Buzzword Bingo, the last part

Buzzword bingo offers a few more expressions to avoid:
stakeholder – Everybody’s talking about stake-holders these days. Do a google search. Do a database search. 3,957 articles have the keyword stakeholder. Most of these are about public agencies or public programs: HIV prevention, educational accountability, public sector scientific research. Health care really loves it. And one of their key stakeholder groups is consumers. That pretty much gets us all, doesn’t it?

But what does it mean? If you look it up in the merriam-webster online dictionary, you find:
Main Entry: stake·hold·er Pronunciation: 'stAk-"hOl-d&r Function: noun Date: 1708: a person entrusted with the stakes of bettors

I don’t think so.

From OED. Now this is a dictionary. It tells you the derivation of words, all possible definitions, when they were first used, even. They’ve got about three pages of "stake," and along about the fourth column of the second page, you find:

stakeholder "(a) one who holds the stake or stakes of a wager, etc.; (b) one who has a stake (sense in 1c) in something, esp. a business." So you go back to 1c–"the post to which a bull or bear was fastened to be baited." Hold the phone. Whoops, wrong 1c, that’s the first sense of the word "stake," about sticks. We need the second set of stake definitions, about money, something placed at risk, or, as they say in 1c: "to have something to gain or lose by the turn of events, to have an interest in;" OK, so that makes some sense.

If I’ve paid into social security all my life, or a pension plan, or have shares in a company, that makes me a stakeholder. I’ll buy that. But how come everybody is using it to mean anybody who might be affected by something. When you talk about issues like public health, what is WRONG with just saying THE PUBLIC??? How did "THE PUBLIC" become "STAKEHOLDERS"? Maybe it was fresh and interesting to use that term the first 300 times, but now it’s gone into the overused and just plain stupid category. Let’s call the public the public, and revert to only using the term "stakeholder" to mean what it really means: Anyone with a piece of the action.

Push the envelope: A phrase dictionary tells us the term originated with the airplane industry where the limits of a plane's performance were marked on a two-dimensional graph. The envelope is the area of the graph that indicates safe usage. The term is now used to mean stretch the boundaries, or exceed existing performance of software, or un-heard of levels of service, or, gasp, original ideas. In use since the late 1970s. Not fresh anymore.

Outside the box: This one was interesting the first time. Just the first time. At this point, if you’re saying "outside the box," you’re in the box.

no-brainer: OK, this is supposed to mean something is so easy to figure out, you don’t need a brain. When I hear it though, I think of something so stupid, whoever did it chose it said it, must not have had a brain. I don’t think I’m alone in this.

Finally, finally, this is it: verbing. This is taking a perfectly good noun, and using it as a verb. An early one was "contact." Please feel free to contact me if you need further information. Later, "access." How do we access your files? "Impact." This program will impact the region.

I thought impacting was something that happened to your bowels, or a wisdom tooth. But the business community thinks not. They even adverb it: "The two companies are forging an impactful strategic alliance." "Entries will be judged on their overall effectiveness and creative impactfulness." You forget what the noun is, so you make a noun out of a verbed noun: Their creative IMPACT. Thanks.

Sports folks like to use nouns as verbs, as well. This eliminates the need to use an actual complete sentence: someone doesn’t win a medal, they "medal." Medaling, not as in my mother is meddling in my business again; but who was that little Harry-Potter-looking-Swiss kid who medaled in the ski jumps in the last Olympics? A whole new verb. Ink. Sports guys don’t sign contracts, they "ink" them. Horses ship to races, guards defense the other team, and on it goes.

Business does it, too: re-skilling; visioning; transitioning.
And speaking of transitioning. . .Here’s my advice: watch your language! Make a note of any words, phrases, terms that bug you. Make a bingo card. Take it to a meeting with you. Or keep it beside you when you read the newspaper, or watch TV, or listen to the radio. You’ll be amazed how often you hear those dumb, trite phrases. Word of advice, though. If you’re in a meeting, don’t yell "Bingo!"

Buzzword Bingo, part two

All right, that’s enough math.

How about sports analogies? Business loves them, all about teamwork and competition. Politicians like to use them too, usually about conflict: the ball’s in our court. We have to run with it. But those make sense. Third strike, you’re out. Take a time-out. Call a foul. Slam dunk. Ballpark figure.

Here’s one that gets me, though: level the playing field. This one goes for everything, Business of all kinds: "computers level the playing field in design" "Coalition for a Level Playing Field, a group of privately-owned parts stores in Northern Ohio struggling against larger chains"
efforts of Women In Cable and Television to level the professional playing field for women in the industry
Insurance--Public claims adjusters can level the playing field for you...
Education –"... public universities should not receive direct subsidies in order to provide a level playing field for private institutions."
Excuse me, but aren’t direct subsidies the DIFFERENCE between public and private universities?
And even SPORTS (though not in a literal sense) uses this particular sports analogy--Will new Olympic drug tests level the playing field? Black coaches--The Level Playing Field™(LLC) - "a comprehensive guide and database to assist in the identification and selection of African-American football coaches in the collegiate and professional arenas."
Politics, of course: the Post reports: "We’re told that the cash from the U.S. Treasury is necessary because unfair obstacles block opposition candidates as they try to communicate with the Yugoslav public." The newspaper added: "U.S. officials say they are seeking only to level the playing field."
So maybe the operative phrase here is "unfair obstacles."

Level the playing field. Let’s think about that. How much sense does that actually make? Aren’t most playing fields pretty level? At least in organized sports, and can someone tell me any non- organized sports these days? Not even community youth league. Kids don’t play pick-up games anymore. It’s all organized. They’ve got people maintaining the fields. And even if the playing field isn’t level, you change sides during the half. So there’s more than having a level field–there’s sun, wind, mud.

Level the playing field. Just everybody stop using the phrase, or never start. Edit it out of anything you see. Just say "no" to "level the playing field."

Raise the bar. Everybody’s raising the bar: business, government, education: We find a virtual agency which designs and implements dynamic systems, promotions, and events that raise the bar for creativity and quality; classes at U of L raise the bar on appreciation of wine and food; eMachines Raise the Bar for Simplicity on the Internet; Government must raise the bar in IT project management; States Raise the Bar on Teacher Standards. Everybody seems to be raising the bar. But what does it mean? What’s the reference? Pole-vaulting? High jump? When else does "raising the bar" mean going for a new standard? Certainly not limbo dancing. You have to lower the bar on that one. So how come so many people from so many different areas of life use a term from an almost inconceivably obscure sport? Because somebody else did.

Wouldn’t it be fun if people started using analogies from other sports. Take horseshoes for instance. I mean, horseshoes is an ancient and noble game. They have pitchers, and they play innings. So what if instead of "surging Christmas sales showing a solid gain, but not a home run." we said "surging Christmas sales showing a solid gain, but not a ringer." Doesn’t have quite the same impact, does it? Not a ringer? Maybe it’s a leaner.

What about polo? Now there’s a sport. You play polo, you’re talking serious equipment. To play horseshoes you need some dirt and a stake and some horseshoes. I mean, they’ve got all kinds of complicated rules if you look at the tournament event rules, but basically, it’s tossing horseshoes at a stick in the ground. But polo? You’ve got to have a horse!!! Well, they call it a "mount," but it’s a horse, or a pony. And there’s all the tack and protective gear for the player and the horse, and a ball, and a mallet. There’s a lot of rules about eligible mounts. The mount can’t be "blind" (even in one eye) or "showing vice" (kicking, out of control). The mount can score a goal, though, if it knocks the ball with its hoof. It’s called a "pony goal."

Polo’s a pretty tough game. The game doesn’t stop unless something really bad happens, like if the mount’s girth breaks and the player is in danger of falling. If the player falls, he is allowed 15 minutes to recover, unless he loses consciousness, in which case he can’t play the rest of the day.
I went to a polo game once. It was actually pretty low-key and fun. I think it was the equivalent of a pick-up game of polo, if such a thing is possible. Anyhow, there were a bunch of people there at the field just sort of sitting on their cars and watching. Tailgating, if you will. At half time, (they call the periods "chukkers") people got off their cars and walked around the field smashing the clumps of dirt and grass dug up by hooves and balls and mallets. It’s called "divot stomping" (hey! We’re leveling the playing field!).

Anyhow, wouldn’t it be great if instead of saying something like "we struck out" if a bill or something didn’t pass, the governor or somebody said, "our girth broke" to indicate the bill was out of control and in danger of failing!!! Or, for a minor set-back, "we just broke a stirrup leather, but we’ll be back." Hey, and after a really messy debate, the TV pundits would be talking about reconciling the parties and they’d say "there will be a lot of divot stomping" after this debacle. Or if you’re working hard but facing stiff competition, and things finally go your way, instead of saying you got a "lucky bounce," what if you said it was a "pony goal!"

Polo talk. How about jai alai? A game of action. How about the next time somebody does something unethical, illegal, or just plain against the rules, what if instead of calling it a foul, or saying someone was "hitting below the belt," we go jai alai on them and declare the malfeasance a "TWO WALL" SERVE.

More buzzwords coming soon . . .

24/7–365–180! Bingo

Did you ever play Buzzword bingo? It’s a little game I got from the funny papers. Ever read that comic, Sally Forth? Sally works in an office. Goes to a lot of meetings. So, for fun, she and her colleagues play buzzword bingo. It’s like regular bingo, except instead of numbers, you have...buzzwords. Supposedly stylish or trendy words or phrases. It does kind of help you pay attention in meetings. I’ve never actually heard anyone "bingo," either, but it’s fun. If I were doing a current general-purpose buzzword bingo card, here’s what I’d include.

24/7. You like that? You ever say that? Not me. I don’t even like to hear it. I don’t even like to look at it. But it’s everywhere.

So where did it come from? Not military, like A-OK or 19 hundred hours. Not police like what’s your 20 or we’ve got a 5-1-1 on the 9-2-7.

I looked it up. It’s right there in the dictionary. Merriam-Webster’s online language center (available 24/7). It’s an adverb. Or adjective. Date 1986. No derivation given. This ain’t the OED. Here’s the definition: "for twenty-four hours seven days a week Example: " Great.
But where’d it come from? I was thinking technology, or advertising, or both. Online. Access. 24-7. But 1986? Didn’t have too much online access then. No internet. No dot.coms. Automated tellers? Toll-free phone numbers maybe. Our operators are on call. 24/7.
The earliest mention of 24/7 I could find was a group involved in the mid-eighties New York based Black Rock Coalition, once again on tour as the legendary South Bronx NYC Heavy Metal Soul band, 24-7 Spyz! They got it from somewhere, though.

Keep tracking it down, you come up with drug dealers, or as the Texas police note in their drug slang web site, "Clockers - Entry level crack dealers who sell drugs 24 hours a day." In the immortal words of Dre and Snoop Dogg, "ain’t nuthin but a G-thang."Our crack dealers are waiting for you to pull up. 24/7.

We’ve got ourselves a catchy phrase–from the drug culture thank you very much–that everyone seems to be using: tech support is available "24/7" library reference service is offered "24/7" a mom’s job is "24/7." Oh, yeah? You saying your mama’s a CLOCKER?

So what’s my problem? Besides just being tired of 24/7? I don’t believe in the concept. In my view, there is no reason for ANYTHING except 911–fire, police, ambulance–to be available all the time. OK, maybe Waffle House. But what’s wrong with Open 24 Hours, or We Never Close? Time honored, perfectly clear. My son and I were in Paris a few years ago, and there was a little café close to our hotel. Open 23 Hours. Now that was confusing. We never did figure out which hour it was closed. Same guy always seemed to be working there, too.

Cut to 1992. That’s 12 years ago already! 24-7 was campus slang, along with "buff"or "biscuit" to describe a fit or cute guy; gill-net theory of dating (go out with anyone, I guess); "earth-muffin" Birkenstock-wearing, no-make-up nature lover. . . So maybe it was clever. The first time you heard it anyway. Maybe you even had to process what it meant. 24/7? Oh, yeah, 24/7! I get it! OK. We got it.

So why does the term 24/7 appear in more than 600 recent articles? It’s like face-painting. Have you ever seen a news article about a fair or carnival that doesn’t have a photo of some kid getting their FACE painted? Find something else to take a picture of! Please!
12 years later, 24/7 is still with us. I’m surprised CNN doesn’t just go ahead and change the name of headline news to 24/7. I’m surprised none of the new cop/fire/emt shows is called 24/7. I’m surprised the 7-11 hasn’t changed its name to the 24-7. Folks, 24/7 has entered the vernacular. Like I said, it’s in the dictionary!

That’s the only 1992 slang which seems to have survived: I looked up biscuit, it’s there, but only the bread, pottery, and color definitions, not the cute guys. No "gill-net daters." No earth muffins. They made some suggestions, though, for earth muffin, like I couldn’t spell or couldn’t type. Like "maybe you meant": earthmoving, earthmovings, earthmover. No. earthmovers . Uh, no.

anthemion (I had to look that one up. Flat floral form, like in relief sculpture) erythremia (had to look that one up, too– told me to look under polycythemia ve·ra.) Something about too much blood, causing nosebleeds and enlargement of the spleen. Not an earth muffin, that.
unthrifty, arrhythmic, earthworms, more suggestions. Sounds like a found poem to me: Unthrifty arrhythmic earthworms.

24/7. . . 24/7/365 Just in case you didn’t get it yet. Or maybe we want you to know WE NEVER CLOSE. Not even Christmas day. Even WAL-MART closes Christmas day. People should close Christmas Day. No one should have to work on holidays. Or Sundays. People should have days to be not busy. Not have a choice but to stay at home. Or go for an aimless wander. I’d even like it if they disconnected the phones. I even like it when the power goes out! You just have to be quiet. No noise. It gets dark, you go to bed. Quiet. 24/7. 24/7/365.

You know what really kills me? People who use these phrases you hear all the time, but they get it wrong. Smart people do this. My boss has one he does all the time. We tease him about it. Throw the baby out with the wash. Right. We all bathe our babies in the laundry. Another friend, very smart, ALWAYs instead of "for all intents and purposes" says "for all intensive purposes." So people say these things without really thinking about what they mean.

Like "do a 180." Know what a 180 is? It’s geometry. Like a 90 degree angle. That’s a right angle, right? So if you double that, it’s 180 degrees, which is a straight line, only if you’re talking about a 180 degree turn, you’d be going back the way you came. Like if you spin out on the interstate and do a 180, you’ll be heading the wrong way. Not good.
So you’re doing a 180-- a complete reversal, an about-face, a GO BACK before it’s too late. However, a lot of folks get it mixed up. Didn’t pay attention in geometry class, I guess.
Like they’ll say a 360 degree difference. A CIRCLE is 360 degrees, all the way around. Big change, there. Gets you right back where you started from. My favorites, though, are the ones who don’t even have a CLUE.
I watch these crime shows all the time. You know, true crime, like Forensic Files, and the New Detectives. City Confidential. Lots of times the people who commit the crimes don’t really think it out all that well. I mean, they’ll do something and try to cover it up, but they don’t know all the tools the police have. Luminol, dna, fiber analysis. Anyhow, this one lady decided to kill her husband, because he was too demanding. She wasn’t about to do it, though. She had enough sense to know she would be looked at if his death was suspicious, so she recruited her sister.
The sister, apparently, had self esteem issues. The wife managed to convince her sister that this apparently nice-looking, hard-working, family man whose main fault as far as I could tell was that he wanted to do it EVERY night was a BAD GUY. So the wife convinces her sister it would benefit HER (the sister) as well as the wife for him to be dead. Something about insurance money.
Now this is our first clue the wife maybe wasn’t all that bright since she wrote this all to her sister IN A NOTE. But, here’s what she said: first, you can get your boobs done. Get your boobs done...that’s bringing out the queen early. The wife listed a couple of other things the sis could do with her share of the insurance money: quit her job, move into a nicer place. Oh, yeah, go to rehab.
Ah, now we see the vulnerability of the sister. Boobs, job, condo. Those things are nice, but a motivation to kill someone? Nah, it’s the rehab. She’s got a problem. I guess a woman who would kill her husband probably wouldn’t mind too much to exploit her addicted sister, either. The wife wasn’t taking any chances, though, so she hammered the message home. Get your boobs done, Tell your boss to shove it. Get a nice condo, get off drugs and alcohol, in short! a 365 degree change in your life!!

365 degrees? 365 degrees!!! That’s the number of days in a year! It’s got nothing to do with a direction! It’s not a turn-around! It’s all the way around and then some! 365 degrees? That’s not even an oven temperature. Really. Did you ever see a recipe that said to pre-heat the oven to 365 degrees? No.
So, yeah. Figure out with a mind like that at work what happened. The wife woke the husband in the middle of the night saying she heard a burglar. The guy gets his gun and goes into the garage where the sister is waiting with a gun, she fires, and misses, the guy fires and kills her, then realizes it’s his sister-in-law and calls the cops. Make a story short. The sister died, the wife went to jail. Only the husband survived. I’ll bet he knows how many damn degrees are in a circle. He probably even knows how to do a 180.