Words or phrases that drive you mad

Azari

Fruitcake wrote: »

A few years ago the multi-national company for whom I work came out with a load of corporate b0llock-speak incuding the phrase, "leverage shared information."

Upon enquiry of the grownups (management) as to the meaning of this phrase, the workforce were never given a plain English explanation, but all were told to use it. The workforce persisted and asked from management to director level what it meant, as we mere plebs did not understand it. We were were consistantly and persistantly told that it was a desirable thing to which we should all [STRIKE]perspire[/STRIKE] aspire and was the sort of thing that would make our company great.

It took several years but gradually we wore the company down and eventually the expression was formally withdrawn.

We (thirty thousand strong) never understood what it meant but someone somewhere dreamed it up and said it was a good thing and we should all do it.

Ten years on and I still don't have a Scooby what it meant, but I can still remember telling a Director, "you'm talking boll0cks man" when he insisted it made sense and I endeavour to work to its basic principle. *confused*

"We're doomed....DOOMED" I tell you.

"Leverage" had a specific and well understood meaning in financial circles where it meant, simply stated, to make the best use of some resource.

It then became a buzz word for management gonks where it was effective synonymous with 'use' or 'use to best advantage'. So all they were saying was that you should make best use of shared information.

Quite why your management couldn't tell you this is something of a mystery. As, indeed, is the fact that not one of 30,000 people managed to work it out. It is just another case of people using a long word with a somewhat specialist and not commonly understood meaning to stand in for a more appropriate, smaller, word with a well known meaning.

Dave_C_2

Fruitcake wrote: »

A few years ago the multi-national company for whom I work came out with a load of corporate b0llock-speak incuding the phrase, "leverage shared information."

<snip>

"We're doomed....DOOMED" I tell you.

Anyone for buzzword bingo?

FakeIrish

I cannot tolerate people who uses swear words in their uneducated belief that they are being hilarious.

Paul_Varjak

What is was, was...

Because you then knows what follows is going to be utterly incomprehensible.

Fruitcake

Dave_C wrote: »

Anyone for buzzword bingo?

Oh I have played that many a time, only it was pronounced slightly differently to buzzword. It began with bull.... if I remember correctly.

sharpy2010

Sagz wrote: »

MacDonalds drive thru staff have taken to saying 'See you later'. As I'm usually driving from one side of the country to the other I tell them that if they do 'see me later' it will mean I'm lost.

And no doubt when you do so, they just think "what an idiot".

sharpy2010

esuhl wrote: »

Oh.. and I'm not sure whether this is correct or not, but last time I travelled by train an onboard annoucement was made: "The door buttons are now activated". But the word "are" signifies present tense, which contradicts"activated" suggesting past tense.

I would have said either "The door buttons are now active" (to give their current state) or "The door buttons have been activated" (to infer an earlier action). But then I thought... if the door buttons are active, there is nothing to say that they haven't always been in that state... and to say that they "have been activated" means that they were activated in the past, but may have been subsequently de-activated. So saying that they "are now activated" makes it clear that the activation happened in the past, but the buttons are still active in the present. It also avoids the split-infinitive in saying "The door buttons have now been activated".

Oh dear, time to stop the trainspotting I think!

Azari

sharpy2010 wrote: »

And no doubt when you do so, they just think "what an idiot".

Yes, because the staff there are, to put it politely, not the sharpest knives in the draw and probably wouldn't be able to work that out.

hansi

Why, when reporting incidents like the shooting of two Britons in the USA, do the reporters have to mention the value of the house that their parents live in. It has no relevance to the story, and I don't need to know that they live in a million pound house. Who needs to know this superfluous information:mad:

Eenymeeny

hansi wrote: »

Why, when reporting incidents like the shooting of two Britons in the USA, do the reporters have to mention the value of the house that their parents live in. It has no relevance to the story, and I don't need to know that they live in a million pound house. Who needs to know this superfluous information:mad:

We could start a whole new thread on news reporting! I agree whole heartedly. I also get annoyed when they add their opinion, it should be unbiased reporting. Also asking for our opinion, you tell us, that's your job! ... and describing people, such as "40 year old blonde" is that relevant? See? I could go on and on...:o:rotfl: