Once we know something, it becomes hard to imagine what it feels like not to know it.
More quotesApparently nobody sells more toothpaste now. They “reimagine oral wellbeing”.
This linguistic inflation is not harmless. “Get 500 more qualified buyers to request a demo” forces choices. “Transform the category” lets every department staple its favourite project to the strategy and call it alignment. One objective guides work; the other provides air cover for a year of expensive wandering.
Grandiosity also makes failure wonderfully photogenic. A rebrand cannot fix the weak product, but it can produce a cinematic launch film. A campaign charged with “owning culture” need never admit that nobody remembered the advertiser. A software company can disrupt the future while quietly trying to move six customers off spreadsheets. When the verb is big enough, evidence looks petty.
I am not against ambition. I am against ambition being measured in syllables. Make the result enormous if the opportunity deserves it. Make the objective painfully specific: who changes, what they do, and what they stop doing instead. “Reassure existing users that migration will not interrupt Monday morning” is not a small job. It is merely one that can fail in public.
Nudge. Reinforce. Reassure. Sell. Retain. These words rarely get a standing ovation at the strategy away-day. They do have the unfashionable advantage of meaning something.