If The Shoe Fits: Bullshit In / Bullshit Out
by Miki Saxon
A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.
Have you ever wondered where all the bullshit business terms (BBT) came/come from, especially since their spread predates the Net and social media by decades?
A fascinating article in the Guardian traces the birth and rise of business bullshit that sprang from a 20th-century Russian mystic, was embraced by corporate leaders, inspired Scott Adams of Dilbert fame, and has been re-imagined and added to by consultants and pundits ever since.
It hasn’t always been this way. A certain amount of empty talk is unavoidable when humans gather together in large groups, but the kind of bullshit through which we all have to wade every day is a remarkably recent creation.
Founders and others in tech are especially fond of BBT as they go about changing the world.
There’s even an online generator that takes the effort out of remembering terms yourself.
Business bullshit always reminds me of a guy I worked with, who believed the more multi-syllabic words he used the smarter he would sound.
He didn’t and you won’t either.
The article is long, but well worth the reading time.
It might even help squelch your own penchant for using them.
Hat tip to CB Insights for pointing me to the article.
Image credit: Scott Adams
