Negative feedback loop

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

I don't know why I thought of this place when I read this article

all these explanations lack granularity and do not contain metrics sufficient to let us know if we need a new paradigm

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Are these the worst examples of business jargon?

Earlier this month, when we set about to demystify some of the worst business jargon at the World Economic Forum in Davos, we could not have imagined it would hit so many of our readers' raw nerves.

Hundreds felt compelled to get in touch with their own submissions, some unprintable, but the best of which we have "outlined" below.

There was, of course, plenty of criticism of our selections, with many objecting to the singling out of "benchmarking" – a term that has been in use in many disciplines for several decades – and a passionate debate about the precise meaning of "negative feedback loops", more of which later.

But perhaps the wittiest critique came from Charles Crowe, who maintains that "all these explanations lack granularity and do not contain metrics sufficient to let us know if we need a new paradigm".

We have taken that on board, Charles.

Agile

Alec Finney vented his frustration: "Everything HAS to be AGILE now. Managing projects, building computer systems, having lunch." There was no shortage of agility at Davos, come to think of it. Indeed, shaping the "agile governance of technology" was one of the key themes of 2018's World Economic Forum.

As of yet

Hugo Pettingell emailed: "When I was a lad 'as yet' was considered sufficient to indicate 'until now'. Or am I being picky? Bit like the unnecessary 'per' in 'as per usual'."

We think you are being a tad picky with the last one, Hugo. "As per usual" was used as far back as 1923, by none other than acclaimed writer Katherine Mansfield.
Bafflegab?

Pete S wondered what we should call this jargon: "When my father worked in the Pentagon in the '60s this claptrap was called 'bafflegab'," he emailed. "What is the term now? Perhaps, 'globaloney'?"

Bandwidth

"I don't have the bandwidth for this" – meaning "I don't have the time or capacity". Adrian Watt added: "probably destined to become interchangeable with headspace".

Centre around

This one irked David Burns. It's widely used, but pedants, or "careful writers" as the Routledge Student Guide to English Usage calls us, would do best to avoid the phrase, as strictly speaking, a "central point cannot go around something else".

De-risk

"I think it means to reduce the risk of something happening or to dump risky stuff (it's always stuff) somewhere," said Richard Nash. Your guess is as good as ours, Richard.

Forward planning

Robert Webb joined many in submitting this hideous phrase for consideration. "Planning is always for the future so the addition of "FORWARD" is totally irrelevant," he fumed.

High net worth individuals (or HNWIs)

David Burns again. "Of course," he wrote, "Davos is not for rich people, it is for 'high net worth individuals'." Well, and for low net worth journalists, David.

Learning receptor units

A gem courtesy of Michael Rosenthal, of Warwick University. "Take a look at the language university administrators use," he emailed.

"Some time around 2000 I wrote 'our principal aim must be to maximise the cost-effective throughput of learning receptor units' in a document that went through two or three meetings before someone suggested we might substitute 'students' for 'learning receptor units'."

Negative Feedback Loop – THE BACKLASH

Such was the level of feedback to this entry (irony alert), that it almost took the BBC email servers offline.

"Sorry to have to correct you but your explanation of negative feedback loop is totally the opposite of its true meaning," wrote Airbus spacecraft engineer Ian Walters, joining a chorus of condemnation.

"A negative feedback loop, as used in every control system on the planet, provides stability by feeding back a control signal that is opposite to, or negative, to the measured error."

"You perfectly describe a system having positive feedback from one economy onto others."

Steve D, who works for the UK government, had similar expertise to impart.

"You're incorrect about the negative feedback loop, also known as balancing loop. This is a term from systems dynamics. It happens when an increase in something feeds into a loop of interactions that ultimately tends to dampen down the increase."

continued

 

Edited By Ady1 on 10/02/2018 09:55:13

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

…or is that positive

[JourneymanParticipant @journeyman]

This is a direct "copy and paste" of a BBC article. Not entirely sure it should be here! The link possible but not all the text. Something about Copyright…

Original article here BBC: Are these the worst examples of jargon etc.

John

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

John,

I agree … But previous experience has demonstrated that people here don't always take notice of links, and they appear to prefer being spoon-fed.

MichaelG.

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Relax. The copyright police don't work on weekends.

"Learning receptor units" for students? WTH were they thinking? Or was someone having a larf and seeing how long it would take the pointy heads to twig to it?

[Cornish JackParticipant @cornishjack]

Seems to me that there are two major sources of this rubbish – journalist/broadcasters and politicians. Of the former, people like Prof. Will Self, Professor of Contemporary Thought !!! at Brunel, produce their 'programmes to slit your throat by' using a vocabulary out of reach of ordinary mortals. The less well-versed political contemporaries hear something esoteric and, apparently, relevant to their auto-blah and introduce it at the next opportunity. 'Monkey hear, monkey do' then spreads the nonsense further. Two recent examples – 'trope' (don't ask!!); thankfully that was so irrelevant that it disappeared quite quickly. Unfortunately, among many others, we now have 'going forward' as the smart-ass version of the 'future' and more and more 'idiot speak' imported from the 'septics'. The other forum which I use has just introduced a 'Grumpy Ol Git' thread for rants such as this … any possibility, Neil???

rgds

Bill

[Brian WoodParticipant @brianwood45127]

It all sounds too much like Trump fodder to be true, do they even know what they are saying to each other?

[Enough!Participant @enough]

Posted by Hopper on 10/02/2018 12:00:51:

"Learning receptor units" for students? WTH were they thinking?

Reminds me of the technical report that landed on my desk many years ago that stated "The device was set up with its axis parallel to the Earth's gravity vector."

(i.e. vertical).

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

I like, and perhaps was taught, to avoid repeating the same noun in a sentence and preferably not in a paragraph either so it is desirable to have more than word or phrase to describe each entity. As well as improving the verbalisation of the expressions it enhances the optics.

I am more concerned with the deliberate changing of a word or phrase to mean something different, the classic being 'Gay' but whether that is permitted on this forum is up to the curator of the site.

I've been a bit lazy in my wordsmithing so the above is a little disjointed.

Edited By Bazyle on 10/02/2018 17:01:10

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Copyright wise the cut and paste is a bit over-long, but ASdy DID include the link.

Going forwards perhaps we can economise on bandwidth and de-risk future posts by keeping things a bit shorther.

That's the negative feedback over

BBB

Neil

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

When I was still a staff man rather than a contractor I used to go to high level meetings where aspiring young managers would try to baffle us all with this sort of rubbish. When we old hands started playing bullsh*t bingo they calmed down a bit, but there will always be people who try to mask their lack of knowledge by using creative vocabulary.

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