To explain the buzzword matrix that pervades our daily lives as corporate employees or technical junkies, I’ve compiled this little dictionary for you to help you understand the TLAs, corporate speak, and buzzwords used by industry professionals. The list items are in no particular order.
Note: This is a work in progress and will be updated periodically.
Legend:
TLA (TLA) – Three Letter Acronym – Abbreviations to help us not say what it is we want to say.
Corporate Speak (CS) – Corporate terms created to confuse or obfuscate the true meaning of the concepts they describe.
Buzzword (BW) – Terms that typically repackage old ideas into fresh new ones designed to get you to buy in to old or non-innovative technology.
Definitions:
Best Practices (CS, BW) – In the corporate world, it refers to the actions performed by the people who’ll be blamed if things don’t work. As a buzzword, it’s the stuff you have to do to avert the security holes and bugs in the software the vendor just sold you.
Difficult Decisions (CS) – Layoffs.
B2B (CS, BW) – Businesses doing business with other businesses. Early example: Kids who have to buy lemons to make lemonade to sell at a lemonade stand.
Going Forward (CS) – Replaces “Um” on conference calls. May also refer to the inevitable or unpredictable future.
End-to-End (CS) – also known as Soup to Nuts, Cradle to Grave – Refers to a complete solution most of which has to be subcontracted to other companies (see B2B).
Agile (CS, BW) – Refers to very expensive technology designed to be lightweight, possibly cross-platform, and to replace as many people as possible. Rarely fulfills its promise.
Strategic Partnership (CS) – A desperate and usually fruitless attempt to boost stock prices of both companies involved. May produce a temporary sense of euphoria for stockholders.
Cloud, Cloud Computing (CS, BW) – New term for old technology where lots of computers, in multiple locations (for redundancy and load balancing), are available to do their processing, data delivery, or access.
