New Words at Work

By: Bill Moore
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:43:04
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As it says in Ecclesiastes 12:12, of the making of books there is no end, and the same is true of words. New words keep getting made up and old words keep getting new meanings. Every recognizable group or profession; sports, business, religion, entertainment, et al, creates words first to be used only by the "in" crowd. Then these get spread abroad to be adopted and then adapted by other groups. It wasn’t so many years ago that the bottom line had meaning only for accountants, IPO for stock traders, and aerodynamic only for design engineers. As a professional business writer, I have to keep up on what the new words are and which ones I either may or must use in my job. Here's just a few of the many that I've run into—or up against—recently. Some aren't new so much as just now gaining wide acceptance. Actionable, as an adjective, was originally a legal word meaning a situation that presents grounds for a legal action. In business, it's become perverted to mean anything you can take action on. "If it's not immediately actionable, don't even bring it up."

C-level is that august level in the org chart occupied by the CEO, COO, CFO, and their ilk.

"You'll never get C-levels to attend a meeting on this subject." Deceptionist, if it isn't a "real" word yet, should be. This is a receptionist whose job it is to obstruct access to the boss by confusing, intimidating, or simply lying. All with a sweet smile. "A deceptionist like that makes you feel good even when it's a blow-off." DOMA is a heading I ran across on a list of customers considered no longer viable sales targets. To at least one auto OEM, it means Died Or Moved Away. "The DOMA list in that market is getting too large for site viability."

Elevator speech is a term for a brief statement that gives a clear picture of a product, plan, or company. The idea is that it can be presented between the first and tenth floors of an elevator ride. It began as a derogatory term, but lately it's gained respect as something that every employee should be able to deliver regarding when asked, "What is it that you." "Know your elevator speech cold so you can tell 'em who we are and what we do in under a minute."

RDB is another "if it isn't, it should be." The Rectal Data Base (RDB) is where ideas come from that you have to pull something out of your ass.

"Hey, I just went into my RDB and came out with a killer plan for marketing that shlock."

Rough order of magnitude hasn't become ROOM yet, but I'll bet it will just as scientific, wild-assed guess became SWAG. It means the same thing with a touch more corporate tone. "I can give you a figure, but it's going to be a rough order of magnitude."

Zero-tasking is my favorite because it's so close to what I'm doing right now and probably what you're doing, too.

"I off-load one more responsibility on this project, and I hit zero-tasking."

It’s not enough just to walk the walk. You have to be able to talk the talk, too.

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