# When did nonsensical corporate jargon become a thing? How is it still a thing? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 21, 2025, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958 "2025-06-21T23:09:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/81 "2025-06-25T14:25:00Z")
There’s a lot of talk about middle management being the fountain head of corporate jargon, but where I hear it the most is startup founders and CEOs pitching to investors. My wife is a mentor at an entrepreneur incubator. I’ve attended some pitches and when I asked her if she understood a particular piece of jargon, she said, “No. And neither do the investors. That’s the point.” The money has more faith in a good bullshiter than it does a good plan. That explains most of Wall Street, as well. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/82 "2025-06-25T15:41:02Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > I used ChapGPT upthread to compare US and German erasers using corporate buzzwords. It spit out the following table Y’know, I am worried about the level of delight this exercise has given me. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/83 "2025-06-25T17:22:47Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > That is to say, the higher you go up the ladder, the less the person typically knows about how the actual work they oversee actually gets done. So if they can create ambiguity or confusion with flowery, nonsensical language, it gives management an ability to fall back on “you didn’t follow my instructions”. On the other hand, the guy they promoted into being the head of the microelectronics group where I worked was the leading expert on processors and how to debug them. He was really good. He sucked at being a manager, especially at that level. Management skills and technical skills are two different things, especially because even an expert who gets promoted enough is going to be running things they are not an expert in. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/84 "2025-07-02T06:53:35Z")
My wife and I had a small friendly debate about a piece of corporate slang yesterday. She used the classic phrase “run it up the flagpole” in reference to a project she’s working on at her company. I then completed the phrase, “and see who salutes.” She was confused. She’d never heard that part. After a little discussion, we determined that we use the phrase differently. In her workplace, you say “run it up the flagpole” to mean you send a proposal to one or more specific higher-ups with the intent of soliciting their support. However, in my experience, I’ve heard the phrase in its fuller form, which has a more general sense of making a proposal visible to the wider organization to see who agrees with it and is willing to get behind it — a broad popularity test, in other words, rather than a suggestion targeted at particular leaders. My wife had never heard that interpretation and insisted that her organization doesn’t use the phrase (just the first part) that way. This is an extremely old phrase in corporate terms. You might even say it’s a hoary cliché. So I can see how it would have fallen out of favor, but was still hanging around in the background, and then morphed into its new form and re-emerged. In other words, between my wife and me, perhaps both of us were right about the phrase’s meaning, just from different perspectives. And in the context of this thread, that leads to amusing scenarios where different people are using the same opaque jargon to mean different things, and the organization winds up bumbling around with people crashing into each other at cross-purposes as a result. ---
**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:** [July 2, 2025, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/85 "2025-07-02T09:58:15Z")
At which point, no doubt, consultants will be employed at great expense to advise on consolidating the organisation’s communications culture with a whole new lectionary for obfuscating the bleedin’ obvious. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/86 "2025-07-02T10:30:11Z")
There are a lot of good observations here. Mine is that a particular kind of corporate jargon rose in parallel with the decline of secure, well-paying companies that produce goods and services, and the rise of non-productive jobs that slice up those companies and sell them for parts. If your only real role is to reduce actual productive work to money-producing components to be swapped around and liquidated, then obviously your language is going to become more abstract and less concrete. If all you do is manipulate things with language, then you’ll develop elaborate forms for it. And if these spaces are lucrative and competitive (which they are), then there’s kind of a stampede to imitate the language of the powerful, and create innovations that shape it. It’s pretty crazy. Where I work, normal rank-and-file can barely understand conversations that VPs have with each other, or when they address their underlings in settings that are intended to reinforce their power. The point of this language isn’t to communicate, it’s to signal control of the narrative, or submission to that same control. If you don’t conform, if you’re creating value instead of talking about value, then you’re not part of the conversation, you’re just a cell on a spreadsheet, an object to be manipulated and liquidated as necessary. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/87 "2025-07-02T14:14:54Z")
Re: Running it up the flagpole. > [@Cervaise](#): > > This is an extremely old phrase in corporate terms. You might even say it’s a hoary cliché. I think it was already a cliche in the mid-1950s when it was used in _12 Angry Men_. That film probably added another 70 years to its lifespan. ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/88 "2025-07-02T15:36:30Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > The point of this language isn’t to communicate, it’s to signal control of the narrative, or submission to that same control. I see this when people use acronyms _knowing_ I have no idea what they mean. It’s as if they’re a member of the Secret Acronyms Club™. ---
**Author:** ![Fish\_Cheer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fish_cheer/32/17179_2.png) [@Fish\_Cheer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish_Cheer)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/89 "2025-07-02T16:27:53Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > My wife had never heard that interpretation and insisted that her organization doesn’t use the phrase (just the first part) that way. Same here! I know the full phrase from the Harvey Danger song, but in a work context I’ve only ever heard the first part with the meaning your wife intended. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/90 "2025-07-02T17:07:25Z")
It’s kind of funny imagining corporate jargon having different dialects. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/91 "2025-07-02T17:37:43Z")
I was told I could be the bottleneck. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2025, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/92 "2025-07-02T23:24:46Z")
I’m pretty sure _Mad_ magazine was parodying its use in corporate (and especially advertising) culture by the latter 1950s. ---
**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:** [July 3, 2025, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/93 "2025-07-03T06:48:55Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > I was told I could be the bottleneck. In a discussion of some aspect of health management, I once saw someone stressing how important it was to keep X in the loop, going forwards. I suggested a health and safety assessment of that might be needed: no-one noticed. ---
**Author:** ![ZonexandScout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zonexandscout/32/544_2.png) [@ZonexandScout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZonexandScout)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/94 "2025-07-03T13:01:09Z")
This gives me flashbacks to a couple weeks in the late 90s when my group at a large corporation had to come up with a “mission statement” acceptable to the executives. It took quite a few meetings and a lot of thought, but I think we finally came up with “Our mission is to do the things we’re supposed to do when we’re supposed to do them. And have integrity while we’re doing them.” ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/95 "2025-07-03T13:13:00Z")
“Running it up the flagpole” has always meant (to me) essentially the same as “trial balloon” - put it out there, see who agrees and what the downsides or criticisms are. I would think the concept of passing it to higher management is “run it up the ladder”. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/96 "2025-07-03T14:15:58Z")
> [@md-2000](#): > > “Running it up the flagpole” has always meant (to me) essentially the same as “trial balloon” Kinda. Running it up the flagpole is putting the idea out there. A trial balloon is actually initiating a policy in a limited and non-committed fashion. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/97 "2025-07-03T14:29:32Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > I’m pretty sure _Mad_ magazine was parodying its use in corporate (and especially advertising) culture by the latter 1950s. Allan Sherman used it in his Gilbert & Sullivan parody “When I Was a Lad” in 1963: > I worked real hard for the dear old firm > I learned most every advertising term > I said to the men in the dark gray suits > “Let’s run it up the flagpole and see who salutes.” > I ran it up the flagpole perfectly > So now I am a partner in the agency ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/98 "2025-07-03T14:42:51Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > In a discussion of some aspect of health management, I once saw someone stressing how important it was to keep X in the loop, going forwards. I read somewhere that “keep X in the loop” originated from an ancient type of telecommunications (i.e. a copper-wire loop) used by municipal police departments. It was called “the loop” and was a wireline network favored over broadcast because in earlier times, radio either wasn’t available, or wasn’t very secure. Anyway it was originally “stay in the loop” (monitor the broadcast channel) until the terms drifted. I can’t find a source on this, Google sucks lately, but this is something I recall reading in the past year or so. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/99 "2025-07-03T14:47:46Z")
I thought it had something to do with flight formations. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2025, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958/100 "2025-07-03T14:49:27Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#): > > I see this when people use acronyms _knowing_ I have no idea what they mean. It’s as if they’re a member of the Secret Acronyms Club™. I used to work for a government agency where acronyms were ubiquitous. We used a lot of them constantly, some frequently, a few every once in a while. It was hard not to fall into a default assumption that everyone we talked to at work knew those acronyms because we were so inundated with them, but inevitably there would be somebody new, or we would talk to someone in a peripheral organization that wouldn’t know our specific ones. It was expected that any time they were used in writing you spelled them out the first time, but that was less held to because we did few reports and lots of presentation slides. It’s not necessarily being intentionally obscure. Sometimes it is habit and default assumption. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-nonsensical-corporate-jargon-become-a-thing-how-is-it-still-a-thing/1019958.md?page=6)