peanut butter approach

Definition

Spreading resources, attention, or budget thinly across all initiatives rather than concentrating on priorities, ensuring mediocrity everywhere. The 'everyone gets something' strategy that guarantees nothing succeeds spectacularly.

Example Usage

We're taking a peanut butter approach to innovation funding, which means twelve underfunded projects instead of three properly resourced ones.

Origin

Popularized by former Yahoo executive Brad Garlinghouse in his famous 2006 'Peanut Butter Manifesto' memo

Fun Fact

Garlinghouse's memo warned that Yahoo's peanut butter approach was killing the company—they ignored him, and Google ate their lunch.

Source: Business strategy and resource allocation terminology

Related Terms

Intermediate

waterfall methodology

A sequential project management approach where each phase must be completed before the next begins, flowing downward like a waterfall. Popular before everyone realized that business requirements change faster than waterfalls flow upward.

💼 Corporate / Business

Beginner

Jargonish

The art and language of professional jargon — specialized terminology, buzzwords, and insider lingo used across industries to sound authoritative, signal expertise, or obscure simple ideas behind complex-sounding language.

💼 Corporate / Business📱 Gen-Z / Internet Slang

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rep

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.

💼 Corporate / Business

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tradeoff

The cruel reality that you can't have everything—gaining one thing means losing another, much like how financial stability means fewer spontaneous trips to Bali. In economics and business, it's the sacrifice made when choosing between two desirable but mutually exclusive options. Every decision involves tradeoffs, which is why MBAs spend years learning to justify whichever choice makes the spreadsheet look better.

💼 Corporate / Business

Intermediate

cookie-licking

Claiming a project or territory without actually doing anything with it, like a toddler licking cookies so siblings can't have them. It's territorial pissing for professionals.

💼 Corporate / Business

Advanced

normalizing

In business context, the process of adjusting data or metrics to account for anomalies, seasonality, or one-time events to reveal underlying trends. It's statistical cosmetics that make ugly quarters look presentable to investors.

💼 Corporate / Business

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