A plea to the new CEO: drop the marketing buzzwords

Question

The new Stack Overflow CEO has started interacting directly with the community. There was a blog, a podcast, and even some direct responses to user questions. Those are all great starts, but one of my main takeaways from it is that Prashanth is a stereotypical boss. Here are some examples:

Scripting the Future of Stack Overflow

^{What does this even mean? The title of the blog post}

As we enter a new decade, there are tremendous forces converging—cloud computing, big data, AI, ML, and an increasingly diverse group of young coders from around the world.

^{This sentence is packed full of mostly unrelated buzzwords. From the opening line of the blog post}

My style is to show, not tell, and I wanted you all to be the first to know when I shared a vision with our larger community.

^{You say that, but literally all that's happened so far is talk. From the question on MSE opening the discussion}

Now I get it, buzzwords have their uses. I also sometimes need to talk to senior stakeholders who don't really know any details and just want the big picture. This type of language is great with them. But we are not those senior stakeholders. We are tired of the corporate PR language that SO has been peddling our way for a while (e.g. the first apology, the second apology, the third apology, etc).

So my request to you is: when you communicate with us, please be direct, clear and jargon-free. Talk to us as you would talk to a peer. I think this is especially important in this period of "show don't tell" and "trust rebuilding"; if the words you say make it sound like you can wriggle out of anything, I won't put much stock into them.

I also want to be clear that your communication is greatly appreciated. These steps are positive. This post is meant to help you improve your communications with us, not to be another tally in the 'meta users are toxic' list.

Answer 1

The buzzword bingo in that post is entirely relevant for the target audience: people who might buy or invest in Stack Exchange. It wasn’t written for the users of the sites at all, despite any pretence to the contrary.

Being frustrated that a CEO puffing their business up to secure investment won’t speak plainly is like being frustrated that your pet rock can’t do long division.

I’m not saying you’re wrong to be annoyed, just wasting your time. Sorry.

Answer 2

A plea to the new CEO: drop the marketing buzzwords

and

The buzzword bingo in that post is entirely relevant for the target audience:

I disagree.

A really clever speaker adapts to the audience.

It would be perfectly reasonable (and actually: a really smart move) for the CEO and his leadership team to do the following:

• internally develop a vision (and a roadmap) into a future that say, combines the idea of growing SE Inc, whilst also re-connecting to the community
• to then talk and work with that user community, using language that resonates with us
• and to talk and work with investors, journalists, analysts, big customers, ... using that buzzword riddled dialect of the English language known as "business talk"

But of course, framing all message for that second audience is less work, and avoids the risk of some investor reading "internal" MSE communications and getting confused. And what risk lies in annoying this community?

Answer 3

Buzzwords are confusing - especially when communicating with an increasingly diverse audience of potential non English speakers. Even English speakers have difficulty, we think we know what Prashanth means but it may mean something to us but translates differently for others. Say what you mean and mean what you say. - Di lo que quieres decir y significa lo que dices. (Google Translate)