Why we have office jargon--and why we may not want to use it

Office jargon or corporate speak exists for a reason–actually several reasons. 

One reason for it is that people who are doing the same things all the time typically develop a shorthand for talking about things they all know and understand. If you are in the same field or work in the same office, it’s faster and more precise to say “cleat” than “the wooden thing that holds up the closet pole so it can support the weight of all my clothes”. So, people who have a lot of overlapping knowledge and are working in the same context can speak or write specifics more quickly and effectively through jargon.

Another reason we end up with corporate jargon is that all of us are coming to work with different cultural backgrounds that have different levels of overlap–some people come from a different part of the county; some people come from a different country entirely. The words and sentences that we use are developed based on who we interact with throughout our lives, most importantly as children–which is why some of us have accents that stand out when we leave the place where we grew up (note: all of us have accents, whether they are unusual or not depends on whether we are interacting with people from the same culture (no accent perceived) or a different culture (accent stands out = Where are you from? 🤔) 

And one more reason has to do with etiquette: we are supposed to be emotionally neutral at work, so many phrases exist as a way to avoid saying the thing we actually mean with the goal of sounding nicer in some way. Corporate speak allows us to say hide the true meaning or emotional impact–even though everyone knows what you mean and feels bad about it anyway.

So, corporate speak is a way of creating a new language from the special circumstances of the many different cultural backgrounds of professionals at work who are supposed to be polite, respectful, and ideally emotionless.

Even with these understandable and even admirable reasons for creating a new language, we end up with words and expressions that are recognizable for their daily use in the office. Some of these words and phrases may have applications outside of the office, but they show up in our work lives because we are trying to circumvent direct communication.

Which, in my opinion, is silly. 

I am a person who prefers plain speech. Instead of “let’s look for the low hanging fruit”--I, a person who has never actually picked fruit in my life (ok, that’s a lie, I have an apple tree. And I’m short. So I get it 😅)--do not need an analogy to fruit-picking to understand that what my boss wants is for us to do the easiest (and often least effective) things first. 

I don’t want to think about “where the rubber meets the road” because I would like to have all 4 wheels on my car touching the road at all times, except maybe during an oil change. You can just say “we’ll know if it works when we actually do it” and that makes sense to me.

No need to rehash each one when I’ve already written about most of the ones I despise. Last year, my writing group came up with 24 phrases in office jargon that we really don’t like. You can see all of those here: https://medium.com/@jenny-appendance/24-phrases-in-corporate-jargon-that-must-die-539f890eacbf With witty and snarky reasons for why we all hate these phrases. 

The reality is that most folks are using office jargon because they hear it around them. Humans are amazing mimics. 

But just because other people do it doesn’t make it good. The other people using office jargon may be using it because they think it gives them some status at work or because they don’t understand what they are saying and are just repeating some things back. Many people using office jargon are unaware of how it affects their audience–until and unless it gets used on them. 

These phrases tend to avoid, obscure, and otherwise *prevent* actual, effective communication. 

The goal at work is to get the job done, to meet our responsibilities to our customers and to keep the business moving forward. Achieving the desired outcomes and results requires clear communication. And office jargon just isn’t clear. Or effective.

In most cases, your audience will be better served if you just say what you mean or ask them a question. 

Instead of “per my last email,” you can say something like this:

Did you have a chance to review what I already sent?

Did you have a question about the information I sent on x date?

As explained in the email below…

Instead of “throw him under the bus”, you can say something like this:

Are you blaming him for that mistake?

I didn’t mean to blame you.

The vendor totally blamed that customer.

Instead of “circle back,” you can say something like this:

Remind us to talk about that at our next meeting.

Thanks for bringing that up, but let’s keep focusing on x.

The goal is to start paying attention to the phrases you hear at work and then consider whether they are actually useful in communicating with your audience or if they are sneaky ways of avoiding feelings or accountability. 

Once you start noticing them, you can start deciding whether to use them or not. In most cases, I prefer to use the plain language instead of the corporate jargon because it ensures that my audience understands what I mean and helps me clarify the emotional intent so there isn’t any passive-aggressive tone.

With everything we say at work, we should be making sure that the people we are working with can 1) understand it, 2) act on it, and 3) feel generally good about it so that they want to keep working with us. 

Corporate jargon may have its uses, especially as a shorthand for things that come up in an office frequently or specific content knowledge.

But if it makes people feel bad or isn’t well-understood, then it isn’t serving us in the workplace.