'Unrefined' words / phrases

[brideyb]

I'm a little... rough around the edges

But I want to be seen as more sophisticated and grown up at work (prof services) and socially. I catch myself saying things that my colleagues never do and want to train myself out of it in order to progress and be seen as a shit together adult. My vocab seems to be stuck in my teenage years, I can't think of the words right now but I know I do it - things like ' cool' and ending a call with see yaaaa laterrrr'

Middleclass Mumsnet and senior professional woman - what phrases do I need to cut out?

The OP said her work was full of ex-public school people, and I took that up.
Now I really must do something else.

And yet you can have someone like Prince Harry leaving Eton, a supposedly highly-selective top public school, and left with a B and D at A-level, despite having an independent tribunal ruling that he’d had help from teachers for that B. Hardly a glittering education from somewhere that costs almost £50,000 per year, has a Phil/teacher ration of 8 to 1, and is described by the Good Schools Guide as having ‘teaching and facilities second to none’.

It’s pretty disingenuous to think that those educated at private/public schools are admired for their high levels of education.

@Demilunary

And yet you can have someone like Prince Harry leaving Eton, a supposedly highly-selective top public school, and left with a B and D at A-level, despite having an independent tribunal ruling that he’d had help from teachers for that B. Hardly a glittering education from somewhere that costs almost £50,000 per year, has a Phil/teacher ration of 8 to 1, and is described by the Good Schools Guide as having ‘teaching and facilities second to none’.

It’s pretty disingenuous to think that those educated at private/public schools are admired for their high levels of education.

Of course there are always going to be people that fritter their education away. Doesn't mean it's not a high quality education.

You can lead a horse to water...

I can imagine what Harry would have done at my sink school.

@ILoveShula

Not a point about being unrefined but I've just received this in an e-mail

" Greetings from [agency_name]!!!
We have openings for a [Job-Title] in London. If interested, kindly revert back with your updated CV. "

The "!!!" has irritated me and the "revert back" makes me think 'to what should I revert?'.

I HATE exclamation marks. I rarely use them.

They have their place, @Oneearringlost, but only one at a time

Yes, you're right @ILoveShula, I agree.
But they are very overused.

I was always taught not to start a sentence with "And" or "But", however, I have disabused myself of this rule. There can be a certain elegance to this.

They are, aren't they!!!

There can.

You’re missing my point, @whistlers. you said people looked up to ‘public school types’ because of the high quality of their education. Let me suggest this really isn’t the reason.

Well quite @Demilunary
There’s this pervading belief that the upper/moneyed classes ‘do it right’
They mostly don’t actually.

@Demilunary

You’re missing my point, *@whistlers*. you said people looked up to ‘public school types’ because of the high quality of their education. Let me suggest this really isn’t the reason.

Why do you think they do?

@RickOShay

Well quite *@Demilunary* There’s this pervading belief that the upper/moneyed classes ‘do it right’ They mostly don’t actually.

They're clearly doing something right!

Like what exactly?
Holding on to their unearned privilege?

@whistlers, as far as I can see, large elements of UK society are completely incomprehensible without grasping that a lot of people do think the UC, or people higher up the class ladder, are truly ‘better’ than they are.

It’s not so much admiration of money, because there’s a lot of sneering about ‘new money’, it appears to be ingrained, acquiescent class consciousness, from those who keep voting in cabinets thronged with Old Etonians to the people who’ve never had any breaks in their lives and nonetheless camp out overnight to wave little Union Jacks along the routes of royal weddings of privileged people who have absolutely no comprehension of how ordinary difficult their ‘subjects’’ lives are.

@RickOShay

Like what exactly? Holding on to their unearned privilege?

You're making a massive assumption that it's unearned.

Personally I would say not to change who you are to try to be your idea of what's expected. You won't ever get it 100% right, and will look weird and try-hard, not to mention the fact that you are perfectly fine, just as you are. Embrace your own voice, and idiosyncrasies - they make you stand out from the pink shirt brigade, and you will never be truly comfortable wearing "professional me" like a suit. You have your own experiences and your own background to be proud of, bugger pretending to be part of a crowd.

I'm not saying turn up in flip-flops and fart during meetings, but you don't have to become an identikit plastic drone to make a success of your career.

No human has more value than another.1

What do you think the upper classes are doing right @whistlers

@RickOShay

No human has more value than another.1

Maybe not but some people give more to society than others.

For example, paediatric surgeons are more useful to society than I am.

I know a woman who is MD of a company and she is just always herself, never tries to be someone else, and no it doesn't fit the hard, humourless picture we have of the power businesswoman. She swears, she 'fesses up when she's made a mistake, she has a laugh. Hasn't stopped her getting to top management level.

That’s pretty much the definition of the UC, @whistlers. It’s inherited money, land, privilege. Their ancestors have have been Tudor upstarts who married in with an eye to the main chance, or distinguished themselves on the ‘right’ side of the Civil War, been US oil heiresses who married in to asset-rich, cash-poor aristocratic families, or been Victorian industrialists who bought a title, but their descendants aren’t the ones who made the money/fought the battle/toadied to the right royal.

@whistlers, but paediatric surgeons are highly unlikely to be UC, or indeed from the ‘moneyed classes’…?

But the paediatric surgeon isn't "better" than you; their life is not worth more than yours. They just make a specific contribution to society. As do, say, teachers. Or delivery drivers. Or bin collectors. Or the police. Or any other job you care to name. One job may pay more than another, or take a lot of study to get into, but the person doing the job isn't better or worse than anyone else.

My original point was about private education

Asking polite questions at the start of a meeting. How are you today? How's the weather where you are? Did you have far to travel? Etc

Unless you are in Bristol, then the only way to address people in the first instance is 'alright?'

I am REALLY struggling to get out of that habit, and it's difficult