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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Anyone else have an aversion to corporate bollock speak?

570 replies

LindaLaHugh · 07/02/2022 15:58

I say aversion - deep hatred would be more accurate. It gives me The Rage
You know the type of thing " deep dive" " I'll take that away to action it" " even " going forward" makes me a bit stabby

OP posts:
SportsMother · 12/02/2022 08:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

NeedWineNow · 12/02/2022 09:18

@SquirrelG

And don’t get me started on bloody annual reviews where I have to sit and listen to someone patronise me with all the things I’ve done well. Utterly infantilising and makes me cringe myself inside out, I’m a middle aged woman and I don’t need to be told I show promise and have a bright future with my organisation, I’m not 16.

I agree - especially when the person doing the review is so much younger! And the dumb questions - what are your ambitions? I've been the receptionist for well over 20 years and I'm heading for retirement in a few years, what do you think??? Annual reveiws themselves are ridiculous - if I do something exceptional tell me at the time, same if I am not performing well. Otherwise, if I want to discuss something I will ask to see you - not wait 11 months until my next review!

This in spades! We have quarterly reviews and we've been asked to come prepared with feedback, look at our objectives and let the reviewer know what we've been doing 'outside the box' and how we anticipate our roles are to develop going forward.

Well, reviewer, I've got 9 busy few earners to juggle and make sure everything is done to high standard. And I'm retiring in the summer so honestly where do you think my career is going?

The annoying thing is we do all this just to be told 'oooh well you know you're at the top of your pay grade and there's nowhere really for you to go, so we're not giving you anything extra, but we are taking on new fee earners so you'll be getting another couple to work for'....

DePfeffoff · 12/02/2022 09:24

I remember, as a governor, having to do a review for a headteacher who was about to retire. The council seriously suggested that we should interrogate him on whether he'd planned for retirement properly.

ErrolTheDragon · 12/02/2022 09:50

I don't find annual reviews too bad because my managers are usually pretty much on the same page (sorry) as me. The first one, many moons ago, had a question about my 'energy levels' - well, for two British scientists inevitably that resulted in sniggering about degeneracy and it's been downhill from there ever since.Grin

TyrannysaurusXXrightshoarder · 12/02/2022 10:23

@daimbarsatemydogsbone

A mouse ate my cheese? - doesn't exist Who stole my cheese - is a parody of - *Who moved my cheese" which is management book that contends employees are mice and they should get used to being reorganised to fuckery and listening to corporate bollockspeak as it's good for them.
When that book came out the then CEO, of the IT company I worked at, bought a copy for every member of the management team. He was an epic wanker, and handing that book out was the final straw for one colleague, who effectively resigned when he left his copy on the CEOs desk with the words ‘Fuck Off, Neil’ written across it in black marker.
DGRossetti · 12/02/2022 10:25

Lessons will be learned.

ErrolTheDragon · 12/02/2022 11:03

@DGRossetti

Lessons will be learned.
If only...
RachelGreeneGreep · 12/02/2022 13:23

When that book came out the then CEO, of the IT company I worked at, bought a copy for every member of the management team. He was an epic wanker, and handing that book out was the final straw for one colleague, who effectively resigned when he left his copy on the CEOs desk with the words ‘Fuck Off, Neil’ written across it in black marker.

Grin
DGRossetti · 12/02/2022 13:47

@RachelGreeneGreep

When that book came out the then CEO, of the IT company I worked at, bought a copy for every member of the management team. He was an epic wanker, and handing that book out was the final straw for one colleague, who effectively resigned when he left his copy on the CEOs desk with the words ‘Fuck Off, Neil’ written across it in black marker.

Grin

In my last role the CEO had written a few books and was running a podcast series (they saw themselves as a bit of an entrepreneurial guru)

So all new starts got given a copy of one of them ...

EvelynBeatrice · 12/02/2022 14:37

Many moons ago we used to have a team competition with a prize for the person who'd managed to get the ' phrase of the week' derived from call from big cheese in US into the most client emails. Luckily several clients were 'cognisant' of this and 'on board'.
What was less amusing was the inappropriate sexual phraseology used by some of the older men in this male dominated field. '. Yes, they lifted their skirts for them'; ' yes, we really need to get into bed with x on this'.etc etc.

ddl1 · 12/02/2022 14:39

@DGRossetti

Lessons will be learned.
Mistakes were made.
Normanpriceisnotarolemodel · 13/02/2022 08:45

Can’t believe no-one has mentioned having skin in the game yet?

daimbarsatemydogsbone · 14/02/2022 21:10

When that book came out the then CEO, of the IT company I worked at, bought a copy for every member of the management team. He was an epic wanker, and handing that book out was the final straw for one colleague, who effectively resigned when he left his copy on the CEOs desk with the words ‘Fuck Off, Neil’ written across it in black marker.
I so wish I could be this person, but I never have the guts to stand up to this utter utter shitbollocks

shockedNeighbour · 14/02/2022 21:24

Personal experience tells me that American's are the WORST for this.

I have monthly meetings with Americans that I just can't stand. Literally EVERYTHING they do is "exciting" and "innovative" except it's REALLY NOT.

Gives me the rage.

Phineyj · 14/02/2022 21:39

Legend has it that one year in Secret Santa at my school, someone got the Deputy Head 'Management for Dummies'.

For a while we had The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People in the car as an audio book. It was so fantastic for waking us up on long motorway journeys as we shouted abuse at the radio. Happy days.

Merryoldgoat · 14/02/2022 21:51

I read ‘how long between the flash and the bang?’ on a FB group the other day and nearly threw up in my mouth.

FlouncerSIT · 14/02/2022 22:06

And in this week's How to Play Bullsh*t Bingo, going forward, we will mainly be pivoting....

AAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHH.

I had to go and look at this to cheer myself up (other models are available): www.bullshitgenerator.com/

Mydogmylife · 14/02/2022 22:57

An oldie but one of my bosses favourites ' growing the business exponentially ' - used constantly and not always appropriately

whatinthenameofhen · 14/02/2022 23:48

Or I'll touch base with Jordan in Accounts.
Moving forward...
Coming back round full circle..

ErrolTheDragon · 14/02/2022 23:52

[quote FlouncerSIT]And in this week's How to Play Bullsh*t Bingo, going forward, we will mainly be pivoting....

AAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHH.

I had to go and look at this to cheer myself up (other models are available): www.bullshitgenerator.com/[/quote]
Ooh... I got 'cultivate turn-key users' on my first go. Just need to be careful not to drop the n- from it.

ErrolTheDragon · 14/02/2022 23:58

Having hit the button a few times, some of them actually aren't total bullshit IF, but only if, you genuinely are developing stuff like cloud-based machine learning applications.

But 'envisioneer' is not a word. Having seen it I'm now prepared to deliberately unmute and laugh if anyone uses it.

FlouncerSIT · 15/02/2022 00:44

My working week this week consists mainly of meetings. I may just have to see if I can slip the word envisoneer into the dialogue without anyone noticing.

Mind you, given some of the teams in the NHS I currently work with/for (NOT the clinicians, who generally are pretty down to earth and definitely call a spade a shovel), they'd probably think it was an excellent new word that perfectly encapsulates what they're attempting to achieve. They might even start convening a working group, steering group, committee, and ratifying party to deal with it...not that I'm radiantly cynical from over 15 years of exposure to bonkers and often mutually contradictory initiatives cascaded from Whitehall based think tanks or anything...

FlouncerSIT · 15/02/2022 00:45

*envisioneer, even.

(When are we getting an edit function?!)

Snoozer11 · 15/02/2022 00:59

Some of the phrases on this thread are actual phrases though, they're not corporate speak.

"Can't see the wood for the trees", for example. Not corpoarte speak.

"Can you action this?", however, is very much corporate speak, and it instantly makes me lose faith in the capabilities of the person speaking.

The best managers and senior colleagues I've had have always spoken like normal people. They're competent, hardworking, knowledgeable and approachable.

I've worked with two people who particularly sound like they've swallowed a corporate dictionary. Both managers who were much less effective than their plain talking peers.

One had to say some words about a lovely member of staff who sadly died far too young. They gave the coldest, most impersonal tribute they possibly could have. It felt completely inappropriate.

It always strikes me as a replacement for actual competence. It doesn't instill confidence that they hold their position through their own natural talents - merely that they are acting their role, and the corporate speak is their script.

Interesting that many in here say it's a man thing. In my experience, the worst culprits with this have been women. Although I accept I'm lucky in that these people have been few and far between.

SingingSands · 15/02/2022 01:29

My manager asked me to "distribute comms to the team that facilities are actioning the repair schedule" on a matter. I think she meant "let everyone know that the kitchen tap is being fixed".