Corporate Whore

I am a bona fide badge-carrying member of Corporate America. I sit and participate in many, many meetings to discuss business issues and I'm saying right here and right now that I am fed up with Corporate Speak. I define 'corporate speak' as saying some long-winded phrase to describe something when all you need to do is simply state your point without all the fancy metaphors gleaned from management books and the like. That was a bit too long of an explanation, wasn't it?

Corporate Speak is bullshit talk. That's about as precise and to-the-point as I can manage today just coming back from vacation.

Here is the latest catch-phrases that I've collected since the beginning of this month:

• Looking left and looking right (The corporate equivalent of the children's rhyme "Look up, Look Down, Look all around--your pants are falling down!"?)
• Confronting the brutal facts
• pressure-testing
• How can we do this without more paddling?
• Triage your time
• How do you want your pain?

So from time to time, I'm going to post more of these phrases just for the fun of it. I hope you'll be mindful of corporate speak and jot down some good ones that you hear during the day and send them along to me, too. Please email me at [email protected] with your favorites.