Watch Kevin Duncan’s video about absurd business phrases and what they mean...
Kevin Duncan on why people waffle...
“I’ve spent the last 10 years or so advising clients how they should run their businesses. I’m often asked why is it that so many people in business waffle or bullshit, and I think there are three main reasons.
“The first is that it appears people think that if they waffle sufficiently authentically, then it asserts their intellectual authority over the person that they’re speaking to. This may be a double bluff because a lot of us on the receiving end of it don’t think they have the intellectual upper hand. But the person speaking it think that’s the case.
“The second possibility is that we’ve heard so much of this, generally in the media, via politicians, and particularly Americans, that everyone else starts talking that as well way because they think it’s the thing to do.
“And the third one is to do with language at work. People think they should be saying things in the same way as clients, customers and colleagues, because if they don't they're going to get fired.”
On why bullshit is bad for productivity...
“I think bullshit is unproductive for lots of different reasons. The simplest way to explain it probably is what you might call a chain of misunderstanding.
“So for example if a boss waffles or bullshits to a member of staff then the member of staff has any excuse to say 'I don't know what you're talking about. Therefore I'm probably not going to be able to enact what I think you want me to do.'
“What's very tricky about bullshitters is they're neither on the side of truth nor on the side of lies. If somebody is clearly telling the truth, that's easy; if they're lying, funnily enough, that's quite easy too, because at least you know where you stand.
“But the really difficult thing with someone who is bullshitting is that they're not really going for one or the other; they merely grab anything that seems to suit their case and you have no idea where you stand.”
The misconception that causes waffling...
“Now waffling is a completely different thing [to bullshitting]. I train a lot of people, and what I often find is that a lot of people start talking before they've started thinking. A lot of people tell me that they haven't time to think - apparently, although I do suggest that they should spend the first five minutes of every day working out what they're going to do.
“What they tend to do is march up to someone's desk or up to them in the corridor and start talking. And when they do that in all probability they are waffling.
“They've got some rough, unformulated thought which they haven't thought through. And they're pretty much assuming that by dumping it on someone else, it will help them work out what they think.”
Watch Kevin Duncan’s video about absurd business phrases and what they mean...
