Buzzwords that make boardrooms spin and PowerPoints sing.
Short for representative, because politicians and salespeople alike are too busy to say the whole word. In fitness, it's one complete exercise movement; in politics, it's the person supposedly speaking for your interests in government; in sales, it's whoever's trying to meet their quarterly quota by calling you during dinner. The context determines whether you're counting them, electing them, or avoiding their calls.
The act of developing solutions, unnecessarily verbified by people who think 'solving' sounds too simple for their $200k salary. Because why use one syllable when four will do?
To discontinue or phase out a product, service, or project, using beautiful imagery to describe something dying. The corporate equivalent of taking your pet to 'a farm upstate.'
The gradual expansion of a project beyond its original boundaries, like a blob in a horror movie consuming everything in its path. The reason every 'quick project' takes six months.
Operating expenses versus capital expenses—the difference between renting and owning, or in corporate speak, between 'this quarter's problem' and 'future quarters' problem.' The eternal accounting debate.
Euphemism for layoffs that implies the company was the 'wrong size' before, not that they're cutting costs. Because 'firing people' doesn't focus group well.
To perform calculations or financial analysis, often said by people who have no intention of actually doing the math themselves. The prelude to finding out you can't afford it.
Ideation unconstrained by practical limitations like budgets, reality, or physics. Where you pretend anything is possible before constraints murder your dreams.
That insufferable tone of joy and freedom that bubbles out when you're about to have multiple days off while everyone else suffers through their workweek. Not actually restricted to Fridays—this vocal phenomenon can occur on any day preceding your personal weekend, making you the most hated person in the office. Your enthusiasm is their pain.
Corporate-speak for "using something to maximum advantage," often involving debt, other people's money, or buzzwords in a PowerPoint. In finance, it means borrowing to amplify returns; in business meetings, it means someone watched too many TED Talks.
A fancy word for 'the way we think about and do things around here,' often invoked by consultants right before they charge you six figures to change it. It's your conceptual framework, belief system, or model for understanding the world—until someone comes along and shifts it. The corporate world's favorite term for 'we need to completely rethink this entire mess.'
Verbal support for an idea or policy with zero intention of actually implementing it or following through. Corporate theater where agreement is performative rather than actionable.
The delicate art of influencing, educating, or subtly manipulating your boss to get what you need while making them think it was their idea. Reverse management disguised as good communication.
A new executive or consultant who shows up, makes sweeping changes without understanding context, then leaves or gets promoted before the consequences hit. Hurricane management with a three-month fuse.
Business expansion through internal development rather than acquisitions or mergers—the slow, sustainable way to grow that executives hate explaining to impatient shareholders. Building instead of buying.
Documentation of decisions, communications, and transactions that proves what actually happened when someone inevitably denies everything. The CYA strategy in physical or digital form.
A meeting after a project ends to analyze what went wrong and right, theoretically for learning but often devolving into blamestorming. Autopsy for failed initiatives.
A leadership style where executives fly in, make noise, dump criticism on everything, then leave while others clean up the mess. Involves zero context and maximum disruption.
The approach favored by people who want to get things done without getting lost in theory or idealism, though in corporate speak it's often code for 'boring but functional.' A pragmatic solution is practical and realistic, which makes it the antithesis of most startup pitch decks. Being pragmatic means choosing Excel over the sexy new tool because, well, Excel actually works.
Someone whose job is to analyze data, systems, or markets while the rest of us just make gut decisions and hope for the best. In tech, it's usually a systems analyst who translates business babble into technical requirements. In finance, it's someone who stares at spreadsheets all day and occasionally predicts the future with varying degrees of accuracy.
Corporate buzzword for "products" or "services" that makes everything sound innovative and strategic. Tech companies don't sell software anymore; they provide "enterprise solutions" that "solve business challenges." It's the verbal equivalent of putting racing stripes on a minivan—same thing, but now it sounds fast and important.
Someone with a supernatural ability to arrive exactly after all the hard work is finished, conveniently dodging effort while maintaining plausible deniability. The workplace phantom who materializes only when the moving truck is packed, the project is complete, or the cleaning is done.
The logistics industry's fancy term for dragging stuff from Point A to Point B, typically involving large trucks, trains, or ships doing the heavy lifting. It's both the action of hauling things and the business of charging people money for said hauling. Essentially, it's the fee you pay someone else to move your heavy things so you don't have to.
Abbreviation for "hundredweight," a confusingly inconsistent unit of measurement that equals 100 pounds in the US and 112 pounds in the UK, because why make international commerce easy? Still used in agriculture, shipping, and by people who enjoy watching others frantically Google conversion rates. A relic from when math was apparently more of a suggestion.