The 20 Worst Business Buzzwords

20. Synergy

Synergy isn’t a bad word, but it’s a word you can’t say without making everyone in the room notice.

It’s overused in business and only used in business- no one says that their chicken and wine had great synergy at dinner.

Not the worst word on this list, but it has been beaten to death in the business world.

19. Open the kimono

This one is shocking and horrifying. Unfortunately it is alive and well in the corporate world.

The imagery in this phrase is as vivid as a Guillermo del Toro movie without any of the artistic merit.

18. Burning Platform

As one commenter said, it makes sense “if you’re a fireman,” but otherwise leave it alone.

It’s almost meaningless, despite being meant to reference a 1988 tragedy where 168 people died.

Not a great way to talk about your need for a cereal marketing campaign.

17. Action item

Confusing- we decided not to just do things, but to make everything part of an explosive story about how we make photocopies and ask Margaret in accounting when her birthday is.

Getting a new pencil is not an action item, it’s a task.

16. Wheelhouse

It’s an odd one. Here’s how the conversation always goes:

“So we need a report/chicken run/kimono opener. Can your firm handle that?”

Wrong: “Yeah, that’s right in our wheelhouse.”

Right: “Yeah.”

15. Disruptive/Game-changer

Whatever you’re doing, these words do not apply.

Your software that lets you compare likes on Facebook to likes on Twitter is not disruptive, and putting the cheese on the bottom of your cheese does not change the game.

Don’t use these words unless your name regularly appears in Wired.

14. At the end of the day

Whatever you’re doing, these words do not apply.

Your software that lets you compare likes on Facebook to likes on Twitter is not disruptive, and putting the cheese on the bottom of your cheese does not change the game.

Don’t use these words unless your name regularly appears in Wired.

13. Circle Back

Compare:

“Can we circle back to the thing you were saying about pizza delivering dogs?”

“What did you say about pizza delivering dogs?”

See how much clearer that second option is? Circling feels like going the long way around.

12. Deep Dive

“Research” is the word you’re looking for. You did research.

Even that might be a stretch, since in reality you probably stared at an Excel sheet dumped out of your Cognos Cube while your boss leaned on the back of your chair and said “So, which one of these are the sales numbers?”

11. Take offline

It’s supposed to be the nice way to say “The thing you keep talking about is disrupting this meeting, let’s never speak of it again,” but it never comes off that way.

The most infuriating part is that no one is ever “online”- when does anyone say “Let’s get this conversation online” when they want to start a meeting?

10. Leverage

This one never appears outside of an office. No one ever leverages their cutting board to get garlic bread ready.

The reason for that is that we don’t leverage things- we use things.

If you’ve got a smart guy in the office or a new piece of software, you can just use them to solve the problem.

9. Begs the question

So this one is a philosophical problem- “begs the question” doesn’t mean “brings up the question.”

It’s a logical fallacy that means you’ve assumed the truth of your conclusion in the premises of your argument.

Everyone will know what you mean if you say “Rachel’s missing finger begs the question of what she did last night,” but it won’t make sense.

8. Reach out

Call, email, get in touch with, talk to, fax, page, send a smoke signal to, or any other communication option.

Reaching out always sounds like a commitment to yell into a crowd before shrugging your shoulders and walking away.

Take responsibility for making sure you actually contact someone.

7. Surface

“Our new report [better yet, deep dive] surfaced some interesting results.”

You just learned something, but it sounds childish to say that you spent $4,000 to learn that people like cheese more than they like edible flowers. Just say that you learned – you can even “discover,” if you have to – something new.

6. Low-hanging fruit

Another dumb way to say something that everyone already knows.

“Let’s go after the low-hanging fruit.”

No, let’s do the really hard stuff first and watch someone else do the easy things. Of course you’re going after the low-hanging fruit, your neck is too short to reach the good stuff up top.

4. Utilize

Like leverage, but with an extra twist, because it has another more accurate meaning.

According to the Grammar Girl, “‘utilize’ often appears ‘in contexts in which a strategy is put to practical advantage or a chemical or nutrient is being taken up and used effectively.”

So not only is “utilize” unnecessarily long, you’re using it wrong.

3. Thought leader

People can be smart or they can be experts or they can be leaders, but a “thought leader” makes no sense.

You don’t lead thoughts, you lead people.

If someone is influential, people might like their thoughts, but you’re never, ever a thought leader.

2. Going forward

Not only does going forward just mean “in the future,” it is also used exclusively in sentences where you could replace it with absolutely nothing.

“Going forward, we’ll be working closely with Jose and his team.”

“We’ll be working closely with Jose and his team.”

See?

1. Myself

This is the worst because people use it when they think longer words mean more intelligence points, and even smart people fall into this trap.

You can bring the feedback to me or Martin, not to Martin or myself. Unless you’ve done something to your own person, you should not use “myself.”

Originally written by Andrew Marder, the full post can be found here