Page 145 - The New Articulate Executive_ Look, Act and Sound Like a Leader

136 DELIVERY

7. Don’t use confusing words. Some words send out signals that
often can be misleading and fuzzy. Examples:
Fuzzy: I would like to cite that site as just one more example of
how we have lost sight of our environmental mandate.

Clear: That location is just one more example of how we have
lost sight of our environmental mandate.

Fuzzy: The city building codes require that we raze [sounds like
raise] all buildings that are beyond repair.
Clear: The city building codes require that we tear down all
buildings that are beyond repair.

Fuzzy: I found all the hectic activity leading up to the wedding
to be enervating [sounds like energize, but actually means
“draining”].

Clear: I found all the hectic activity leading up to the wedding
to be exhausting.
Fuzzy: When we hurt the tourist industry, we are in effect cut-
ting off our air line [means “oxygen hose,” but sounds like Jet
Blue].
Clear: When we hurt the tourist industry, we are in effect cut-
ting off our lifeline.

In the age of AIDS awareness, conundrum begins to sound a lot
like condom. Diffi cult-to-pronounce words like conundrum, covet-
ousness, or problematic probably ought to be left out (Jerry Ford
couldn’t pronounce nuclear, so instead he had to say atomic).
Sometimes words can be used deliberately, for whatever reason,
to send a hidden or tongue-in-cheek message. In his book The Lexi-
con of Intentionally Ambiguous Recommendations, Lehigh University
economist Robert Thornton came up with devilishly clever ways to
write recommendations for lousy job candidates. For example: