What phrase do you hear ALL THE TIME during your working day, that makes you want to scream?!

[Ilovemychocolate]

So I’m a childminder.
Whilst out with the kids (presently four 2 year olds) I hear “you’ve got your hands full” multiple times a day!
Over and over again, and it’s SO hard to react with a smile sometimes! (But I do obviously)
When I worked in shops it was “printed it this morning!” if someone handed me a fresh note.
So what do you hear constantly whilst working, that makes you scream inside?!

Yeah, but he makes me laugh all the time!

‘Misssss have you got a pen I forgot one?’

Of course I do but if you can remember your phone and your lipgloss you can remember a pen.

And before anyone asks - no I don’t give detentions for no equipment, no I don’t make a big deal out of it. I spend £5 a week on pens at Tesco and give them out when required with minimal fuss.

It's my voice. Obviously not to close colleagues but distant people and external clients/suppliers, absolutely.

It's just a brief opener to someone I have a slightly formal relationship with and who I haven't communicated with in a while

I think emails can read as very rude/abrupt without them

“I just wanted to touch base with you”

My colleague (who thinks she is senior / superior) saying 'we need to drill down' whenever there is something to discuss. What does that even mean?

Look at things in greater detail. There is some rather ancient software I use that requires me to drill down to open up individual records to handle errors and queries and drill back up again (did the developers never use a Black & Decker to know that's not possible?) to see the broad statistics.

It's vaguely related to the 'deep dive' - although that always reminds me of movies where if somebody decides it's a really good idea to go that deep, they always disturb something that eats the guy on the right's head.

That's the difference, then - we get them from people we literally see every day. It's not their voice. It's not even them, it's AI.

My manager threatens to do it to me regularly. I told him that if he does, he will get back a florid email with zero paragraphs, Oxford commas, with some bonus ones in strange places for extra interest, and repeated three part sentences, faithfully promising that I shall do the needful, remaining his loyal servant, in perpetuity, and offering multiple faith based blessings to him and his woman. And if he does it again, he'll get all of the above, plus more exclamation marks than he ever thought possible for anybody over the age of 14! As it's really irritating! And never makes the writer sound enthusiastic as it's intended to do!

We're not allowed to use Teams because, well, they say so. It would definitely reduce email traffic, though, leaving Outlook purely for messages intended for public consumption.

Oh wow, yeah I couldn't be doing with that.

(Luckily my managers are variously entertainingly candid or mercifully brief in their communication.)

Current buzzwords from the ExCo members at my company seem to be “affecting a cultural shift” and “setting the tone from the top”. 🙄

Not only do these phrases indicate how invisible, ineffective and lacking in credibility this leadership team truly are, I’m 99% certain that buzzwords are all they will ever be…..Both individually and as a group, they are useless when it comes to taking any kind of substantive action that would actually deliver a definitive, positive change.

Frankly, if I wasn’t fully contractually Home-based and my salary and benefits package wasn’t so good, I’d have run for the hills some time ago. A fact I have to remind myself of regularly, especially after I’ve just had the same utterly pointless f*cking conversation as I had the previous quarter with one of said senior numpties.

Roll on retirement!!

Another one here who cannot abide "reaching out". You aren't reaching out, FFS, you're asking or contacting. Stop talking nonsense.

Reminds me of my manager who had appalling grammar, and who used to bang on about the tidiness of my desk. I told him that if he kept off my desk, I'd keep off his grammar.

Mind you, he was the one who suffered for it as it meant he sent his letters etc out uncorrected and revealed to the world just how illiterate he was.

That just gave me a sorrowing smile as my dad would do that every day he was in hospital for his final illness, plus he'd ask for a bottle of beer. 😄 Once he was in hospice they actually gave him the occasional beer and it would make his day.

@Els1e that phrase is acceptable only if one works in a dental surgery.

So much this!

No, President Trump’s carers.

When people use ‘I hope you are well’ on an email. It drives me mad. They don’t care if I’m well or not 🤣

I just posted this too. I hate the phrase, particularly when it seems to be on every email and I don’t even know the person. I’m pretty sure it started during covid.

We use ‘patient touches’ as a measure of how successful a product is in med tech. Always sounds wrong to me. “We managed to touch 20M patients this year, so next years target will be 30M patient touches.” Eeewwww

Yuck that's gross! Gives me a mental image of a machine reaching out and poking someone.

Onwards and upwards

The current trajectory at work is 100% not doing either of those things! Climbing Everest would be easier!

My husband who has never mowed a lawn in the 53 years we've been married leaned out the bedroom window and called out "you've missed a bit" I told him if he said that again he'd mow the lawn!!!

Me, myself personally. 😖

No but if you don't, you get accused of being abrasive, especially if you are a woman. It's just easier to put it in. Completely pointless but apparently oils the wheels...

Agree. Women shouldn't still be getting held to different standards in 2026, but sadly we are.

So & so “was / is a legend”. Uuuch!