100 Banned Words

Oops, missed this event in my 'Days That Change The World' diary, but apparently it was National Plain English Day yesterday, 11 December 2007. To mark the occasion, the Local Government Association (LGA) published a list of 100 words that public bodies should not use if they want to communicate effectively with local people.

Local government leaders say that unless councils talk to residents in a language that they can understand, then the work they do becomes inaccessible and reduces the chances of people getting involved in their local issues. The list can be found here, but is replicated below. For anyone remotely familiar with 'Govspeak', this is a timely intervention by the Plain English lobby. It's just a pity that something so obvious has to be published at all! (NB. Not quite sure why 'welcome' is on the list??)

The LGA's top 100 'banned words'

1. ambassador
2. agencies
3. beacon
4. best practice
5. bottom-up
6. CAAs
7. can do culture
8. capacity
9. capacity building
10. cascading
11. cautiously welcome
12. champion
13. citizen empowerment
14. community engagement
15. conditionality
16. consensual
17. contestability
18. core message
19. core value
20. coterminosity
21. coterminous
22. cross-cutting
23. customer
24. democratic mandate/legitimacy
25. distorts spending priorities
26. early win
27. empowerment
28. engagement
29. engaging users
30. enhance
31. evidence base
32. external challenge
33. facilitate
34. fast-track
35. flexibilities and freedoms
36. framework
37. fulcrum
38. good practice
39. governance
40. guidelines
41. holistic
42. holistic governance
43. improvement levers
44. incentivising
45. income/funding streams
46. initiative
47. joined up
48. joint working
49. LAAs
50. level playing field
51. localities
52. meaningful consultation/dialogue
53. MAAs
54. menu of options
55. multi-agency
56. multidisciplinary
57. outcomes
58. output
59. participatory
60. partnerships
61. pathfinder
62. peer challenge
63. performance network
64. place shaping
65. predictors of beaconicity
66. preventative services
67. priority
68. process driven
69. quick hit
70. quick win
71. resource allocation
72. revenue streams
73. risk based
74. scaled-back
75. scoping
76. seedbed
77. service users
78. shared priority
79. signpost
80. single point of contact
81. slippage
82. social contracts
83. stakeholder
84. step change
85. strategic/overarching
86. streamlined
87. subsidiary
88. sustainable
89. sustainable communities
90. symposium
91. synergies
92. tested for soundness
93. third sector
94. top-down
95. transformational
96. transparency
97. value-added
98. vision
99. visionary
100. welcome

Comments

[Dave Briggs]

What in God's name is wrong with 'engagement'?!

[Steve Dale]

I could probably take a poll of married men and get you an answer :o)

[Ed]

'Engagement' is a tricky word much mis-used. If you read cscape's latest survey on customer engagement you will find that many people think it is a different thing.

Also - blimey what a list! I am going to have to watch my buzzword happy mouth... Years ago, during boom1.0, while writing a website proposal for the NHS, i had a dream that I was in the final interview panel and the interviewer leaned forward and asked...

"So... Ed, tell me... what exactly is 'interactive, interactive, interactivity?"

First thing i did the next morning was count how many times I had used the word!

[Steve Dale]

Ed - thanks for the feedback (and apologies to Dave for my flippant comment on 'Engagement'). I guess we all start to adopt the jargon or grammar of the people we're in day to day contact with. The fact we have this list would infer that public sector employees don't often have dialogue with ordinary citizens - and if they do, we don't know what they're talking about. Unfortunately I also see this 'Govspeak' on Government and Local Authority web sites, and the newsletters that my own council regularly send out. No wonder politicians and councillors have trouble 'engaging' citizens when we're not all talking the same language!

[Pete]

Mmm - how does "Leveraging and evangelising the benefits of Social Media applications and Web2.0 technology for more effective networking, collaboration and knowledge sharing in and between public and private sector organisations" go down?

[Steve Dale]

Brilliant Pete - you've managed to pick a sentence for which not one word is on the 'banned list'. However, I'm not sure you've got the copyright...could have sworn I've seen this somewhere before!! :o)

[Aubrey_Iowa]

Only reason I voted for him was SARAH. I wasn't even going to vote until he picked her. I had voted in every election since the late 1960?s., http://vanessahudgensbikinizc.tumblr.com vanessa hudgens bikini, 8(((, http://kristenbellnakeden.tumblr.com kristen bell naked, hpvkw, http://christinahendricksboobsnu.tumblr.com christina hendricks boobs, 8838, http://haydenpanettierenakedsu.tumblr.com hayden panettiere naked, 6718, http://trishstratusnudeea.tumblr.com trish stratus nude, :P, http://monicabelluccihotzo.tumblr.com monica bellucci hot, 598, http://selenagomezbikiniyx.tumblr.com selena gomez bikini, hbk, http://evalongoriasexmf.tumblr.com eva longoria sex, %((,