# Corporate Speak That Pisses You Off **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 24, 2020, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852 "2020-12-24T23:02:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/82 "2020-12-26T03:48:20Z")
> [@DeadTreasSecretaries](#): > > Without buy-in from all key stakeholders around the meaning of guest, these headwinds are going to occupy too much bandwidth. We’re going to need to have an open dialogue to drill down where the rubber really meets the road. Remember, there is more than one way to skin a cat. And by doing that, we can leverage our synergies so that all parties can be proactive in furthering our mission on a going forward basis. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/83 "2020-12-26T03:50:32Z")
It means that your company thinks that employees are capital assets that you own, buy and sell.\ What else does capital mean? When Marx wrote _Das Kapital_, he wasn’t writing about employee relations. He was writing about capital, owned by corporations and employers. “Personnel” is a far better term to refer to people, not as “resources” or as “capital.” I am a person, not an asset, not capital and not a resource. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/84 "2020-12-26T04:14:44Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > It means that your company thinks that employees are capital assets that you own, buy and sell It’s not just my company. We use Workday and they categorize some of the functions, such as legal name changes, editing licenses, or editing photos, under HCM. > [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > “Personnel” is a far better term to refer to people, not as “resources” or as “capital.” I suppose. I don’t think I’ve ever worked for a company that had a personnel office it’s always been human resources. So that ship sailed a long time ago I think. Incidentally, we refer to employees as employees rather than assets or resources. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/85 "2020-12-26T04:15:51Z")
Do you have an “employee relations office” or a “human resources office”? Yes, that ship sailed a long time ago, and I’ve been making this same complaint to human resources officers throughout that time. They’re always taken aback because they think calling a person a “resource” is more complimentary than calling a person a person. If I’m a “resource”, that is the company putting me on the same level as their physical resources, their financial resources, and so on. I’m just something that the employer uses and will dispose of as needed. At least it’s honest. ---
**Author:** ![Obeseus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbce88/32.png) [@Obeseus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Obeseus)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/86 "2020-12-26T04:21:48Z")
Dashboard. My last employer was bought by another company, which resulted in a new crew of higher- ups. At our monthly business meetings, all I heard from these guys was things like, “The purchasing dashboard shows . . .” There was no dashboard anywhere. Any numbers in this dashboard had to be picked out of several paragraphs of a report. A previous employer had a sign out in the shop that was updated periodically. It included things like our defect rate, on-time delivery rate, 100% order fill, etc. I suppose that could have been called a dashboard, but nobody called it that. Upon joining my current employer, I heard the boss mention the sales dashboard. I asked him where the dashboard was, and he told me that it was in a report. You had to read through several paragraphs to get the key numbers. There is no real ‘dashboard.’ ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/87 "2020-12-26T04:23:46Z")
My favs are in the news media. “We _ **reached out t** _o the terrorists but they did not return our call.” “It was _ **not immediately clear** _ who kidnapped the baby.” ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/88 "2020-12-26T04:56:49Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > I agree on that. The myth of the “internal customer” is one of the more harmful corporate trends out there. It creates a transactional mentality but without the vital informative function of pricing. For example, I have no way to say “customer A isn’t a good return on investment, so we’ll keep doubling their rate until they either yield revenue or go away.” They’ll never pay off, they’ll never go away, so we’re stuck with them. I actually really like the “internal customer.” I’ve done a lot of work on things that aren’t external facing and have had to push back against crappy work because the end result isn’t going to be seen by the public. I think it helps sometimes to point out that we do have a “customer.” It’s Linda-from-accounting. And while she will end up using whatever we throw at her, we get paid in whatever time she saves in her being more efficient at her job (and just being generally happier because she’s not forced to use horrible tools.) > [@Obeseus](#): > > Dashboard. My last employer was bought by another company, which resulted in a new crew of higher- ups. At our monthly business meetings, all I heard from these guys was things like, “The purchasing dashboard shows . . .” There was no dashboard anywhere. One team I’m on does this with “burndown chart.” It’s a paragraph, not a chart. And nothing is being burnt-down. I asked about it pointedly once. I flat out said “that’s not a burndown chart” after it showed up again. Since then, I’ve not said anything. Apparently, they really like that phrase and it’s not worth the fight. The ones I hate: “story” [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/UlkIVIau1Nk/hqdefault.jpg "You are not a storyteller - Stefan Sagmeister @ FITC") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlkIVIau1Nk) and “journey.” ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/89 "2020-12-26T07:47:35Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I’m in HR You have my sympathies. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/90 "2020-12-26T08:02:16Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > That’s why we have these different words. When I say that my mother in law is a guest, you know without question that she has not been asked or required to pay. Why? Because that is what that word means. If I use that word, you wouldn’t have a question in your mind whether I charged her, because that is what the term “guest” means. And yet, I can honestly say that I have never heard a person staying at a hotel be referred to as a “guest” and thought to myself “So does that mean they didn’t have to pay?” Nor have I ever stayed at a relative’s house, given them some money to cover the expenses, and thought of myself as a “housecustomer”. ---
**Author:** ![blabbermeister](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e9a140/32.png) [@blabbermeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blabbermeister)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/91 "2020-12-26T11:15:04Z")
> [@amarinth](#): > > The ones I hate: “story” and “journey” This is going to get worse. Boring people have read in some book that you should use stories to “engage” people. Result: They’re going to keep doing exactly what they’re doing, cramming fourteen graphs into a single PowerPoint slide with the density of a neutron star, reading every number out loud and referring to it as the “Story.” ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/92 "2020-12-26T11:57:22Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > We don’t deliver solutions. We solution ideas. Reminds me of the odd fad for advertising a business as being all about solutions, which sort of sounds helpful and businesslike, except that it depends on persuading the customer that they have a problem (that implicitly they don’t understand yet). I first noticed this on a van proclaiming “snacking solutions”, then one for a business offering “fenestration solutions”; there’s probably some whizzkid in a chemicals company all geared up to rebrand them as “solutions solutions”. Also, I remember in one organisation someone insisting that we needed to “keep all stakeholders in the loop going forward”. I asked if they’d done a full health&safety assessment on the idea - tumbleweed. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/93 "2020-12-26T12:35:30Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > If not, what word could I use to distinguish her from a customer? If not “guest” then what other word? You could try “visitor”. Also, nobody uses the word “customer” to refer to a person paying to stay at their house. Usually, they’d say “renter”, “lesse” or “tenant”. Is she visiting or is she renting? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/94 "2020-12-26T12:52:25Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > You could try “visitor”. Also, nobody uses the word “customer” to refer to a person paying to stay at their house. Usually, they’d say “renter”, “lesse” or “tenant”. Is she visiting or is she renting? I think that is my point. If I say that she is my guest, then nobody would ever think that she was paying to stay here. I suppose that “customer” is pretty stilted, but yes, renter or tenant would be good words. But if she was paying money to rent out an extra bedroom, nobody would understand the term “guest” to be that. If I said she was a guest, you would think that she was here by invitation or permission and not paying. That is what the word means, even if hotels and restaurants have used this type of corporate speak long enough for it to be in a dictionary. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/95 "2020-12-26T13:17:12Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > But if she was paying money to rent out an extra bedroom, nobody would understand the term “guest” to be that. If you run an AirBnB or own a hotel, then yes, people would assume your guest was paying to stay there. If you said that you have 3 guests staying at your AirBnB, I (and everyone else) would think they were paying. If you said that you have 3 guests staying at your home, then they aren’t paying. If it’s your home, then you would have to say renter or tenant. If it’s your hotel or your BnB, then the word “guest” conveys the same thing. It depends on the location the person is staying at. If you said your MIL is a guest at your home, then she isn’t paying. If you said she was a guest at your hotel or your BnB, then she’s paying. Maybe you’re comping her stay or giving her a huge discount or something. But that’s besides the point. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/96 "2020-12-26T13:27:29Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > Okay, so we’re going with “I’m right and all the dictionaries are wrong?” That’s your final answer? Nah, that argument doesn’t work. Dictionaries are not prescriptive. They describe how language is used. His argument is that the word has been used incorrectly for a long time. So of course that usage will be in the dictionary, just like any of the “corporate speak” mentioned elsewhere in this thread will be if it has been used long enough. If being in the dictionary doesn’t make other posters wrong, then it doesn’t make @UltraVires wrong. The best way I could see to show his claim to be false would be to look at the etymological history, and seeing if the meaning of “customer of a hotel” predates the usage “person who is given accommodation by a host.” If not, then I can’t see how this is any more than just opinion vs. opinion. It would mean that hotels and similar did choose the word “guest” for the positive connotations of being a guest at someone’s house. @UltraVires is annoyed by this usage, even though you (and I) are not. > [@Riemann](#): > > And how about these expressions? > > _guest performer_ > _guest host_ > _guest worker_ > > These guests are _receiving_ payment. How does that fit into the restricted definition that you have pulled out of your… brain? Those would obviously be situations where the host (the venue) is accommodating the guest by paying for them. The objection @UltraVires has is to someone called a guest having to pay. And Google ngram is interesting, but very incomplete for anything before 1800. It’s interesting data, but you need more to establish that there wasn’t some word that predates the usage of “guest” for hotels. * * * I think you guys are barking up the wrong tree. Even if @UltraVires is wrong about hotels, he’s right that there is this pervasiveness of businesses using language like “guest” to add a different connotation to the interaction. He is right about restaurants calling people guests when they are customers. Why would they do that except if “guest” implied something different from customer? I think it fits right into what this thread is about. I’ve seen this trend in ads for a long time. Disney did this whole “come home” campaign to try and get people to come to the theme park. Olive Garden says “when you’re here, you’re family”–but family doesn’t normally pay for their meal. You can’t tell me that’s not a sort of corporate speak, being used to try and make the customer feel more like a guest in your home would feel. And that sure seems like exactly how most hotels want their customers to feel. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/97 "2020-12-26T13:46:18Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > The best way I could see to show his claim to be false would be to look at the etymological history, and seeing if the meaning of “customer of a hotel” predates the usage “person who is given accommodation by a host.” Well, if that’s where we need to go for the answer, [etymonline.com](http://etymonline.com) explains that the the meaning of “person entertained for pay” is from the late 13th Century, and predates any meaning associated with staying somewhere for free. Before that it came from a root word probably meaning “someone with whom one has _reciprocal_ duties of hospitality” and before that it came from a root word meaning “stranger” or “enemy”. So, for at least 700 years the term “guest” has meant “person entertained for pay”. Not sure when the other meaning came about, but it looks like it was at least 100 to 300 years later. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/98 "2020-12-26T13:47:35Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Olive Garden says “when you’re here, you’re family”–but family doesn’t normally pay for their meal. This is an excellent example. I am all for puffery and businesses being allowed to exaggerate and bullshit in advertising. But this statement is a complete falsehood. When I go to a family member’s house, or they come to mine, they don’t put their name on a waiting list, be given a buzzer, and then are allowed to enter. As you said, they are not billed at the end of a meal. There is no puffery in that statement; it is just an absolute lie, which I contend is true when hotels and restaurants call me a guest. I am certainly not family, and I am not a guest. I am a paying customer–and again, there is nothing wrong with that. It is a business relationship. They are providing me a valuable service for which I am willing to exchange money for. Nothing unsettling about that. But they aren’t doing it for free or out of some sense of kindness. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/99 "2020-12-26T13:53:48Z")
But it doesn’t matter what the word meant in the 1200s, and we probably couldn’t understand them anyways, even though they were speaking English. What matters is the common understanding of the word today. And we have picked words that we know the difference in meaning. If someone is a guest at my house, they aren’t paying. If they are a customer, or a tenant, or a renter, then they are paying. For a hotel to say that I am their guest, they are bullshitting people. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/100 "2020-12-26T13:58:33Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > it doesn’t matter what the word meant in the 1200s, and we probably couldn’t understand them anyways, even though they were speaking English. So, it doesn’t matter what modern dictionaries say; it doesn’t matter what historical usage was; it doesn’t matter what every English speaking person understands it to mean; it only matters what you feel the word should mean. Under those constraints, then I guess you’re right. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2020, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852/101 "2020-12-26T14:01:20Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > So, it doesn’t matter what modern dictionaries say; > it doesn’t matter what historical usage was; > it doesn’t matter what every English speaking person understands it to mean; > it only matters what you feel the word should mean. > > Under those constraints, then I guess you’re right. I dispute your third sentence. It is not what every English speaking person understands it to mean. If I say that my mother in law is a guest in my home, you and every other English speaking person understands that to mean she is not paying. Do you disagree? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corporate-speak-that-pisses-you-off/928852.md?page=6)