Worst corporate jargon of the week: Architect
Offender: Architect
Every one of us has been an email chain which is borderline unintelligible for the amount of corporate lingo thrown in there. At City PM, we’re taking a stand and calling out the worst jargon which travels around the City faster than you can drink an overpriced pint. This week: architect.
What does it mean?
NOT a person who is qualified to design buildings, that’s for sure. Forget bricks and mortar, in corporate settings, an architect refers to builders of the intangible world. Linkedin currently boasts openings for ‘content architects’ (copywriters), ‘cloud architects’ (programmers), ‘enterprise architects’ (unclear), ‘data architects’ (the IT guy), ‘information architects’ (liars) and even a ‘social video viral architect’ (losers).
See also: engineers.
Who uses it?
Enthusiastic recruiters who want you to think you’re the main character: you’re not Derek from IT, you’re the team’s superstar cloud software architect, a builder of hearts, minds and Excel spreadsheets. Said offenders may also say things like “it’s good to e-meet you” and are likely still believe the Metaverse will catch on.
What could it be confused with?
- A person who is qualified to design buildings
- Computer programmers
- Copywriters
- God (the grand Architect)
- Bakers, butchers, candlestick makers; anyone who has ever made anything
- Communist propaganda (Stalin appealed to writers as “engineers of the human soul”)
Should we be worried?
Undoubtedly. Especially the poor sods who spent years grafting to become actual architects.
How do we get rid of it?
Grab your hard hats and high vis boys and girls, we’re setting up our own Content Destruction Unit and taking a wrecking ball to this nonsense. Let’s see how stable those foundations are without a degree.