According to a survey conducted for Accountemps , a temporary staffing company for accounting, finance and bookkeeping professionals, going overboard in the cliché department is a no go.
Words that the survey found to be most overused include:
- “At the end of the day”
- “Solution”
- “Thinking outside the box”
- “Synergy”
- “Paradigm”
- “Metrics”
- “Take it offline”
- “Redeployed people”
- “On the runway”
- “Win-win”
- “Value-added”
- “Get on the same page”
- “Customer centric”
- “Generation X”
- “Accountability management”
- “Core competency”
- “Alignment”
- “Incremental.”
“Buzzwords and industry jargon are a form of shorthand used by people within a particular company or profession, but they can be confusing or even seem exclusionary to individuals outside of that field,” said Max Messmer, chairman of Accountemps, in a press release. “When these words are overused, they can lose their impact altogether.”