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Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126654 02/03/06 05:03 PM
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This week: "Think Outside the Box."

AAARRRGGGHHH! That phrase has now become so irritating that I'm afraid I will lay the Hammer down on the next jackass who says it in a meeting. Note to Sales/Marketing/Management folks: If you are in any way competent you should have hired people who by DEFAULT look at problems from many angles before deciding a course of action. And your company should be selling products that are different and better than the competitors. If either of these things are not true it is a reflection on YOU and your inability to hire the right people. On the other hand if you use that phrase out of habit or because you think it's cool in that disturbing frat-boy automaton way just DON'T or someone is going to lay the the Hammer down one of these days.


"That's some catch, that Catch-22." "It's the best there is." M22ti VP150 EP350 QS8 M3Ti
Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126655 02/03/06 05:49 PM
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connoisseur
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My old company started using that inane phrase in the late 70's.(hate it) You would think if they were actually thinking outside the box, they could come up with a new phrase by now. The other catch word I hated from back then was paradigm.


A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing.
Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126656 02/03/06 05:59 PM
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"We need to think outside the box to achieve a paradigm shift to achieve new synergy within the product space."

Uh, so you want us to create a warp drive unit?


"That's some catch, that Catch-22." "It's the best there is." M22ti VP150 EP350 QS8 M3Ti
Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126657 02/03/06 06:26 PM
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axiomite
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nice.

Some of my personal "favorites".

"Failure is not an option."

Or after someone has made an error..."We need to be sure that doesn't happen again." Really? Gee, thanks for that. I thought making mistakes was why we were here.

Or how about when five tasks are given to you at once. You ask the reasonable question..."which is top priority? which do you want me to work on first?" and get the classic..."They all need to be done right now." Oh, really...ok, hold on, I'll just clone four copies of myself for you.



Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126658 02/03/06 07:20 PM
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In reply to:

"which is top priority? which do you want me to work on first?" and get the classic..."They all need to be done right now."


Which to me means they're all of equal importance... and they're catagorized right under "lunch".

I've noticed how things are asked of you based on the following words in someone's title:

Officer (CEO/COO) says "I don't care where we go as long as we make more money when we get there" - they know what they don't know and usually stay out of my hair as long as I'm producing. - in high school, these guys were in 4H and missed all the good parties.

Sales says "I promised the client we'd get them to New York by tomorrow" - they ask for the difficult and leave me alone to find the best way to walk on water to make them look good. They need me to make things happen, I need them so I don't have to come into direct contact with the clients' sales guys. I don't speak their language (which consists of sayings like "you sly dog", "how's your wife and my kids?" and are usually punctuated with an elbow to the ribs and spilled beer) so they translate for me. - in high school, these guys were getting drunk in church.

Marketing says "The client needs to be in New York by yesterday", hands me a map of Eastern Europe and jumps up and down in the back seat screaming "Are we there yet?" and "You know, if I would have driven we'd be there already", then they usually hit their head and drift off to sleep until their next lack of forethought becomes my crisis - they ask for the impossible, micromanage every step and then try to put the blame on my shoulders when it all goes to hell. Most of these people have extra chromosomes. A further way of determining someone in marketing is whether or not they have TGIF - Toes Go In First - written on their shoes. - these guys had mothers that drank while pregnant.

Bren R.

Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126659 02/03/06 08:03 PM
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In reply to:

"which is top priority? which do you want me to work on first?" and get the classic..."They all need to be done right now."



My standard reply to that is along the lines of "OK, they'll be done when they're done."

Don't even get me started about the promises the S&M boys make. Unbelievable. They spout off their "MarketingSpeak" crap without understanding the tech behind what they are selling. They then can not for the FREAKING LIFE OF THEM resist saying "uh, yeah, we could add that in. By tomorrow." Ever wonder why "vaporware" is so prevalent in the industry? That's why. We have a project RIGHT NOW that is supposedly 3 weeks behind schedule because a sales rep, WITHOUT THE BENEFIT OF CONSULTING OUR ENGINEERING DEPT., sold a non-existent application to a customer. Not just a module for a current app or and update but a BRAND NEW APP. On top of that he allows the customer to add req's to the project constantly. My solution: Either make all S/M personnell go on salary only or they have to give up 50% of their commissions to the folks that ACTUALLY DO THE WORK!


"That's some catch, that Catch-22." "It's the best there is." M22ti VP150 EP350 QS8 M3Ti
Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126660 02/03/06 08:20 PM
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shareholder in the making
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I wonder what those S&M guys say about us IT folks.

Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126661 02/03/06 08:30 PM
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I'm thinking S&M would stand for Sales & Marketing. In that case there wouldn't be any leather involved. Sounds like it should BS to me.

How about "It will get easier once you get used to it," which really means bend over, buddy.

Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126662 02/03/06 09:06 PM
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axiomite
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One of my favorites is the use (or misuse, depending on how you look at it) of the word "clearly" in a manner which implies "and if you don't see it the way I do, you are the stupidest jackass to walk on two legs." Clearly the word "clearly" is clearly overused to clearly indicate that clearly anyone who clearly disagrees with me is clearly an idiot! AAARRRGGGHHH!


Jack

"People generally quarrel because they cannot argue." - G. K. Chesterton
Re: Hated Sales/ManagerSpeak phrase of the week:
#126663 02/03/06 09:25 PM
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In reply to:

I wonder what those S&M guys say about us IT folks.



I would assume they view us as know-it-all roadblocks to their goal of acquiring that beachfront house in Barbados. That and as their personal research lab because they are too lazy to actually learn things for themselves. Example: The other day one of them decided they need use an enterprise-level CRM solution. Fine. But as part as their shpiel it came out that they didn't actually want to learn how to use it. They want IT to not only research the software (believe me, they don't want any part in actually choosing it because if we spend $$$ and they don't use it or they claim it's not what they wanted they can (try to) blame IT) but to learn how to use it and all of its quirks then show them how it's done.

Now, I have no problem with learning the basics of any new app, and I have no problem with teaching people those things. But everone else here and at other jobs just understands that if you need a new tool it is necessary and imcumbent on them to expense the ubiquitous "$50 computer book" and learn about that tech for yourself. At my company it is NOT IT's job to act as a help desk in that way. For problems or hard-to-find answers to software or hardware questions yes. But to answer basic functionality questions from people who don't even bother to use the Help menu, no. The question is does IT have the cycles available for this? No. We are a 2 1/2 person crew. The 1/2 works QA part time. We not only keep all of the systems running here but design an build the rackmount computer systems that are shipped to customers. Right now we have 1 ready to ship, 2 being finished, the pieces for 2 more arriving, and have 6 count 'em 6 in various stages of design. And of course every design has to go through CCB's at every stage. On top of that of course we are researching this CRM software. That leaves basically negative time to become the Jedi masters of the client side of this software. Luckily our VP put the kibosh on that idea quickly. And still luckier is the fact that our President/CEO is an engineer. We will research and implement a solution APPROVED bye the S/M department, and they will buy the books and learn how to use it to their advantage. Of course we'll buy one too, but *ssshhhh*, they don't need to know that.


"That's some catch, that Catch-22." "It's the best there is." M22ti VP150 EP350 QS8 M3Ti
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