Vault.com has a recent blog article titled “How Not To Sound Like A Liar At Work“, describing how people generally are put off with hollow business jargons. Not only that, most of us actually think whoever using those phrases are lying to our faces. The article includes a few commonly used business jargons and their respective underlying meanings. Here are a few examples:
Business-speak: “Deep dive“
What people who aren’t liars say: “Instead of doing our usual half-assed job, we took the time to investigate properly.”
Business-speak: “Circle back“
What people who aren’t liars say: “We’ll discuss this again – ideally when we actually know something about it.”
Business-speak: “Deliverables“
What people who aren’t liars say: “Mundane tasks I am responsible for completing.”
Business-speak: “Let’s take this offline“
What people who aren’t liars say: “Let’s talk about this after the meeting, so we don’t embarrass ourselves in front of the boss/waste everyone else’s time.”
I bet none of the above business talks are new to you, regardless of what you do. You see it at work, and you hear about it all the time in politics and virtually any news outbreak on TV.
What I find hilarious and fascinating is the website “Unsuck It“, dedicated to “unsuck” the terrible business jargons you come across with. Basically, you type in the jargon and you are presented with the unsucked version. Brilliant. Here are a few of my best finds.
Innovative
Unsucked: New, Slightly improved, Shiny
All-hands
Unsucked: Staff meeting
As soon as possible
Unsucked: In an unreasonable amount of time. Quickly
Challenge
Unsucked: Problem
Elevator pitch
Unsucked: Brief, persuasive summary. Particularly one tailored to an influential audience trapped with the speaker in a small, windowless box suspended from a cable with no obvious escape route (p.s. check out my post on Elevator Speech)
Empower
Unsucked: Assign a menial or unpleasant responsibility to someone, particularly to a low-status individual or group (Ouch…)
Paradigm shift
Unsucked: A new, crappy reality to which employees or customers must accommodate themselves. Change in basic assumptions or a profound shift in perception. Possibly the most overused, diluted, otherwise useful and descriptive phrase
I hear what you’re saying
Unsucked: LA LA LA LA LA I can’t hear you
Interject
Unsucked: Interrupt whatever you’re saying to show you I was raised by wolves
Knowledge transfer
Unsucked: Sharing relevant experience throughout an organization. Bitching about office politics over drinks. Getting old-timers to divulge useful information before you lay them off for being too expensive
Outside the box
Unsucked: Unconventional. But in a way that won’t challenge anyone or get me fired. Also, I’m too lazy to think of useful descriptors
Pencil in
Unsucked: Schedule, with the understanding that you are going to flake at the last minute in favor of someone more important
Rightsizing
Unsucked: Chicken shit for firing
Wow factor
Uncuked: I don’t know what I want, but it’s not what I’m looking at. Tart it up!
If you can think of more, send them to me as I can use a laugh every now and then, especially at work!
Confessions of a Corporate Shopaholic 
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