TL;DR
Jargon may feel like a shortcut to sounding smart, but it’s actually one of the most expensive communication habits in the workplace. Every buzzword and acronym that goes over someone’s head costs you time, trust and real money – and the fix is simpler than you think.
Picture this: you’re three innings into the World Series and the commentators are rattling off stats and inside baseball lingo. Your partner turns to you and says, “I have no idea what they’re actually talking about.” And you’re right there with them. This has happened to me many times and while it’s mildly entertaining during a baseball game, that same feeling of confusion plays out every single day in workplaces everywhere. Except there it’s not entertaining. It’s expensive.
Jargon, buzzwords, and acronyms can feel like professional shorthand. They signal you know the room and that you belong at the table. But here’s the problem: when even one person in the room doesn’t share your vocabulary, you’ve already lost them, and everything that follows that conversation suffers.
Jargon Feels Smart. It Isn’t.
We’ve all been guilty of it. Jargon feels safe and makes you feel like an insider. When you use the right terms in the right meeting, it makes you feel like you’re in the right place. The problem, though, is that many of us aren’t using jargon correctly. And the people who are on the receiving end often can’t tell the difference.
My friend Dave Yewman, a fantastic speech and storyteller, used to take a sentence like, “We need to leverage synergies to optimize the customer journey,” and ask the person, bluntly, “What the hell are you actually talking about?” When he would ask someone this, they might be stunned, mainly because people have gotten so used to using these jargon-dense sentences so commonly. (Also, Dave is British, so it just sounded more important coming from him.) His point was simple: just say what you really mean without using the jargon so everyone can understand it.
Vagueness is the enemy of productivity.
Every time someone leaves a meeting unclear on what to do next, what “done” looks like, or what “success” actually means, is time and money wasted, two times over, if they have to come back and clarify or worse – start working without understanding and later having to course correct.
What Jargon Is Actually Costing You
Let’s talk real costs: time, trust, and money. When you trade clarity for cleverness, you slow everything down.
Confusion creates rework, rework creates waste, and waste drops straight to the bottom line in the wrong direction.
Anthropologist David Graeber coined the term “managerial feudalism” to describe how organizations create layers of unnecessary work and complicated language to make people look busy rather than effective. Sometimes jargon doesn’t just happen accidentally — it’s used as camouflage. People use complex language to sound competent when they’re actually unclear. And the higher you go in an organization, the easier it is to hide behind that fog.
Then there’s the cross-functional landmine problem. When teams are siloed, they develop their own internal language. Marketing speaks in funnels and demand gen. Finance speaks in basis points and EBITDA. IT speaks in tickets and sprints. That’s fine within those silos. But when you need to work across them — which all of us do — those insider terms become barriers.
When teams don’t share language (or are adaptable with their language), they stop sharing understanding. And when people feel like they might not look as good for asking what something means? They stop asking questions altogether. What you’re left with is a room full of nodding heads — which feels like alignment but isn’t. I had a professor in college who would nod enthusiastically while you were talking and then say, “Nope. Absolutely wrong.” Don’t lead that meeting.
When Jargon Is (Actually) Okay
Of course, there are instances where jargon is ok to use and sometimes even essential. My father was a surgeon. In an operating room, with a life on the table, precise and fast language is the whole point. Pilots in a cockpit, navigators on the water — same deal. Those are closed systems where every person in the room shares the same vocabulary by necessity. Time is life.
But most of us are not in operating rooms. We’re in conference rooms, Zoom calls, and Slack threads with colleagues from different departments, different backgrounds, and different levels of context. Assuming shared language in those rooms isn’t efficient — it’s a liability.
How to Kill the Jargon (Starting Now)
Here’s the good news: this is fixable. And it doesn’t require a communication overhaul — just a few deliberate habits.
Know your room before you walk in
Before any meeting, presentation, or email, ask yourself: will everyone here understand what I’m about to say? If the answer is no — even for one person — you need to either explain the term or swap it out. Context is key to clear communication, so make sure your language is saying something everyone in the room can actually receive.
Write how you talk
If you wouldn’t say it over coffee, don’t say it in an email.
Nobody is impressed by “pursuant to our recent dialogue.” Just say “as we talked about.” The $10 word doesn’t make you sound smarter; it makes you sound like you’re trying too hard, and let’s face it: nobody likes a try-hard.
Invite clarity in the moment
When someone says something confusing, ask: “Can you give me an example?” or “Can you explain that another way?” Don’t be shy about it, no matter where you are in the organization. In fact, if you’re the most senior person in the room, asking for clarity is one of the most powerful things you can do. You’re modeling for everyone else that it’s safe to not know, safe to ask, and that understanding matters more than looking polished.
Ban the meaningless buzzwords
Synergy. Bandwidth. Robust solution. Ideate. If you can’t explain it simply, don’t use the word. Create a short list of banned phrases for yourself — the ones you reach for out of habit — and find the plain-language version for each. Your team will thank you, even if they never say so.
Here’s a before-and-after to make it concrete:
Before: “Let’s circle back to align on the KPIs.”
After: “Let’s meet again after we review this data to make sure we all agree on what success looks like so we can share it widely.”
One builds confusion. The other builds consensus. The choice is yours — every time you open your mouth.
Be the One Who’s Clear
Being clear is a leadership choice. When you ditch the jargon, you’re being respectful of your people and their time, and you’re saying to everyone in the room that regardless of their background or level, “I want you to understand this conversation and contribute to you.” That’s not just good communication; that’s good leadership.
So next time you’re tempted to leverage synergies or ideate around optimizing channels, pause. Say what you mean in plain English because clarity speaks louder than any buzzword ever will.
Listen to Lee’s podcast episode on the topic here!