| | By Mick James
Nothing is more
gratifying to a
columnist than a bit of
feedback, and if things
are getting slack on
that front nothing works
better than being rude
about people. So when, a
couple of weeks ago, I
wrote a piece on “why
consultants talk
rubbish”, I thought I
was guaranteed a heaving
postbag of the disgusted
from Tonbridge Wells to
Toronto.
So, I thought I’d
throw myself back in the
fray, inspired by an
unlikely ally, and also
direct readers to a
wonderful resource. A
happily mistyped URL led
me to the works of Tony
Proscio. Add this
bookmark -
http://www.comnetwork.org
/jargonmain.htm - to
your Favourites now, and
make sure you download
and read the PDFs. I
guarantee you will never
be able to use words
like “leverage” (the
consultant’s verbal
Swiss Army knife) “at
scale” or misuse words
like “parameters” again.
The interesting thing
about Proscio’s essays
is that they are aimed
neither at consultants
nor management, but the
area he consults to,
charitable foundations
in the USA (the essays
were commissioned as “a
plea for plain speaking”
by the Edna McConnell
Clark Foundation, may
blessings fall upon it). | |
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| | You might have thought
the charitable sector
would be relatively free
from the verbal Dutch
Elm disease that infects
so many of our
institutions, and would
express themselves in
terse, urgent prose: “We
have to do something to
help these poor kids
before they get into
even more trouble!” But
apparently even this
hard-pressed and worthy
sector is entirely
capable of constructing
sentences like:
“Comprehensive community
building naturally lends
itself to a
return-on-investment
rationale that can be
modelled, drawing from
existing practice.”
As Proscio puts it,
“When any occupation’s
cognoscenti write to
one another, day after
year after decade, they
come to express
themselves, like feral
children, in unlovely
grunts and wheezes that
no one else can
understand.”
Proscio’s initial
essays into the field
drew a mixed response
from his audience. Many
were in sympathy with
his general thesis but
made the point that they
were in competition for
cash (always, mind you,
referred to as “funding”
or “resources”) with
other foundations, and
unless they larded their
submissions with magic
words like “empowerment”
and “synergy” they | |
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| | wouldn’t be taken
seriously.
I suspect this is
what drives a lot of
consultants to the
lexicon of “leverage”
and all its unlovely
cohorts. Plain speaking
can leave you looking
seriously short of chips
at the poker table. You
might sell someone a
pair of shoes for their
kids by saying that they
were pretty tough and
had plenty of growing
room, but a complex
computer system needs to
be robust and scalable.
If all we have done
is create a sort of
courtly language in
which to transact our
business life, then this
might all be seen as a
bit of harmless fun. And
indeed Proscio’s first
two essays are quite
light in tone. But in
the third piece “When
words fail” he decided
to go deeper into the
political implications
of the misuse of
language: “People are
drawn to
philanthropy...largely
by a clear-headed and
intelligent desire to
make the world better.
Yet the stilted
doubletalk gives a
different and far more
menacing impression: a
country-club bourgeoisie
whose every utterance is
intended more to impress
and intimidate than to
discuss, inform, or
persuade. If that false
image has been spreading
– and inviting periodic | |
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| | waves of attack from
politicians and the
media – the blame for it
lies at least partly at
the doorstep of
foundations.”
With a qualifying
sentence or two about
making shed loads of
money, you could easily
apply that thought to
consultancy.
In the US,
conservative
commentators have
successfully created
this image of a “liberal
elite” lording it over
the plain folk of
America. Some of it gets
pretty nasty, some of it
is valid comment. What
Proscio has put his
finger on is that the
conservatives are
winning this argument
precisely because they
are expressing
themselves in blunt,
call-a-spade-a-spade
language, while their
opponents tie themselves
in knots.
Now, Proscio writes
from a country where the
divide between the
agendas of liberals and
conservatives has never
been wider. Over here,
by contrast, with David
Cameron and Tony Blair
heading the nominally
reactionary and
progressive wings of our
political establishment,
things have never been
more confused. And I
wouldn’t want to sign up
consultants to any
political agenda.
Consultancy may not be
about making the world a | |
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| | better place, but it is
about making things
better in the limited
sphere in which it
operates. It rests on
the fundamental belief
that change is not only
possible but positive,
in a world where change
is increasingly being
forced upon us.
So I would argue that
consultancy is
inherently progressive
at some level. Some
consultants are
clear-headed enough to
realise that their
competition is not just,
or even primarily, other
consultants but internal
forces of inertia,
reaction and vested
interests. These forces
will tend to dress up
their defensive
arguments in the
language of blunt common
sense – if all you’ve
come equipped for is
some elegant verbal
jousting with fellow
MBAs, it’s very easy to
be routed by such an
approach.
The effects of
resistance to change
range from the
impoverishing (the loss
of markets and jobs to
China and India), to the
fatal (global warming).
It would be a shame to
lose the battle for the
want of the horseshoe
nail of a decent
vocabulary.
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