Have you ever used buzzwords in the office and felt unsure about the listener’s understanding? Buzzwords are often over-used in the business office. These real buzz words and buzz phrases were gathered while listening carefully in the Detroit area automotive industry.

Have you ever used buzzwords in the office and felt unsure about the listener’s understanding? Buzzwords are often over-used in the business office. These real buzz words and buzz phrases were gathered while listening carefully in the Detroit area automotive industry.

The calamity in the use of buzzwords is that they lack universal meaning (definition) and are seldom defined when first used. A manager uses them so that he will sound like his director who used them. A supervisor feels obligated to follow the example. Everyone may eventually be saying the same words but with different buzzword definitions. Hence, communication is greatly hampered.

Here is the fifth twenty-five of at least 200 contemporary buzzwords. Each is used in a sentence or followed by descriptive dialogue.

  1. Get our foot in the door – Go get out foot in the door with the finance decision-makers
  2. Getting push-back – I volunteered to join their focus group but we’re getting push-back from the legacy members
  3. Grassy knoll – Watch their progress from a grassy knoll so we’ll be ready to take action
  4. Grow the business – Making our customers in other departments dependent on our output is a part of growing the business
  5. Handcuff it – We don’t want anything to go wrong so handcuff it for absolute control
  6. Handle it in a Sidebar – Don’t diffuse this meeting by dealing with topics that you can handle in a sidebar (some other time and place)
  7. Handrail it (guide) – Handrail it by providing vital information while letting progress take a natural course
  8. Have we finished conversating? – I have another meeting to attend; have we finished conversating? (There is no such word as “conversating” It is a natural outgrowth of “can we conversate.”.
  9. Heads up – Why didn’t you give me a heads up about her poor work ethic?
  10. Held hostage by… – We seem to be held hostage by the misunderstanding you created two years ago
  11. Heuristically speaking – Our test programs are evolutionary; heuristically speaking
  12. Hit a sweet spot – Your specific praise of the engineer’s work hit a sweet spot with his manager
  13. Hit all four corners of the box – We hit all four corners of the box. because we had flawless research
  14. Holes in the data? – Where are the holes in the data set?
  15. Home run – Hit a home run by having all your ducks in a row for the presentation
  16. Hotdesking – Acquire additional skill sets and you can do some hotdesking (filling in) when other workers are laid-off
  17. How to eat the elephant – If you will each take a small part of the project, I’ll show you how to eat the elephant
  18. I need the info – I’m the boss, I need the info
  19. I.D.I.O.T error – Even the boss can make an IDIOT error.
  20. If you’re happy with it – If you’re happy with it, then go ahead and do it and I can claim it was completely your idea
  21. Initiatives – You don’t have enough project initiatives to make yourself worthwhile to our organization
  22. In no uncertain terms – I told him in no uncertain terms not to cooperate with the cost increases
  23. In the driver’s seat – As the manager, I’m in the driver’s seat
  24. In the Zone – You’ll understand all of these buzzwords when you get in the zone
  25. Incentive compensation (I.C.) employee level – An egalitarian society is not possible in an environment that includes both IC and non-IC employees.