As with tennis elbow overuse will cause you pain. Alas, not just our weary elbows ache after the same activity over and over again but also our weary minds will feel the pain from management speak overuse syndrome.

As time and managers go by and the folder of Powerpoint presentations, called 'presentations' gets bigger and bigger bursting at the seams with templated ocean blue design, you can bet your KPI's that the call to action headings will be front and centred before you can say epicondylitis. We've continued to put faith in our tired terminology and it's seen us through the good times and bad. We've run it up the flagpole and had more burning platforms that bonfire night, before that became really illegal.

Each time we roll them out they are further cemented into our psyche like old friends from way back when. But my, how they've changed. We've adopted them and adapted them to suit our office needs and in-capabilities. An engagement score these days has executives nodding and note taking but it wasn't that long ago that engagement only referred to proposal of marriage and providing a score would be giving your fiancé a reasonable rating out of 10.

We've gone straight to the war room to steal the strategic lines of defence and just left it at strategy this and strategy that and hopefully left the artillery behind. We're aligning our strategy now and no longer is our alignment just the work of a really good chiropractor, we've crunched and adjusted the lower backs of our business to walk with a lesser limp.

Values used to be about the cost of my sandwich and talent only referred to baton twirlers and people who could sing. Now I need to explore the hygiene factors of my ideas instead of my kitchen sponge and be so transparent hardly anyone knows I'm here. Retention should only be about water as anything else would be just too painful and measuring my bench strength should be left to a home handyman with an extractable tool.

High performance used to be singled out for acrobats and performing seals but now we ask everyone to swing from the trapeze and clap hands simultaneously but when things turn horribly wrong we get out the liposuction and right size the fat right out of the joint.

Termed 'Weasel Words', Don Watson wrote about the lack of accountability that goes with this management speak and it seems we've not listened as we continually stamp them all over mission statements, vision and values and position descriptions.

So why don't they work? If there is any doubt as to the ineffectiveness of this terminology try them at home or next time you're at the footy. For example "my wife's white sauce really adds a value proposition to the veg". Doesn't really work does it?

Substituting real words instead of management speak is a reverse form of bullshit bingo that can create hours of entertainment in your next monthly presentation. Every time one appears, raise your hand and ask "when you say Roadmap don't you really mean list of things to do" or "does platform really mean platform as in train platform and if so which one and what line?"

Well I'm off to formulate a framework for dinner, it's getting late.