NEWS

Public relations is a thankless business, which requires unfortunate flaks to pander to the inflated egos and unreasonable demands of clients and journalists. (For an object lesson about the industry's dynamics, consult Charies Chrichton's 'The Sweet Smell of Success', in which Burt Lancaster humiliates and manipulates PR boot-licker Sidney Falco, played by Tony Curtis.)

To be successful, PRs need to be ever more inventive to come up with story angles that will attract press coverage.

Hats off, then, to Midlands Property website officebroker.com and their advisors at Powells PR for coming up with a doozy od a release cataloguing the 10 worst examples of management speak. Not only did they hang the idea on the topical resumption of the BBC's 'The Apprentice' (remember all those cringe-worthy.

Brentisms from the unlamented cockney geezer Simon SMith?), officebroker.com has also preserved an important record of the techno-jargon that has pervaded our lives in the early 21st century.

"We are sure Sir Alan Sugar would cringe at some of the management speak heard in offices across the land on a daily basis," said officebroker.com managing director Jim Venables.

"Like most companies we often find ourselves indulging in a session of blamestorming if something doesn't go according to plan, but we are such little ideas hamsters that we always get the ball rolling again quickly!"

officebroker.com's 10 worst jargon crimes

1. Calling a colleague a '404' (as in the web error message 404: Not Found) for being completely useless.
2. Saying you will "knife and fork" a task - in other words, manage it bit by bit.
3. Claiming at an interview that you are "ready to plug and play" - that you are ready to start the job immediately without any support or training.
4. Offering to "bookmark" someone you meet at a conference, rather than taking note of their contact details.
5. Inviting colleagues or staff to a "thought showering" session - the supposedly PC term for brainstorming.
6. Referring to your PC as the "square headed spouse".
7. Declaring that there is an "elephant in the room" or a "100lb gorilla". What you actually need to do admit that there is a big problem that everyone is ignoring.
8. Describing yourself as being "behind the curve" to demonstrate your grip on modern technology and life.
9. Talking about "swallowing the frog" when tackling a particularly horrible task.
10. Talk about spending the afternoon "in the field", when everyone knows you are skiving.