"Master of the Obvious"

I'm a graduate student at the University of Dayton (Go Flyers!) finishing my Masters of Education in Community Counseling. That means I'm training to be a therapist. One day in class, I commented on something the professor said because I wanted clarification. A classmate turned to me and said, "You have an uncanny grasp of the obvious."

"Thank you?" I thought to myself.

To this day I don't know if that was a compliment or a brazen slap in the face. What I've come to accept, is that there are an awful lot of folks in business who have no grasp of the obvious. We get so caught up in sounding smart or powerful or in charge that we forget to simply state the obvious.

How many times have you sat in a business meeting and thought, "what are these people talking about?" The trend is so bad there are games like Conference Call Bingo where folks try to get 5-across on a playing card filled with meaningless corporate jargon that does little more than bore the listener. In its worst forms, these phrases confuse employees and customers alike.

Let me know if any of these sound familiar to you:

- We're a global solutions provider
- Our people make the difference
- We need to go the extra mile
- Let's look at the big picture
- We can't lose sight of our value-add

We've grown so accustomed to hearing these phrases from our leaders in the workplace that we've forgotten to ask them what they actually mean! When was the last time you asked your boss, "Hey, when you say ,'Our people make the difference,' what do you mean by that? What kind of difference are we making? Are the employees 'Our people' or is there some group in a back office somewhere with the title 'Our people'?"

I'm interested in your thoughts. What are the things you hear in the office that make you scratch your head and ask, "Huh?" What are the questions you'd really like to ask your boss (you know, if you weren't scared to death that you'd be fired for speaking out)?