SUMMARY [1.0]: Overused words and phrases

[Rowena Hart <rhart -at- INTRINSYC -dot- COM>]

This was rejected the first time for being too long, so I'll break
the message in half and try again...

This message includes all of the overused words and phrases
sent to me by so many helpful people that I can't list them all here.

I'll send out a second message with a quick summry of the
discussions that were stimulated by my request for lists of over-
used words and phrases.

And an equally titanic list from Stan X. -

Action item
Actualize
Agents of change
Ball in your court
Ballpark
Bells and whistles
Best practices
Betamaxed
Big picture
Blamestorming
Bleeding edge
Branding
Business units
Capture
Center of Excellence
Challenge (as problem)
Channel
Closure
Comfort level
Committed
Competitive advantage
Contingencies
Core
Core business
Core competencies
Critical
Deliverable
Deployment
Discipline (as noun)
Download
Downsize
Drive
Drives
Empower
End user
Energize
Excellence
Expert system
Facilitate
Failover
Focal
Focus
Fuel/fueling
Fungible
Gatekeeper
Global
Goal oriented
Going forward
Guesstimate
In the loop
Infrastructure
Interface
Issue
Issues (as problem)
Key
Knowledge management
Launch
Levers/leverage
Low-hanging fruit
Mainstream
Manage
Market driven
Metrics
Micromanage
Model
Near-term
No-brainer
On board
Operating model
Opportunity
Opportunity (as problem)
Optimization
Out of the box
Out of the loop
Paradigm shift
Partners/partnership
People skills
Pleased
Plethora
Poised
Position
Premier
Proactive
Process
Proof of concept
Quantify
Raise the bar
Reinvent
Reliant
Restructure
Right-size
Robust
Scale up/down
Scope
Shared values
Shared/sharing
Site-based
Skill set
Spends (n)
Stakeholders
Synergy/synergies
Task oriented
Team player
Tracking
Turnkey
Utilize
Value added
Verbage
Vertical campus (Skyscraper or tall building I invented this one!)
Vertical/horizontal integration


>From Ron S. -

How about the use of nouns as verbs, as in:
"Let's conference."
Or verbs as nouns:
"Perform the install."

>From Keith W. -

...or verbs as nouns. AKA nominalizations, as in:
This is a description of the software installation.  or...
This describes how to install the software.

Try "use" (three letters) in place of "utilize" (seven letters)...
"is" in place of "consists of..."
"Indicates" in place of "suggests"

>From David N. -

Today, I'm finding the use of "details" as a verb irritating; as in:
"This section details how to install the Widget Explorer in a
system with..."

how 'bout simply writing:
"This section describes how to install the..."

>From Doug V. -

Here's another one:
"In order to blah-blah" instead of simply saying "To blah-blah"

>From Ellen M. -

I am really sick and tired of reading about "robust" software.
How about you?

>From Mark L. -


      ** I'm on a crusade against the use of "multiple" to
         mean "several."  When I hear of a program being
         installed for multiple users, I think of cubicles full
         of Siamese twins.

         "This product runs on multiple platforms."  What's
         a multiple platform?  A machine that runs both
         Windows and Linux?  Oh, you mean the product runs
         on various platforms.  Could've said so unambiguously.

>From Jeff E. -

Some different words from my list:

BENCHMARK (-ING)
SYNERGIES (-ISTIC)
CENTROID (My GM claims that he heard this somewhere, meaning "centrally
located")

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