It's not consultant speak -- it's corporate speak. One of the uses of the "parking lot" is for issues that are not critical to the one at hand so they don't start taking everyone off on less-important tangents.

LOL! Yes, I was just in a meeting where we "parked" everything. Seriously though, in answer to your question, I don't think clients force consultants to pretend to have the answer(s). I think that consultants feel they have to prove they are worth all the money they are charging by showing every bit of work that they do and then they buy time so as to go get the answer. I think full-time employees have a bit more freedom to be honest about having to research an issue. Personally, I like to think that management (clients) have more respect for people who are direct about what needs to be done, including the ability to say "I don't know". Just as one tells the media that they will have to research a question, one should be upfront about doing the same thing to a client. If everyone had all the answers all the time, well, then, everyone would be perfect and no one would need anyone. What a boring world that would be, don't you think?

But if as a consultant I admit I have to go and research something cuz I dunno--well, why wouldn't the corporate client think: HELL, I can research the thing just as well as the consultant can! I do think there's this mutual fallacy between clients and consultants, that the consultant really does know it all. And I think that's what explains all these weasel words like "tall grass," etc.

And Diane, I recognize that "parking lot" is a place to put aside irrelevant issues. But whatever happened to good old-fashioned, "Okay, I hear you, Hank. We can discuss that another time. Let's stick to the point."

Why the need to use a mealy-mouthed term like "parking lot"?

This doesn't seem so puzzling to me. In the examples you cited, it seems that perhaps the consultants wanted to avoid having to give a long, detailed, and possibly narrowly focused answer to a complicated and possibly narrowly focused question in front of a crowd that wanted something snappier and more entertaining. Maybe they were just doing what we're all taught to do when giving speeches: answer the questions of general interest in front of the crowd and--if you can't find a way to make them of general interest--answer other questions face-to-face.

Oh, I'm not criticizing the actual answers in those situations.

Just those phacile phrases that came to my attention--and reminded me of my own long-ago days as a consultant.

Hmmm, interesting point Jane. But one must wonder, if such a pointed question is asked, isn't it because a pointed answer is wanted?

Dave - I don't think people will think, "HELL, I can research the thing just as well as the consultant can!", because 1)they probably already know this, and 2)there just isn't enough time in the day, so they ask for help. Also, I agree with your point about just saying "let's not get distracted" versus "parking lot", etc. I'm trying to simplify messaging and people keep coming up with new corporatespeak.

Anyway, I will add in a disclaimer as I have only worked with two agencies - one fab and one a "snake in the grass". However, the fab one was fab because they stuck to their specialty while the other tried to be things they weren't.

I recognize that there are a lot of people out there that are better at some things than me and vice versa. Working together to provide solutions is what I want.

Maybe the difference between a good speaker and a great speaker (note: speaker, not consultant), is that a great speaker can find a way to answer any question, regardless of its narrowness or dullness, in a way that interests the entire audience. A merely good speaker, to avoid being boring, may need to have a side conversation with the asker.

When I consult (rather than just writing), I occasionally find that my plain-spokenness--"Hmmm, I'm not sure about that. I'll need to check it out and let you know"--LOSES ME MORE CREDIBILITY THAN IF I HAD USED THE CURRENT JARGON. I can just tell from eye contact, body language, and what they say that that the execs are thinking, "Fer cryin' out loud, she doesn't even know our language." Once, in such a case, I then threw in some gobbledygook, and everyone's demeanor changed for the better. So what's a consultant to do? We depend on pleasing clients, so if we sometimes talk like idiots...well, YOU do the math....

OK, I ashamedly admit that I believe I am the one who so foolishly slipped into corporate-speak with the "tall grass" comment in response to a question in the panel session (of which David was a part) because the question was, I felt, too far off the topic. I wanted to respect the expectations of the folks who were in that session and try to keep the discussion focused.

If you know me (and David does), I rarely slip into corporate-speak or consultant-speak, and it would figure that the one rare time I do, I get called on it.

But I can't let the consultant-bashing go entirely. I'm an independent consultant, I've never worked for a big consulting firm and never will (on principle), and I pride myself on offering the kind of customized service that most big consulting firms can't seem to offer. When I say we'll talk about it later or let's not get into that right now, it's because my best counsel is that we should talk about it later and not get into it right now. It's not because I'm afraid to say I don't know. I readily admit when I am not knowledgeable about something. For example, in my session on analyzing and applying survey results, I confessed before a packed room that I am not an expert in survey science. I am an expert in how to ask the right questions and how to use the data to make improvements.

Let's try not to generalize about consultants too much. Some of us believe passionately in giving our clients straight answers and a great deal for their money.

I'll accept the reprimand on corporate-speak, however. :-)

Why the need to use all these mealy-mouthed terms, you know, at the end of the day? I don't use 'em; I figure those who do just want to prove how hip and corporate they are. At the end of the day.

Robert, I'm not consultant-bashing any more than I'm client-bashing.

I think ALL consultants are motivated to do good work and give a great deal for the money, actually. I'm getting the feeling that the relationship between (mostly larger) consulting firms and corporate clients is dysfunctional and to avoid a number of elephants in the living room, we sometimes invent pretty language.

Such elephants can include:

• The problems are actually too big for the consultant to solve.

• The consultant doesn't know any more than the client.

• The client doesn't actually want to solve the problem but was forced to bring in the consultant to make it look like he or she is trying.

• The consultant thinks the client is an imbecile but cannot say so--but is still trying to do good work and thus looking for "workarounds," linguistic and other.

• The consultant reports to two internal clients and is loved by one and loathed by the other.

• The client hired the wrong consultant and knows it but doesn't want to fire the person and so makes unreasonable demands instead. The consultant is forced to put some of these demands "in the parking lot" (or back in the "tall grass," where they came from).

• The consultant is being taken advantage of and needs to figure out how he or she is going to do all this work in the available billable hours, while better-paying clients tap their feet.

• The whole project has gone FUBAR and nobody wants to admit it. To the extent that we speak of the project at all, we must speak in nonsense words.

And a million other classics.

I'm not bashing consultants. I'm marriage-counseling.

P.S. Jane, I've been there, too.

Diane, your blog is subtitled: "An odd, desultory collection of book reviews, dreams, ruminations, observations, and questions from an alien misfit."

This is what you get in this country from a wholesale rejection of corporate thinking and the language used to describe it.

I respect you and have come to love your point of view. But you have to acknowledge that it has consequences that not just everybody is going to be willing to pay.

I don't reject it. I'm amused by it, especially as many employees tune out the moment the "at the end of the days" and the "parking lots" come out. Later, you'll find them in the cafeteria making fun of the emptiness of it all. Leadership is more than whipping corporate speak around.

I'm lost. Consequences?

Consequences are, if you don't go in for these clichés--or at least the suffocating corporate THOUGHT CLICHÉS, you are marginalized.

I'm a Myers-Brigg INFP. I was born marginalized.

(insert smiley here)

And I can wield cliches with the best of 'em! I can show you my KPIs!

Ever watch a child learn a new word and the glee they get from saying it over and over, sometimes more appropriately than others? I've felt that when I finally grocked the concept behind some corporate jargon. And wielded the corporate jargon at the next opportunity, probably with obvious glee. It's a nice short hand, industry jargon.

One of our recent hires asked where everyone was going, and a coworker answered "CCC." Which didn't mean anything to the new hire. ;-)

If they didn't speak fancy and seem intriguing, then why would we pay them? If they were plain-spoken, sensible people, they'd be called EMPLOYEES, and we've already got a ton of those.

When I was a consultant, my impression was that we were paid to do what employees had no time or resources for, or that was not a "core competency." So we wrote/designed/managed production of benefits and compensation statements, summary plan descriptions, change communications, etc. We knew our end, but we didn't know every nuance of the client's culture and business. I don't remember anyone being afraid to say they didn't know when it related to something we, well, didn't know. Now, if one of our benefits attorneys had said they didn't the limits on 401(k) contributions, that would have been a red flag to client and consulting team both.

To be clear, I was not consultant bashing. I agree with Dave's 12:07 comment. And, who knows, I may want to branch out on my own one day. I just think being straight and direct works better for me.