Call it what you like — bizspeak, jargon, buzzwords, corporate lingo — they’re all names for the often-infuriating insider terms spoken by more and more folks in business today. We all have certain pet peeves in this arena. What is yours? Being exhorted to think outside the box? Getting an email stating that you’ll be looped back in WRT the deliverables? Having an executive ask you for the 30,000-foot view of the challenge? Perhaps being reminded to leverage your synergy while you work smarter, not harder?

It’s enough to make you ask: why is bizspeak used so widely when so many people despise it?

On the plus side, the use of jargon is a way of showing your immersion in a certain culture. Proper deployment of insider terms can get your resume noticed or can signal that you’re a like-minded individual, a member of the “club.” It shows you’ve been working in the same environment, and know the lingo. When used properly, approved jargon and acronyms can convey certain terms in an efficient manner.

On the negative side, jargon can obscure your meaning, make you seem clichéd, frustrate your listeners — and even make people suspect you don’t know what you’re talking about.

Popular blogger Seth Godin wrote about this last year in his oldie-but-goodie post about business clichés.

Many [business-school jargon words] are actually quite useful, because they give you precise words to describe things that would be difficult to communicate otherwise. For example, telling someone that a particular hedge fund is “highly leveraged” is a lot easier than saying, “They’ve borrowed a lot of money in order to speculate and multiply their positive returns using other people’s money.” On the other hand, the vast majority of buzzwords exist for one reason: to hide. By obfuscating, lying, confusing or just plain avoiding the issue, business people can avoid communicating.

And that’s the real rub for most people. They would support bizspeak if they felt it truly communicated better, or faster, or more accurately. But many of us get a sinking sense that a jargon-laced reply to a thoughtful question is just a way of avoiding speaking clearly.

Another question is: does it make a difference where you use jargon? This article at Helium makes a distinction between internal and external jargon, making a case for the former but warning against the latter.

Business jargon serves a useful purpose internally, but it is best to avoid jargon and acronyms in communication to the external world. Abbreviated terminology is helpful for those who work intimately within the industry or field because it is fast, efficient and useful in most circumstances. Industry speak does have its time and place, but if used in outside communication, this has a tendency to undermine the effectiveness of the messages being sent. When people use acronyms and abbreviations when writing or speaking to an audience not familiar to the business jargon, it can be pretty counterproductive and result in diminished communication.

This makes sense, but my own feeling is that the jargon can be just as detrimental inside an organization, just judging by the impassioned responses to several online surveys about whether business jargon is considered annoying. “Industry speak” is slightly more acceptable — everyone understands using shorthand in their specialty job, and you won’t see any graphic designers complaining when someone asks for a “comp” or an “Epson” — but general business jargon can convey cluelessness.

Interested in some real-life examples? For a list of the terms that drive average workers crazy, check out this post and this post, too. (Hint: people are pretty upset about problems being labeled challenges, and nonspecific talk about synergy and paradigms can raise listeners’ blood pressure, too.)

Finally, a recently released study from Accountemps looked at the most frustrating and overused terms from 2009. It was conducted by an independent research firm and is based on telephone interviews with 150 senior executives from the nation’s 1,000 largest companies. Here are the results:

Executives were asked, “What is the most annoying or overused phrase or buzzword in the workplace today?” Their responses included:

• Leverage: As in, “We intend to leverage our investment in IT infrastructure across multiple business units to drive profits.”
• Reach out: As in, “Remember to reach out to customers impacted by the change.”
• It is what it is: As in, “The server is down today, and clients are irate. It is what it is.”
• Viral: As in, “Our video has gone viral.”
• Game changer: As in, “Transitioning from products to solutions was a game changer for our company.”
• Disconnect: As in, “There is a disconnect between what the consumer wants and what the product provides.”
• Value-add: As in, “We have to evaluate the value-add of this activity before we spend more on it.”
• Circle back: As in, “I’m heading out of the office now, but I will circle back with you later.”
• Socialize: As in, “We need to socialize this concept with our key stakeholders.”
• Interface: As in, “My job requires me to interface with all levels of the organization.”
• Cutting edge: As in, “Our cutting-edge technology gives us a competitive advantage.”

The problem, says their CEO, is in turning your listeners off. “When business or industry terms become overused, people stop paying attention to them,” said Max Messmer, chairman of Accountemps and author of Managing Your Career For Dummies. “The best communicators use clear and straightforward language that directly illustrates their points.”

We’re left in a jargon-filled world, and it seems the best thing any of us can do is resolve to communicate clearly ourselves. If you ever need to look up a mystery acronym that starts showing up around the office, we suggest “The Ridiculous Business Jargon Dictionary”, which has the exhaustive list, nicely alphabetized. And if you have a colleague who thinks jargon is as ridiculous as you do, you might make a small gift of these hilarious jargon mugs we found online.

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