Language is a relatively decent way to communicate, I think we can agree on that. Except, of course, when the language you hear often at the office is so bereft of meaning it leaves you gasping for air in shock.

Don’t get me wrong, I like playing with words. For example, I love the word monetise primarily because I have an affection for money, but also because I imagine the world around me bursting into impressionistic perfection.

I'm making heaps of money with Google Ads. Ta da!

Some words and phrases, however, are completely pointless. For example, to conversate, which is supposedly a fancy corporate of saying to talk. If you’re going to invent words, invent cool ones like Burgess’ Nadsat.

Web 2.0 is another one of these. Although I can understand the principles behind Web 2.0, I always fail to get what people mean when they say, “Yes, excellent, except it needs to be more Web 2.0!” Are you that devoid of lingo to apply a basket term for a worldwide phenomenon no one can really chart? Indeed you are.

And btw, this pic FTW, megalulz. Sincerely, The Trolls

Challenge used to mean something when knights clad in black shouted, “I, fair sir, challenge you to a duel!” Nowadays it means a problem. That’s right. Problems don’t exist any more, they’ve all been outsourced to India. What we do have are challenges, and many of them, which will require 360 degree thinking. Really? Wow, that sounds like a superpower to me!

And speaking of superpowers, what is up with all these Product Evangelists? Say I go to Afghanistan and start promoting use of the Western style toilet, does that make me a product evangelist too? Because let’s face it, that’s what you’re doing, in metaphorical terms. Evangelists could write, even if they couldn’t use citations and the APA standard, whereas you’re just a hawker.

Have you ever pre-prepared? No? It’s easy! To pre-prepare means to stroke yourself using a redundant prefix on a word which means the opposite of what you’re doing. There is no such thing as pre-prepare or pre-preparedness. If it’s ready, you don’t need to prepare for it! George Carlin had an excellent segment about pre-heated ovens. He said that there are only two states an oven can ever exist in, heated or unheated, which is the absolute truth. To pre-prepare is pretty much the same thing.

What do we do now?

Do you know exactly what in the pipe means? I heard this very often for a long time, and I always wondered if it was the speaker’s tenuous grasp on the English language that led from ‘in the pipeline’, an oil industry metaphor (not really, it actually comes from aviation) to the obnoxious ‘in the pipe’.

Seriously, this pipe?

So next time you hear someone spouting bullshit phrases like ‘forward looking‘ or ‘let’s action that‘, send them here, to The Corporate Gibberish Generator, or The Corporate Bullshit Generator where they will swoon under the ravages of ill advised and non sensical tripe.

As a bonus gifting idea, maybe you could get your team leader (see: boss) this Dictionary of Corporate Bullshit: An A to Z Lexicon of Empty, Enraging, and Just Plain Stupid Office Talk this holiday season (read: Christmas).

My seal of approval for your fake, made up words

Do you often come across ridiculous, meaningless and made up words at your job? Let the world know your frustrations in the comment box below, and help stop the madness! Let’s be proactive and upscale before we escalate!