Funny, you didn’t think your job required foreign language skills. However, if the creep of double speak and impossible business jargon has you both befuddled and amused, you’ll appreciate…
   
BUZZWHACK: a website and companion dictionary dedicated to demystifying buzzwords…

Consider yourself a “buzzwhacker” if you might “receive some pleasure in bursting the bubbles of the pompous.” That said, we’ve all been guilty of embracing our favorite phrases… but if you routinely use three or more in a sentence with no sense of irony, be careful with the following…

• blamestorming:  A group process where participants analyze a failed project and look for scapegoats other than themselves.
• Death by Tweakage: When a product or project fails due to unnecessary tinkering or too many last-minute revisions.
• clockroaches: Employees who spend most of their day watching the clock – instead of doing their jobs.
• plutoed: To be unceremoniously dumped or relegated to a lower position without an adequate reason or explanation.
• prairie dogging: A modern office phenomenon. Occurs when workers simultaneously pop their heads up out of their cubicles to see what’s going on.
• menoporsche: Male menopause. Symptoms include a sudden lack of energy, crankiness and the overpowering urge to buy a Porsche.
• adminisphere: The upper levels of management where big, impractical, and counterproductive decisions are made.
• deja poo: The feeling that you’ve stepped in this bull before.
• bobbleheading: The mass nod of agreement by participants in a meeting to comments made by the boss even though most have no idea what he/she just said.
• ringtone rage: The violent response by cube mates after hearing your annoying cell phone ringtone for the 15th time.
   

And even better, 10 of the Most Dreadful Buzzwords of 2006:

• leveraging our assets: The ultimate duh in business. Does not every company seek to put their resources, whether it’s money, location or talent, to best use in order to make a profit?
• mission-critical: Another sign that too many people in today’s business world have read too many Tom Clancy books. What’s wrong with the word “essential”?
• conversate: To have a conversation. Created by those who (for some bizarre reason) don’t think “converse” or “talk” are adequate.
• information touchpoint: Any contact in which information is shared or transferred. Yes, meetings are information touchpoints.
• computerate: Computer literate. To understand how a computer works. “Are you computerate? Or do you need me to do it for you?”
• electronify: The process of turning paper- based data into electronic or digital form.
• price-optimized: Something sold as cheap as possible, particularly a stripped-down version of a previously successful, but expensive product. However, the price-optimized version is likely to have more flash and less substance.
• targeted completion date: A comforting term that gives the impression a project will be finished by a certain date (but everyone involved knows there’s no chance in hell of it happening).
• relanguage: Term used by $300-an-hour consultants when $1 words, such as reword, rephrase or rewrite, would work just as well. “I think we can relanguage that to be more effective.
• critical path: A list of tasks necessary to complete a project. In project management, it’s the ultimate alibi. If there’s even one delay in the “critical path,” the project will not be completed on time.

Find other favorite buzzwords (or nominate one of your own) at buzzwhack.com
 
   
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