These days everyone “talks a bit like a management consultant”: it’s symptomatic of the growing “professionalisation” of ordinary life. Thanks to blurring work-life boundaries and the rise of the “self-help” industry, we increasingly view our lives as “projects in which excellence needs to be achieved” – and can be, with “the right toolsets”. Hence the prevalence of management jargon in “unlikely quarters” such as the nursery: the sphere of “parenting” (itself a “verbification” of the sort so loved by business) has produced “baby-led weaning”, “co-sleeping” and “attachment-parenting”.

Is management jargon necessarily a bad thing? Some words, such as “stakeholder”, are genuinely useful if the only alternative is a lengthy phrase. Moreover, jargon has uses beyond simple functionality. In a work context, it can “convey the impression of legitimacy, boost confidence and gain the attention of others”, argues André Spicer in his new book, Business Bullshit. Perhaps we hope the same is true of our increasingly professionalised social lives. (Rhymer Rigby, The Times).

Personally, I think it arises (“like” as all the students say every ten seconds at the university nearby us) out of lazy-mindedness.  The naive think fancy phrases and gobbledegook make them sound smart and with-it.  Actually, it comes across as displaying a poor vocabulary, maybe a tenuous grasp of grammar, and a desire to obscure the issue with long words.  Somebody who just spouts business jargon opens himself to the charge of being tedious and boring.  He (she as well) needs to understand that with a little bit of effort he can capture the attention of an audience with an original turn of phrase, a harmless joke, a smile, a little charm and a different, arresting approach.