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WTF Does That Even Mean? It's Acronym Soup · Unspoken Career Truths

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  Welcome to unspoken career truths.
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  I'm Cara Wood. And I'm Lauren Levac Gilbert.
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  And we're here to be the Co workers you can trust.
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  In just 10 minutes, we'll cover the strategies you need, the
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  mistakes to avoid, and the insider secrets no one tells you
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  so you can show up with confidence at work.
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  Hey, Cara. Hello.
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  It's EOD and we are recording this episode IRL so that we can
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  laugh about it together. And if anyone can guess today?
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  FTW. Today's podcast is about
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  acronyms and we're calling it acronym soup, so get ready.
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  There's gonna be a lot of three letter words, a lot of acronyms.
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  This might be more of like an acronym therapy session and a
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  corporate speak therapy session. Now, when I was prepping for
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  this podcast, I tried to write a paragraph that sounded and
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  mimics what we're going to talk about.
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  So bear with me here. Ready.
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  Yeah. Let me know if this sounds
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  familiar at all. Ever.
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  Let's circle back to align EOD. Our OK Rs and KPIs need to
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  ladder up to the FY25 strategic priorities.
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  So let's ensure cross functional alignment between GTMR and D and
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  CX. If we can sync with the PM and
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  get sign up from the SLT before the QBR, we'll be in a good spot
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  to drive ROI across all SKU's. Please make sure the CRM and PIM
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  are fully integrated into the tech stack to optimize UX and
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  reduce TTVTLDR. Let's keep the comms tight, stay
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  agile and deliver MVP by close of business Friday.
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  You know what the I For a second I stumbled over TTV and then I
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  realized it's time to value yes. It was really fun doing this one
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  because I was like, how many acronyms in corporate speak
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  words can you shove into a paragraph?
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  I wish that I had a bingo card for that because I feel like you
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  use so many classic ones that oh.
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  My gosh, we should do that for Christmas.
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  An acronym bingo card for corporate America.
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  Totally. Stay tuned, that might be
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  coming. So here's the truth.
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  I mean, half the time people actually know what most acronyms
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  are or saying or what they're saying or what they mean or
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  honestly, a lot of people are too afraid to ask.
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  I don't know if you feel that way, Cara.
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  I actually used to give advice to my interns to keep a notebook
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  with them and write down all the acronyms that confuse them at
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  the start of something. But I also think there's almost
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  like 3 tiers of acronyms. There is the acronyms, a lot of
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  which you used, which were, well, you used a mix.
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  I would say you used two kinds. One, the kind that you hear a
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  lot kind of no matter what industry you might be in, like
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  EOD, end of day, COB, close of business.
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  Those are office acronyms, but they're an MVP, most valuable,
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  you know, sorry, that's minimum viable product in the product
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  world I was gonna see, but someone in the sports world
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  would hear MVP and think Most Valuable Player, which I started
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  to say TLDR. That's one that the whole entire
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  Internet knows. But then there were others that
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  you use that were very, very industry specific, which I think
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  is like a second tier of acronym, just CRM or PIM.
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  But then there's also an acronym that is sort of my least
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  favorite or the ones that I would really flag, which are
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  acronyms that are company specific.
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  And that's like to a company culture, they make sense and
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  nowhere else. And that's where I think it gets
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  even trickier. I love it.
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  And like if you use too many and your writing or your
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  conversation becomes like about synergy and agility and all
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  these things, like it actually discounts what you're saying
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  because people just hear all the buzzwords.
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  So try to use them in the appropriate way.
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  But there definitely is a place and a value for them.
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  Well, and I actually, I'm glad you brought that up because I
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  think there actually is real value in having, in knowing
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  these acronyms. Like you said, you kind of have
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  to know what they mean. So if you don't and you're
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  hearing them, write them down. Ask someone once you have a
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  moment. I've definitely joined companies
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  that just have different ways to measure, like you had OK,
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  RSKPIS, MVPS, all SKU's, all in here.
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  That's different ways that you might structure or measure your
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  company and different companies will use different ones or
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  they'll use a combination. So those are things that are
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  actually OK to ask about. And I actually use acronyms a
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  lot when I'm trying to signal that I know in industry.
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  So it's a way to kind of say to someone like, yeah, I have
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  worked in that space before. You know, like when I say
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  something like, I helped Ehrs be HIPAA compliant when the ACA
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  passed. Like, you know, I worked in
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  healthcare. You.
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  Know what you're talking about? Right.
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  And though I do think it's kind of helpful.
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  I think that's a great point. I think it does demonstrate
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  understanding of an industry. I also love your point, and it's
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  the next thing I was gonna talk about.
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  Don't be afraid to ask, even if it might be obvious to everybody
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  else. Like ask what the acronym is.
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  If you started a new job, There might be some that are specific
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  to the company. There might be some that are
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  specific to the industry. I actually really respect
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  especially people in like a senior leadership role who stop
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  you and say, hey, can you just clarify by what what you mean by
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  that? It's OK.
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  Like, it doesn't mean that you're stupid.
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  It doesn't mean that you don't know something.
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  Like you're just asking a clarifying question.
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  And that's totally fine. So like feel empowered to be
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  able to ask the question and also like have empathy for
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  others around you that are either new or are starting in
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  the industry or if you're talking to someone who's not in
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  the industry. A lot of times when I'm speaking
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  on podcasts in my industry, I always try to explain the
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  acronym. It's kind of always ingrained in
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  my head. Like if I say the three letters,
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  I immediately afterwards explain it.
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  So also just try to keep that in mind so that you can bring
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  everyone else along with you. Yeah, it's funny.
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  There's another kind of cool thing I was thinking about
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  knowing this topic was coming up around acronyms.
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  And that's when you also get some that are like almost too
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  clever or like forced. And I have two examples actually
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  that I want to get your, like, take on.
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  One is when I worked for a large company and they decided to use
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  their values as an acronym. So we always had like an eye
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  care and care spelled out values.
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  I could not tell you what those values are.
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  However, it still worked really well because you hear the phrase
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  I care and you're still like you're paying attention.
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  You're, you know, customer focused, you're responsible.
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  I don't know, maybe those are, maybe it was responsible and
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  customer focused. Maybe it wasn't.
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  Doesn't matter because they use the word care in the acronym.
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  This sort of worked even if you didn't remember the four words,
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  which I admittedly do not. Stop trying to make fetch happen
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  there Cara. That's my Mean Girls quote for
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  the day. Exactly.
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  And then the other one was actually from this past weekend.
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  I went to a really great talk, Allison Woods Brooks, who wrote
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  a book. She's a conversation expert
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  linguist and she wrote a book and she used the acronym talk
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  TALK. So I got really upset when she
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  started walking through the and I recommend the book.
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  I recommend her research really interesting talk and you can
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  decide Lauren, if you think this is a valuable way to do it.
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  But her book again uses an acronym for 4T ALK 4 things you
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  should do with talk. I'm just going to throw it out
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  there. What do you think L stands for
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  in Conversation? I was going to say level
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  learning. Level learning.
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  I like it. I thought.
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  Listen right away. Yeah, that's a good one.
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  It's Levity and she's. Good.
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  Though that's a great one. It's a great one.
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  I remember all all four. And I mean, I did just see it
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  this past weekend. It's topics asking, levity and
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  kindness listening that actually.
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  Fits really great though for when you're giving a talk.
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  Totally. It totally fits really great.
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  And it's not for when you're giving a talk, it's when you're
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  in conversation with people. So all the things you should do
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  when you're talking to people back and forth.
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  But it really threw me until then, the like oddness of it,
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  like not hearing what I expected to hear made me remember it.
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  And so I think it's really interesting when again,
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  sometimes you're learning things.
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  There's like alphabet soup, there's a million new things to
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  learn. And other times, it's actually a
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  way to connect with people, make something memorable.
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  You know acronyms can work both ways.
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  I completely agree. I think acronyms and corporate
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  phrases, they're there for a reason, to keep everyone on the
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  same page, which I feel like in and of itself is some corporate
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  speak to make sure that you can write things clearly, people
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  understand what you're saying. It can be hard for people to
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  keep up those. So just try to explain your
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  acronyms. Don't feel dumb if you don't
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  know them. Ask for clarification and just
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  try not to fall into the corporate speak trap or the
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  acronym TRAP. That's a wrap.
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  Thanks for joining us on Unspoken Career Truths.
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  Don't forget, follow us on Spotify and Instagram.
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