The Art of Speaking Vaguely

One of these days I'd like to try to spend the whole day speaking in vague terms. No matter what I'm asked I want to answer using words but without saying anything -- kind of like how presidential and vice-presidential candidates often answer debate questions.

How many of you remember Mr. H. Ross Perot? He was the business man who ran as an independent in the 1992 presidential election. He also loved to talk in strange rural metaphors that meant nothing.

For instance, he once said, ""If we decide to take this level of business creating ability nationwide, we'll all be plucking chickens for a living." In the context of a presidential debate, what does that mean? In the context of a regular conversation, what does that mean?

And let's not forget Sarah Palin's regular use of sports metaphors, but then I think that goes beyond vague communication into something else entirely.

Anyway, as part of my exercise in speaking vaguely, saying nothing, I want to use the word leverage as many times as I can. I mean, truly, what does that word mean exactly? Two jobs ago I used to interview CIO’s, vice presidents or managers of technology and other executives in charge of the technological workings behind retail companies. Invariably, at some point in the conversation somebody would say, "We leveraged the assets of the company to..."

And every time, I'd sort of scratch my head and wonder, what the hell does that mean? It's just so vague. I could use that answer for almost anything.

Gink, how did you make that turkey meatloaf? Well, I leveraged the assets of my refrigerator.

Gink, what did you do today? I leveraged my free time to accomplish my goals.

Even in the intro to the new TV show "Leverage" the term in intended to be vague. When Timothy Hutton's character says during the credits intro, "We provide leverage," he's being vague on purpose because he can't say what they really do.

Thankfully, in my most recent job I rarely, if ever, heard the term leverage. However, that didn't mean people weren't answering my questions in vague terms.

Just last week I interviewed a woman in charge of training and education at her company. Half of what she had to say was informative and useful. The other half, well I couldn't figure out what she was trying to say.

For instance, at one point in the interview she said, "We got some of their best thinking on best management practices and we put those into an online training session and delivered it out to the membership."

Uh huh. What is best thinking? And what does that mean, it was put into an online training session?

Later, she talked about a new initiative her company has started, which involved wrapping activities around an event and when I asked her exactly what the pieces (or wrappings) of the initiative were going to be. She told me "all the things I've already described," except she'd never really described anything.

I ended up with four pages of notes; about a page and a half actually had solid, concrete information I could use.

I just don't understand the common use of vague phrasing that is daily thrown around by executives, PR people, politicians. Do they think the average person they are speaking to is dumb? Is it just that what they're saying makes perfect sense to them? Is it a way of explaining things they don't even understand? Do they just not want to tell the full truth?

Yesterday, I tried to imagine conversations with friends in my head in which I spoke in very vague terms. But I couldn't do it. I realized it certainly is an art form that most likely either comes naturally or takes years of practice.

I'm not sure I really ever want to be a master of vaguery (ok, not really a word, but you get my point), but I am going to try and use the word leverage at least once a week from now on.