Leveraging My Cutting-edge Digital Platform

By Matt Purdue

They’re called clichés: words and phrases that have been overused to the point that they have become almost meaningless. Businessspeak is rife with them, and it’s time to end them. Look, I’m sure at some point a phrase like “leverage best practices” was new, may even clever. But now it—and its clichéd cousins—is just nauseating. 

I propose that we immediately retire:

Platform—Unless you work on an oil rig, you don’t have to worry about platforms. It’s not a communications platform; it’s a plan or, if you want to get fancy, a strategy.

Dig deep—Stop trying to pretend you work a blue-collar job. Besides, this should go without saying because clients pay us to conduct in-depth research. When is the last time a client asked you for a bit of shallow, perfunctory research.

Drill down—See above. What is it with the PR sector and references to oil, gas and mining industries?

Leverage—When did this become a verb? Leverage “use” instead.

Drive anything—Whether it be driving sales or driving change, it’s driving me crazy. Wouldn’t we rather increase sales or cause change? After all, you can also drive right off a cliff.

Touch base—A completely hollow verb. Unless we truly take it to mean what it has come to mean: “I’ll call them and hope to get their voicemail.”

Leading edge, cutting edge—I’m not sure how these entered the business lexicon. Stop and think about what it’s like to be on the edge: it’s a violent, dangerous, high-risk place to be. So why do we use these phrases to try to convey a positive image of a successful, innovative person, place or thing. Given the fact that these phrases are invariably used incorrectly, let’s just can them.

Human capital—They’re people, people.

Rationalize—Remember the good old days, when people were fired? Then they became laid off. Then they became right-sized. Nowadays when a company cuts people, it rationalizes operations. How can firing people en masse ever be rational? Sometimes it’s necessary, but rational?

Feel free to add your own.

Comments

[Laura]

Excellent piece, Matt.

I suggest we identify other "pain points" and "take this conversation offline."

[Caryn]

My favorite part about "take this conversation offline" is when someone says that to you in person, alone. How can you go "offline" when you aren't on any "line" to begin with? This baffles me.

[Matt]

So "let's take this conversation offline" actually means, "Stop wasting everyone's time with this topic."

[Scott Ellington]

Bravo!

[Matt]

I just ran across a new one. The word "resource" as a verb?!?! As in, "We are currently unable to resource this project due to our current resourcing challenges."

Someone please help me!

[Amelia Denson]

I've always appreciated "let's take this to the next level."