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Attack of the Corporate Weasel Words
theodp writes "Does it bother you that churches have a Mission Statement touting their Core Values? That even the CIA has a Vision? In his book Death Sentences: How Clichés, Weasel Words and Management-Speak are Strangling Public Language and in this Newsweek interview, Australian author Don Watson argues it's time to protest the mind-numbing business jargon that infests our schools, churches and political speech. Examples that people have sent to him can be found on Watson's website."
We are in a culture where people need to specialize in order to succeed. Now there is only so much specialization that can be achieved. So of course buzz words are needed to justify the niche marketing of... business, goods, and even employment specialties.
My sunday newspaper has Dilbert in the frontpage. I remember the days when a kid could wake up sunday morning and have only Garfield and other innocent comics.
Now they are well trained politically, corporately for the next generation of work environment. My neighbors kids always do Dilbert skits. WTF is the world coming to when 10 year olds immitate managers and chief execs for fun?!
One time I spoke out very strongly about management speak. Synergy this, leverage that. Buzzword Bingo is not amusing when you see that someone can gain power by saying absolutely nothing at all.
The counter argument was that it's the jargon of management. Just as programmers talk about arrays in a different sense than a layman, or maybe 'threading' for another example. Buzzwords isn't a problem, it's just the language of management.
I think that's EXACTLY the problem. Managers don't talk to themselves. They lead with ideas, and understand the problems of others to help organize solutions. If nobody understands what the fuck they are saying, it's not management!
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
I have a small business. I am realizing very quickly that success is often determined by your ability to communicate. (I'm also married, and this rule applies equally well to that.)
If you can't clearly communicate to a client or customer, you can find yourself losing business very quickly. If the client thinks they're getting one thing and you deliver another, that's usually a breakdown on your part. The same goes for clients that don't understand what is required of them.
Clear and concise gets the job done, makes everyone more comfortable, and takes less time than thick marketing copy or 'vision statements.'
In my still-idealistic view of the world, that's how it works. I realize that some companies rely on obfuscation and meaningless text to confuse their customers into thinking they're getting one thing when the proposal says another. Or to lock people into contracts that they didn't understand (ie, zero interest for 12 months).
But those aren't honest. And they don't encourage repeat business, referrals, or customer satisfaction. So in my mind, they don't promote success.
I'm looking at writing a mission statement for my own company, and the more I research it the more I appreciate existing ones.
/shrug.
It does baffle me that churches have so much money, and I am a little afraid that God (TM) didn't intend it to be quite that way. I'm sorry (I have agnostic tendencies), if God exists I surely don't think (s)he intended for any church to be large enough to be considered a business. In fact it disgusts me that here in the United States many of the local religious figureheads drive nicer cars, own bigger houses, and smoke fatter cigars than myself. Men of God? Nay! Men of themselves.
That said, I appreciate that (privately owned) schools have missions statements, and I appreciate that they are trying to serve their target. I think that every state-funded school in the state of (insert your region) should share a common mission statement. I think its also in their best interest to fulfill their goals as described by that mission statement.
It has gotten out of hand. There was a time when Not-for-profit really meant Not-for-profit, and I see these "charitable" organizations seeming to crawl forward with beady-green-dollar-sign-eyes.
Anyway. Mission statements are a wonderful invention and critical in this world known as capitalism. Bloody hell, though... why does the local minister drive a Lexus?
Deja Vu
n. 1. The sensation that you've read this very article before.
I don't know which came first, jargon-talk, or politically correct speech, but somewhere in the last thirty years, speech and writing has become more about saying something with empahis on:
Maybe, though I get slaughtered sometimes, that's why I like slashdot... slashdotters give as good as they take. And usually say what they mean, or at least try. Case in point, how simple could a mission statement (hate that term) be other than "News for Nerds. Stuff that matters." be?
I jumped off the politcally correct band wagon years ago when two "corrections" juxtaposed themselves:
You all can fight back by using candid, frank, and direct language. But, you'll pay a price. Utlimately though I think you'll find it much more satisfying.
To make an only somewhat bold and oversimplified assertion, we've seen the effects of the middle-management mentality in (among many other examples) the travesty that has been the Catholic church's handling of the sex-abusing priests: "Middle-management" shuffled most of them around and let them continues to get away with their sick activities, rather than just deal with them properly in the first place.
Would ANY of that happened if there weren't such a tall management structure, if the religion weren't so organized, if it were instead just a bunch of more-or-less disconnected churches who only paid heed to the main-line directly to their "CEO"? And isn't that the way it SHOULD be anyway?
Feel free to flame, but I just can't see the necessity for such a stratified power-structure in religion.
Just the other day I was ranting to coworkers on how this lingo gets into everyday work.
I was writing up a report and I was including the phrase "Solutions", but I forget what I was solving. Can't I just fix something anymore? Why do I have to deliver a solution?
Issues and solutions, issues and solutions. I with I had an old-fashioned problem. I'd probably just fix it!
Most folk'll never lose a toe, and then again some folk'll...
Actually, you'll never get rid of them, until you get rid of weasels. The human kind, I have no grudge against the kind that weigh less than 10 lbs.
cuzality, I had never heard of emergentvillage, so I went to the site - the first sentence starts: "Emergent is a growing generative friendship among missional Christian leaders ..." Yow. Generative?? Missional??
I like price point. I think that implies turning product pricing into a science. I was at Target the other day, and they had Bourne Identity for $13.76. Now I know there had to be dozens of focus groups to come up with that number. But the fact is, at $14.99 it would not have landed in my cart. Somehow, $13.76 sounded reasonable to me. That's a price point. It's also much more concise and precise than "how much I'm wiling to pay".
bance.net
The purpose is to present an image to the casual observer. Words are selected for their appearance--"pro active", "standards compliant", "reorganization", etc. sound like action, consistency, and controlled change.
But they mean nothing. That's intentional. The corporation does not want to offer its detractors any ammunition for future attacks. "You said that..." Well, actually, we didn't say anything of the sort. Did we?
Do you seriously expect some organization to give you a clear commitment to anything without there being some significant benefit to them for doing so?
It's inconsistent with the corporation's fiduciary responsibility (look that one up, it's a real thing) to act in that manner. That is to say, if a corporate leader does things because "it's the right thing to do for the world/the customers/the industry", rather than "it makes more money for the stockholders and exposes the corporation to less risk", then they violate that responsibility.
At best, that violation is unethical. At worst, it's criminal.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
The mission statement for the Church is in the Bible:
1. Love the Lord your God unconditionally
2. Love your neighbor as yourself
It seems like everything else the Church is supposed to do springs from those two commands.
It's good to use your head, but not as a battering ram.
What really gets to me is when it's not even based upon the actual words, but upon the "fear someone might mishear." I'm sure everyone's heard about the politician who got lambasted for using the word niggardly. Then, in a play I was in last year, someone objected to an actor who had the line, "Don't get your knickers in a knot," because she was afraid someone would mishear the word, "knickers." *sigh* And it gets to you after a while. I actually find my self balking for a second before using "black" as a personal descriptor, so many people taking offense, seeing it as labelling.
This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.
I've had two crashes where my kinetic energy was increased... both occasions I was rear ended by some idiot who wasn't paying attention. The phrase you're looking for would be an "unanticipated and sudden change in momentum"...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
Quite frankly, I'd be satisfied if they said "We're working on a new phone, it'll be even better than the last one because it can send e-mails and surf the internet!" instead of "We are designing an nth generation wireless device which will empower users by facilitating multiple forms of digital communication."
My only political goal is to see to it that no political party achieves its goals.
Strunk and White's _Elements of Style_ is another great guide to writing. It lives its message: the book says to be short and to the point, and so the book is actually short and to the point.It goes from the basics like joining sentences to the principles of composition and clear writing. Anyone who wants to be a writer, whether as a journalist, novelist, or academic, needs to pick up a copy.
I can't believe that almost got through senior year of college without ever having read this book, which is ridiculous- there's this idea in America that you don't need to learn the rules and basics of your craft anymore, whether its art or writing or whatever- well, that idea is bullshit. I'm all for breaking loose and breaking all the rules, but it helps to know the rules in the first place. And for every one Jack Kerouac who can write brilliant drug-fuelled free-form prose, there are a dozen people who really need to pick up Strunk and White, and Orwell's _Politics and the English Language_ Essay and learn to string two words together (I'm firmly in the second camp).
I used to be a mid-level manager. I hate listening to people talking about "forces" (did you mean soldiers?) and "resources" (did you mean employees? workers?). I agree with Watson that this kind of talk is deeply dehumanizing.
So at a monthly meeting, when my boss asked me if I needed more resources to complete a project, I said, "I don't think I need any more coal or lumber for this project. I could use some more people though." I think I nearly got fired that day.
The same goes for "management speak". Many of these ideas began as useful things that helped a corporation get its act together. Understanding what your "core competencies" are is important. Defining your corporate "mission" really can help. Identifying "key stakeholders" can be a good thing. But only is these things are actually done with a real understanding of what is being done and why. Paying lip service to these principles (such as slapping togther a "mission statement" simply because "everyone else has one") does not yield useful results. That's what leads to these things having a bad name.
Too often people lose sight of the result they are trying to achieve, and simply assume that so long as they follow some prescribed process or template they will automatically be successful. IMHO that's the number one problem in modern corporate (and government) culture: a focus on process rather than results. Having a "good process" is meaningless if the desired results are not achieved. Blindly imitating successful orgranizations is pointless if you don't understand why they were successful, and adapt their methods to fit your situation.
Actually, the best mission statement ever, IMHO, was:
.
Tastes great, less filling
Clear, concise, no BS. Much better than 'Our coporate mission is to create refreshing malt beverage which is perceived to be market-leading and which will provide maximum shareholder value blah blah blah...'
I interned at a dot com last summer, and didn't really get much of the buzzword bingo going on.
s ivel integration
This summer, I'm interning at IBM, and have decided to make my IBM specific "buzzword bingo" list. Happy playing with this!
best of breed
bleeding edge
(business) process
buy in
cell
customer facing
emerging business opportunity / ebo
executive
face time
grid
incentivize
interface [non technical]
key
leverage
matrix [organization]
middleware
meta [whatever that isn't technical]
on-demand
painpoint
paradigm
perva
resources (when they mean people)
services oriented architecture
silo
SMB/Small Medium Business
solution [as a verb]
synergy
thought leadership
time-to-value
time value of money
total cost of ownership
utilize
value-add
vertical/horizonta
web application
"work smarter not harder"
xml
It has been shown in psychology studies that people judge speakers who use longer sentences and who are difficult to understand as more intelligent than people who speak concisely. Especially in the case of authority figures, we tend to assume that the fault lays within our selves for not understanding their novel phrases or convoluted sentence structure. Like the parable of the "Emperor's New Clothes" people are afraid to admit they understand what the authority figure is talking about lest they be mocked by others.
This phenomenon creates an incentive to create "management speak." People will be less likely to question you if you confuse them. People won't complain about being confused because they fear being called stupid.
The word bomber refers to someone who kills with explosives - eg "The Omagh Bomber Faces Charges"
The phrase suicide bomber refers to someone who kills with explosives but also dies in the same explosion either to evade capture or to make sure the bomb goes off.
So what are homicide bombers?
Oh and while we're on the subject, since when did the Department of Defense also do attacks?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
You might find this an interesting read: The Trouble with Dilbert. A snippet:
If a word or phrase "Resonates" and "Gains Traction " with the masses it will force a "Paradigm Shift" and become normal. In the end, it matters not if the Language Elite "reject" these terms, "With all due respect" if some of these folks "Moved on" with their "vision" we would be speaking Latin. I just find it a real "Disconnect".
If you say you have a specific list of mission goals, you can avoid actually practising the same goals in actual behavior.
Just more of the downsizing of morality in today's Soviet Amerika.
Pay attention to what they DO - not what they SAY.
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-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
- us vs. them (developing a subculture)
- control (doctors sell the idea of control through their discourse)
- power (sounding like an "expert")
- dominance (intimidating through fine use of the jargon)
The entire way a doctor approaches a patient is designed to give the patient the idea the doctor is in control of the situation. Not being in the medical profession, I've always wondered how they teach doctor patient interaction and if they actually touch on these control issues? Anyway, it's the same in any group, even slashdot has its own discourse, (e.g. troll, trolling, flamebait, karma) and demonstrating control of the language of slashdot can be perceived as intelligent or desirable among the slashdot crowd.Scott
Possibly. This thread is, however, an excellent case demonstrating why geeks dont rule the world. If we spent just half the time we spend having arguments about the exact definition of words or acusing each other of not being true anime fans cause we havent learnt Japanese to truely appriciate Neon Genesis we'd control everything.
And like true political-correctness, your funny title obscures your real job. The first thing I thought of was "Toilet Fixer" when in fact you probably were a "Dish Washer".
I worked at K-Mart in High School as an "Retail Inventory Dispersement Technician" or in English, a stock boy. Later I moved up to "Agricultural Supplement Distribution Engineer" and "Cash Transaction Processing Faciliator". In other words, I was a cashier in the Garden Shop and loaded top soil and cow manure into peoples' cars. It was a good job, and I didn't feel the need to make up silly titles for myself.
I think the corporate blither-speak has come about for the same reason as other political correctness: People who are trying to sound intelligent without being intelligent and people who are trying to sound important without being important. There's a direct inverse correlation between this nonsense and plain old ordinary competence and common sense.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
I think of this as "cargo-cult management". (Check wikipedia if you're not familiar with cargo cults.) People notice that many successful companies have a coherent core values and missions and whatnot, and certain kinds of documentation and processes, and decide that those things cause success, when in many cases it's much more likely that some third quality is causing both success and the observable "cargo" of mission statements.
I have to say, having had the pleasure of reading both the original version written solely by William Strunk, Jr., and the revised, posthumous collaboration with E.B. White, that the former is vastly superior. White adds a great deal that, while not harmful, is certainly not as helpful as it ought to be considering the extent to which it fattened the notoriously thin first edition.
Mission: We will serve our customers with (1) top-quality service, (2) good advice and (3) fair business practices.
No weasel words, no paradigms--shifting or otherwise--and no nonsense. What we mean by these terms is spelled out in our values statement (which I won't reproduce here.)
You're a commercial enterprise in a capitalist society. Your first priority is therefore almost by definition to make profit. Why is that not in your mission statement?