What is worse than “political correctness?” In my opinion it has to be “corporate speak,” an insidious disease that plagues senior and c-level management. If left untreated, it quickly spreads throughout the company hampering speech to proportions not seen since the Tower of Babel.

The symptoms range from excessive use of acronyms and abbreviations to frequent vocalizations of long and complicated words. Depending on the progression of the disease, the observer may notice the occasional misused word, or worse, invented terminology. Some of my favorite examples include:

irregardless - No such word. This is actually a double negative: “ir-” meaning “not” and “-less” meaning “without.”

deliverable - It is an adjective, not a noun.

form factor - Unless you are chatting about particle physics, leave this term out of your conversation.

In his 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell noted that there were a lot of bad habits prevalent in communications that were being spread by imitation. He postulated that this would eventually lead to the collapse of natural language as we know it. Are we already there? Orwell pointed out four bad habits that can easily be spotted today: dying metaphors, verbal false limbs, pretentious diction, and meaningless words.

The latter two seem to be most prevalent today. Pretentious diction is most often observed in those higher up the corporate ladder. Meaningless words abound in shareholder communications.

Take a moment today and listen carefully, is that English or “corporate speak?” Can you tell the difference?