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Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

theatlantic.com

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Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#61

Post by rat9988 »

CPLX wrote: post #51
dntbnmpls wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh "values". This meaningless buzzword has creeped into every facet of modern life. From politicians and their "western values" to CEOs and their "values" to baseball teams and their "values", everyone uses "values" to justify their evil or to defend or excuse their evil. And of course there is the "alignment" of "values". Oh, stealing signs doesn't align with your team's values. We benefited from it greatly for year…

I disagree, I think “values” is a great word that has a clear meaning. It‘s a statement of what things you consider more important than others. The problem you’re outlining here is that people often use the word while lying.

This is due to the word meaning having multiple meanings.. Example:

"The values we all shares are fundamental"

We all know the meaning of the word values used in this sentence. we don't know it means what in this context, though. Am i talking about freedom? Equality? Somehing else?

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#63

Post by thaumasiotes »

tomatocracy wrote: post #56
thaumasiotes wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All areas of practice have their own jargon, words that superficially sound similar to regular English but actually have specific insider meaning Related: coverage of the recent cum-ex scandals has often included the factoid that "cum-ex" is from the Latin for "with-without". Of course this isn't true. While cum is Latin for "with", the Latin for "without" is sine -- ex is Latin for "from". Instead, as used in the…

Ex as a prefix does ultimately derive from Latin here but meaning "outside" (hence eg excommunicated or exclave), not "without". This makes sense linguistically because the entitlement to the dividend is outside the scope of what's being bought and sold in the trade.

The meaning of ex in ex-dividend is not "outside".

As originally used in the financial jargon ex-dividend date, ex is used correctly and has the sense "after (in time)". That is, if you buy something ex-dividend, the dividend has already been paid (you're buying after the payment), and so you won't get it. [1] It's sense II in Lewis and Short ( http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%... ) (Note sense II.A.2, which gives us the more vernacular English prefix ex-, as in ex-wife.)

"Outside" is not even one of the many senses of ex in Latin; ex always has a sense related to the core concept of "from". "Outside" is extra.

[1] For some reason, the ex-dividend date is one day before the actual payment, but the idea is still that you're buying after the date of the dividend.

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#66

Post by stewartm »

czzr wrote: post #17

All areas of practice have their own jargon, words that superficially sound similar to regular English but actually have specific insider meaning that promotes faster in-group communication (and a degree of in-group signalling) - this is true for scientists, software engineers, yoga instructors and yes, business people.

If you work for a business, are you not all 'business people'?

In my working lifetime, having people occupying managerial roles that have zero relevant shop floor experience, has gone (or at least feels to have gone) from being the exception, to the absolute norm. Therefore in my experience, this, combined with the point you started with, is the nub of the matter.

Managers when faced with not having a clue what a team in a field that naturally has its own jargon are talking about, are desperate to recover the balance of power. Thus they end up speaking a language designed to to exclude all apart from those who submit to their influence and join in.

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#67

Post by Zhyl »

rimliu wrote: post #29
Zhyl wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shouldn't it be "What are rocks?"

I sometimes use "whois X?", even if the correct form would be "what is?" or "who are?". Using and old IRCism is just more fun.

I guess it would depend whether you were accessing the URL in the second or third person.

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#68

Post by bballer »

granshaw wrote: post #65

Two of the more recent ones that really grate me are “lift” (which isn’t even used consistently, eg “what is the lift (effort) on this” and “how much lift (benefit) would this give us”)... and “North Star” shudder

Haven't heard the "lift" one yet but it feels like a bunch of high school students trying to create their own internal jargon which makes them appear more "hip" per se. Just replace a word with another, adding 0 value and excluding those who don't "get it" therefore creating an exclusivity around it's usage.

Also the "North Star" one, whew, shudder is correct. Let's bury that one forever.

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#69

Post by CheesecakeFred »

yesbabyyes wrote: post #21

It may not be quite the same thing, but this reminds me of Venkatesh Rao's "Posture talk" from his Gervais Principle series: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/11/11/the-gervais-principle-...

I was going to comment on this article, but realized it is futile to go into detail and critizise it at this place.

Simply put I would stay far away from articles and people thinking the way Venkatesh Rao exhibits here. Highly toxic and inhumane management bullshit.

Re: Corporate buzzwords are how workers pretend to be adults

#70

Post by cormacrelf »

There was a great piece on this yesterday by Molly Young. In my opinion, it was significantly better. It contained this excellent point:

> As the leaked Slacks make clear, Korey, as well as her employees, were working under the new conditions of surveillance-state capitalism (or, from the company’s perspective, a culture of “inclusion and transparency”). One reason for the uptick in garbage language is exactly this sense of nonstop supervision. Employers can read emails and track keystrokes and monitor locations and clock the amount of time their employees spend noodling on Twitter. In an environment of constant auditing, it’s safer to use words that signify nothing and can be stretched to mean anything, just in case you’re caught and required to defend yourself.

https://www.thecut.com/2020/02/spread-of-corporate-speak.htm...

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