Currently he’s advertising a strata floor for sale in a multi-level Lower Hutt office building “as is, where is”. The “where is” clearly implies a capability to shift it elsewhere, an exercise which would certainly be a wonderful spectacle if undertaken.
I’ve written for years about the practise of commercial property agents talking cock. For example orthodox industrial buildings being described as “hard working” or for no reason, “high tech”. Rental areas are nowaday “footprints” which in fact they’re not. The latest vogue is for standard storage industrial buildings to be described as “logistic” centres.
But this practise of clouding plain, fit-for-purpose language with waffle extends into every activity.
Yesteryear’s staff clerk is now “Manager – Human Resources”. This clumsy back to front vogue is now rife in both the government and commercial sectors wherein often minor management job descriptions are stretched out ungrammatically.
It’s time lesser roles joined in. Bus drivers can become Human Transport Linkage Executives, stop-go sign holders, Overseers – Vehicle Management Safety Executives and so on.
One that particularly irks me is the unnecessary introduction of the word “solutions” into mainly tradesmen’s company names. Joe Blow Plumber Ltd is now Joe Blow Plumbing Solutions Ltd, a sure give-away of dealing with a halfwit. So too a half page advertisement by commercial real estate agency CBRE in The Herald a week back.
It’s flogging a conventional supermarket building but half of the space is given over to this message, “Award Winning Real Estate Solutions.” This is sheer gibberish, compounded by “award winning” this a pre-fix to virtually everything in New Zealand. I’d stay well clear of it.
Yesteryear’s staff clerk is now “Manager – Human Resources”. This clumsy back to front vogue is now rife in both the government and commercial sectors wherein often minor management job descriptions are stretched out ungrammatically.
It’s time lesser roles joined in. Bus drivers can become Human Transport Linkage Executives, stop-go sign holders, Overseers – Vehicle Management Safety Executives and so on.
One that particularly irks me is the unnecessary introduction of the word “solutions” into mainly tradesmen’s company names. Joe Blow Plumber Ltd is now Joe Blow Plumbing Solutions Ltd, a sure give-away of dealing with a halfwit. So too a half page advertisement by commercial real estate agency CBRE in The Herald a week back.
It’s flogging a conventional supermarket building but half of the space is given over to this message, “Award Winning Real Estate Solutions.” This is sheer gibberish, compounded by “award winning” this a pre-fix to virtually everything in New Zealand. I’d stay well clear of it.
Sir Bob Jones is a renowned author, columnist , property investor, and former politician, who blogs at No Punches Pulled HERE.
2 comments:
Don't worry Sir Bob, when all this type of advertising is put out in Maori language, nobody will have a clue what it means.
It may get to the stage where advertising for anything will include a footnote. "English speakers need not apply"
One so aggressively confident should write correct English
practice n.
practise vb.
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