the thinking, more likely though it’s just around so much that no one takes notice, no one is there to put a stop to the madness. It’s corporate turrets. Some new words are truly needed, with new meaning, usually born of necessity due to some new technology. Others were once just fine but have been twited or overused and left weak, boring, even annoying due to this. Still others are and always have been simply silly. What’s the answer? Here are some of the buzzwords (and a fast-spreading grammar disease) that should be permanently laid to rest.
Innovative –
This means new and creative, as you no doubt know. It’s overused to the point of meaning nothing really. Most people just sort of shut off for a few seconds after they hear it today. Plus, the word creative inherently means new anyway. If something is creative it’s by default new and if it is not new, well then it wasn’t creative. Creative has the added benefit of not putting people to sleep and not being in the tagline of a million tech companies. Everyone uses innovative though… we even use it, we’re trying to get better but it’s so easy to fall off that wagon. Try this, the next time you hear or see the word innovative, replace it with “genius” or “creative” and see how much better it sounds. There are pleny of other words that work the same and are more exciting, less cliche too. Not being facetious (farcical, flippant, frivolous, droll, fanciful, ironic, sarcastic, whimsical, waggish, sprightly, satirical) at all, the thesaurus really is underused.
Champion –
Initiative champion, “she’s championing” this or that, etc. Unless they literally have won some sort of large competitive event and are the defending title holder of it, they are not champion. They might like an initiative, they might be in support of something and be actively trying to get other’s support, but none of that makes one a champion. It might make them annoying and bothersome, but not a champion.
Initiative (as part of a made up phrase) –
An initiative champion is really just someone who supports an idea. Someone can have initiative, but an initiative should not be something someone is trying to do or an idea. “Let’s get this initiative off the ground.” Incorrect. “He had the initiative to get it off the ground.” Okay, but are we talking about something heavy? “She had the initiative to make it happen.” That sounds so much better and has the added benefits of being correct and simple.
Opportunity –
Some in the corporate world have taken to calling problems, honest real problems, opportunities—but not opportunities as in “Hey! Let’s fix this! Cup’s half full!” which would be fine but “opportunity” as in “You’re not getting the promotion because there are too many opportunities in your resume…” Or worse, something like, “We’ve identified some internal cost-saving opportunities in line with opportunity to diversify our core direction.” – They’re going to fire half the staff and sell the company is what all that probably means. Opportunity indeed. Opportunity only means one thing, and it’s a really great word, so let’s not ruin it. If you ever come across anyone using opportunity like that, they probably are not to be trusted.
Thought Leader –
Most would consider Gandhi or Martin Luther King, or Einstein or Socrates, or maybe Steve Jobs in the business world, thought leaders. But today it’s like every person with a half original thought in the corporate world gets the title. It borders on insulting really, when put in perspective.
Bandwidth –
So this is a real technology term that has something to do with range of communications, whether it is radio frequency bandwidth, or more recently and commonly today, bits per second of information referring to computers or the computer connection. And at some point it became common to talk about bandwidth as if we are the computer or communications device. “I don’t have the bandwidth to take on this project.” Um, okay but do you have the time? I’m confused. That or cyborgs are among us, occasionally revealing their mechanical innards in Freudian slips.
“Quotations” –
Quotation marks are becoming a problem. Many bloggers and marketers have taken to using them far too often for all of the wrong reasons. You should quote words when writing a conversation, when quoting (thus the name), when you are talking about the word in question itself not the word as part of the sentence (we do that in the opportunity section and innovative section above as a reference), or when you are using the word sarcastically. That’s the only time to use quotation marks. Some “people” are using them “everywhere” though, and all this does to a “sentence” is make it slower, less interesting, confusing because it sounds sarcastic, as in, “Wait, so you’re being sarcastic when you say people? Not real people? Cyborgs again? Dang it, what’s their bandwidth?!” and it’s incorrect grammatically.
Synergy –
This might be the reigning king of horrible buzzwords. Unfortunately there may be many (it seems from how often it is used, probably cyborgs) who believe that synergy is a powerful and effective way to express energy through teamwork and cooperation. Like, it sounds like energy right? Which is positive, exciting, caffeine-e. “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts”? Boring Aristotle. Learn to write loser philosopher, obviously corporations know better. “The whole creates synergy greater than the sum of the parts!” Wow now that’s exciting! Aristotle totally should have said that instead! …That last part is 100% sarcasm. Seriously let’s all stop using the word synergy.
Facilitate –
Make something simpler and help bring it about… which usually just means to make something simpler since in making it simpler, bringing it about is assumed, and that is where problems with the word arise. “I will facilitate a meeting.” You hear that a lot and that would mean to make the meeting easier as well as to put it together or plan it, but what is meant is that they will plan it only, not that they will make it easier. So when said in that way they are using a longer more difficult word for some reason (probably to sound more professional?) incorrectly which does not sound professional at all. Okay, so now this meeting has become unnecessarily complex for no good reason thanks to a silly buzzword. It’s often used the correct way too. “Our software facilitates payroll management.” Okay, that is a correct way to use the word if you have software that makes it easy to do payroll and takes some part in actually doing the payroll, but it sounds confusing. See the irony in that? Facilitate is only ever used correctly to sell simplicity, but the use of the word makes it sound complex. Does this not sound better? “Our software makes payroll easier.”