I use “walk the talk” whenever I can. It’s hilarious. People use it seriously? What does that even mean?
In the past, I have just sat stone-faced when people said things like, “At the end of the day, it is what it is”*. In the future, I will ask what they mean, and write it down in the back of my notebook.
Ah. Now I get it.
You’re messing with me, right?
Right?
I’m totally not. I created the bonus program at a company I used to work for. The initial draft by someone else was whack and I distinctly remember the conversation. At some point, I said, "we need to make sure the bonus plan incentivizes the right behavior. The way it’s currently set up it will reward odd decision making.
No?
Oh.
So … I was right about how people use “incentivize”.
At the end of the day, it is utilized to task resources with walking the talk.
You can walk the talk, but can you talk the walk? Huh?
I have no problem with most use of “incentivize.” It clarifies the goal is to increase the occurrence of some action without implying any particular approach. Consider that “reward” could also describe a show of gratitude without an ulterior purpose, and is typically material in nature.
Bone, if you’re serious, I’d bet you operationalized incentivization at Enron.
And “encourage”?
There is a word for this. It is ‘motivate’.
And here is the fundamental difference between business-speak and technical jargon. Jargon creates a vocabulary of very specific, meaningful words. Business-speak creates a vocabulary of words that are as meaningless as possible. They are useful for speakers whose goals include misdirection, plausible deniability, unaccountability, blame transfer, and so on.
Motivate and encourage are synonyms yes - but those can refer to a variety of methods. Incentivize means specifically using money as the means. At least when I use it.
Ultimately this type of word choice is used because that is the culture where I and it seems many of you work. If upper management speaks this way - they are signing the checks so I will speak this way - at least at work.
You got me. Anyway, I like Bone’s use to indicate specific monetary compensation better.
IMO the most laughable examples in this thread are inappropriate borrowing of IT-related terms or sentences that reach critical buzzword mass. There’s nothing inherent to business-speak that exempts all of it from being a class of “real” technical jargon. If a term sticks around long enough to escape fad status, then it’s fair to say it’s meaningful.
No offense, but that’s still ridiculous. People are making fun of “incentivize” because it’s not really a word. If you were to use actual words you would say “give incentive” instead of just slapping “-ize” on to the back of a noun. It’s even the same amount of syllables. Now if you excuse me, HR needs to meetingize the process of employeeizing a new candidate
It’s no big deal. I get that a lot of these terms are just silly. Then again at some point all words we have today weren’t actual words. Give it time and people will make up all new shit that drives you bonkers.
I agree that there’s nothing inherent to it, but that’s the way it happens in practice. It’s Cargo Cult Management. “Low hanging fruit” is a useful phrase when you’re trying to choose between a set of options (like which bugs you should fix) that have fairly straightforward metrics associated with them. Applying it to vague and poorly defined things like “business opportunities” sounds more like magical thinking and wish fulfillment.
At any rate, if anyone ever tells me “what’s the ask?” I will deny all knowledge of the term as a noun (except in relation to stock options) and request clarification. If I am persistent enough, the other person will eventually tire of explaining things and add the few syllables needed to make it an English sentence.
I know it’s not “Managerese” but I’ve always found the word “Grok” to elicit the same reaction in me as actual manager speak.
Yes, I know it was invented by Robert A Heinlein in the early 1960s and lots of people (including on this board) regard it as a perfectly cromulent* word, but when I hear the term “Grok”, it doesn’t convey to me “a total and complete understanding of a subject, person or sitation”. To me, it sounds like a cave man name and conjures up images of some guy wearing a sabre-tooth tiger skin using a giant club to hit things, like something from a Far Side cartoon.
*See what I did there?
What’s wrong with “pay”?
Your final point is, of course, correct, but I will continue to use “affect” instead of “impact” when discussing a change I wish to implement (i.e. effect), while maintaining an impassive affect despite the unfortunate effect the utilization of verbs in the place of perfectly appropriate nouns has on me.
I use “incentivize” to mean providing a specific and concrete carrot to get people to participate in a program or give information or whatever that they normally would not bother to do. Like, a reproductive health program in India may “incentivize” young women to attend health training by offering it alongside with in-demand job training. Or I may “incentivize” people to register for my program by offering enrollees access to a database with information they really want.
Motivate is too vague. You can be “motivated” without having a specific incentive to do something- I am “motivated” to keep my house clean. But if you want me to keep your house clean as well, I’ll need an incentive.
Yes, I could say the same thing in a few words, but if one word works, I’m gonna use one word.
Increase the carrotingization of domestic engineers.
You can say the same thing in a few syllables, but if one works …
Because it may not be pay. And “provide an incentive” wastes space on a one-pager.