It’s something so similar to memorizing formulas, when you were in math’s class in primary school. Rather than getting the concept and its application to a context – a good number of us always find it easier to cram the whole thing, and then speak out the terms at right or wrong platforms. In fact, if you are explaining some concept, executives get so much interested in noting down the terms and buzz words that they miss on appreciating the key message. In case, you don’t play with fancy terms, they feel that the conversation was not worthwhile.
I respect these buzz words and/or technical terms and/or business jargons for one particular value – that they allow you to sum up a series of thoughts, a process or a business model into a few words. But that’s it – beyond that it’s about understanding it and applying to your business. And this purpose is also relevant, if the other person is clear on the concept and application. If the other person is just fascinated about the term rather than understanding it, at times it may be difficult for them to get the message. They can’t believe that those heavy sounding concepts could be so commonsensical.
But again common sense is different for different people. Now, if some one is trying to explain investment and investment strategies to me, it might be so commonsensical to him but outlandish and Greek to me. I will actually need to understand the relevance of the strategies and the thought process rather than get impressed by the use of terms.
I doubt the intentions and therefore the impact, when people implement Balanced Scorecard based performance management for their business because they want to implement Balanced Scorecard(BSC) based performance management system (PMS) or because it’s a good thing to do. Ideally there has to be reason or a business case and a problem at hand or an issue that needs to be addressed, and subsequently, if it’s agreed upon that a BSC Based PMS is the solution, then that’s fine. Similarly, if you want to deploy a talent management process and related initiatives because you want to see talent management happening in your business, may be a bad reason – a better one could be a genuine need to profile talent and see how the pool can be further strengthened and leveraged.
Guys, trust me, most of the words floating around is common sense. Respect the thoughts, insights, ideas and application more than the blah-blah of fascinating terms.
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Praveen is the Founder & Principal Consultant of KHEdge, a boutique HR & Business Process Advisory firm. Over last 15 years he has advised & worked with promoters, founders, business leaders, HR leaders in areas of - Business Strategy, HR Strategy, Organisation Design etc.