More bad words - banned by the New York Times

Smath — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 07:53:31 +0000

A little while ago I was fascinated by a post I read on the BBC website with a list issued by the British government of their banned buzzwords.

I spent about an hour last night catching up on some of my RSS feeds (which have fallen badly by the wayside since I've been helping Nee out with her wedding preparations) and design blogger Swiss Miss had a post to a fantastic New York Times blog post in the same vein called Words We Don't Say by Hugo Lindgren.

The story goes that when he first began his job at the New York Times, Kurt Andersen who was the editor at the time has a fantastic list stuck on the wall of his office of words that writers were forbidden to use in their articles. Wherever possible these words would be edited out. This is the image accompanying the article. Click on the image to view the NY Times post:

According to Hugo Lindgren this list is from 1977 at the latest, which was when he started his position at the newspaper, and yet fascinatingly almost all of the words on this list could be applied to a banned-words list of today. I like the comments on the article which suggest some more words: decidedly, going forward, utilize (omg I completely agree!!), however, arguably, impact, reach out to (instead of contact), and decidedly.

Also via SwissMiss I browsed over to a brilliant site that appeals strongly to my desire for order: ListGeeks. The homepage is made up of a grid of various lists by users (eg favourite smells, movies they want to see etc) and one lovely list screamed out at me: Terrible "Corporate Speak" Words by stilltron.

British-government's banned buzzwords

Smath — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:03:17 +0000

In March last year the British government issued an official list of words that have been banned from use by the councils in order that council members effectively communicate. Read the BBC reports on this.

I find this quite amusing.. and I also think that this is a Good Thing, albeit a rather daft list ("client" is a buzzword?). With people everywhere reading many of the same things thanks to the high-speed information sharing of the internet, the meanings of catchy phrases will often become warped or altogether changed, and either way, lose their meaning and their impact.

The full list of the banned words below:

Agencies	Ambassador	Area based
Area focused	Autonomous	Baseline
Beacon	Benchmarking	Best Practice
Blue sky thinking	Bottom-Up	CAAs
Can do culture	Capabilities	Capacity
Capacity building	Cascading	Cautiously welcome
Challenge	Champion	Citizen empowerment
Client	Cohesive communities	Cohesiveness
Collaboration	Commissioning	Community engagement
Compact	Conditionality	Consensual
Contestability	Contextual	Core Message
Core principles	Core Value	Coterminosity
Coterminous	Cross-cutting	Cross-fertilisation
Customer	Democratic legitimacy	Democratic mandate
Dialogue	Direction of travel	Distorts spending priorities
Double devolution	Downstream	Early Win
Edge-fit	Embedded	Empowerment
Enabler	Engagement	Engaging users
Enhance	Evidence Base	Exemplar
External challenge	Facilitate	Fast-Track
Flex	Flexibilities and Freedoms	Framework
Fulcrum	Functionality	Funding streams
Gateway review	Going forward	Good practice
Governance	Guidelines	Holistic
Holistic governance	Horizon scanning	Improvement levers
Incentivising	Income streams	Indicators
Initiative	Innovative capacity	Inspectorates
Interdepartmental	Interface	Iteration
Joined up	Joint working	LAAs
Level playing field	Lever	Leverage
Localities	Lowlights	MAAs
Mainstreaming	Management capacity	Meaningful consultation
Meaningful dialogue	Mechanisms	Menu of Options
Multi-agency	Multidisciplinary	Municipalities
Network model	Normalising	Outcomes
Output	Outsourced	Overarching
Paradigm	Parameter	Participatory
Partnership working	Partnerships	Pathfinder
Peer challenge	Performance Network	Place shaping
Pooled budgets	Pooled resources	Pooled risk
Populace	Potentialities	Practitioners
Predictors of Beaconicity	Preventative services	Prioritization
Priority	Proactive	Process driven
Procure	Procurement	Promulgate
Proportionality	Protocol	Provider vehicles
Quantum	Quick hit	Quick win
Rationalisation	Rebaselining	Reconfigured
Resource allocation	Revenue Streams	Risk based
Robust	Scaled-back	Scoping
Sector wise	Seedbed	Self-aggrandizement
Service users	Shared priority	Shell developments
Signpost	Single conversations	Single point of contact
Situational	Slippage	Social contracts
Social exclusion	Spatial	Stakeholder
Step change	Strategic	Strategic priorities
Streamlined	Sub-regional	Subsidiarity
Sustainable	Sustainable communities	Symposium
Synergies	Systematics	Taxonomy
Tested for Soundness	Thematic	Thinking outside of the box
Third sector	Toolkit	Top-down
Trajectory	Tranche	Transactional
Transformational	Transparency	Upstream
Upward trend	Utilise	Value-added
Vision	Visionary	Welcome

We could use such a list in tech. Web 2.0 anyone?

Jargon

More bad words - banned by the New York Times

British-government's banned buzzwords