Three Words I Wish I Had Eradicated From My Management Vocabulary

Words do matter

I was a people and business leader for two-thirds of my 25-year corporate career. The corporate culture, whether I cared to admit it or not, had shaped my belief system, and I had adopted the mindset and communication style of a Corporate America management playbook, without much questioning. Two years after leaving that world, I have had the time and distance to reflect on those years and see how much I was part of a culture that I now frown upon.

Communication is a key part of one’s management style. The words we use matter. When words we use often become “buzz words” and are templated into popular talking points, their actual meanings start to escape us.

Words can carry hidden messages, messages that help form the corporate culture.

There are three such words, I wish I had eradicated from my management vocabulary. (I am sure there are more.)

Singapore Central Business District - Photo taken during one of my corporate business trips in 2015

1. Responsive

When I was a manager, I conducted many new employee/leader onboarding meetings. I always put “Be responsive!” at the top of my expectation list.

“Be responsive. Always acknowledge an inquiry or request, even if you are not able to provide a solution or complete what’s asked right away.” I would emphasize with a deliberate pause, looking in the eye of the person sitting across the table (or camera), hoping my words had sunk in. To me, being responsive was a measure of a good work ethic, a very basic measure.

I had always been responsive myself.

If I was asked about my strengths, being responsive would be in the top three. A colleague once half-jokingly said that he’d be rich if he had bet a dollar every time I was the first one to answer an email question sent to a group. I took that as a compliment. When people asked how I managed to be responsive at all times, I thought the question was silly: I checked my email all the time and always responded as soon as I could.

I paid a price for being so responsive though, a steep price—I was “on” all the time. Ever since there were the work laptops and home internet (and later with the assortment of mobile devices), I had been tethered to work and available 24/7. The fact that 24/7 availability was not part of the job requirement did not matter. I made answering to work my top priority.

And it was only natural for me to expect others to do the same. Only now, two years after I left my job, I realized how unnatural and unfair that expectation was.

The word “responsive” implies instant action/reaction, when in reality, nothing will suffer if the action is not taken at the cost of dropping everything else you are doing. In reality, the word “responsive” should be replaced by “responsible”—responsible for the job we sign up for and responsible to the people we support and care about.

If I were in an onboarding meeting now, I would say, “Be responsible.”

“Be responsible. Always honor your commitment. Be there when you say you will; deliver what you have committed to others—your team, your boss, your family, and yourself.”

An employee who prioritizes their time and commitment is one who has a good work ethic; a company or boss who requests you always prioritize their asks over everything else is not someone you should be working for.

2. Productive

I liked being productive. It meant being able to produce; to create something of value, something new.

But the meaning of the word took a turn in the corporate world. It became less about producing and more about activities. Being productive simply meant being busy, busy with activities that might not produce anything. An overcrowded calendar became the symbol of being productive.

My calendar went through a “transformation” during the 25 years of my corporate career. It first migrated from paper appointment books to an electronic application on the computer, then synced to mobile devices, and finally lived in the “Cloud”. The appearance of my calendar also went through a “makeover”—it looked like a picture of multi-colored train tracks. “Double-booked” or even “triple-booked” were real things.

There were meeting appointments—All-Hands meetings, Quarterly Business Reviews/Weekly Business Reviews meetings, one-on-one meetings, skip-level meetings, project sync-up meetings, and those regular relationship-building-but-don’t-produce-anything “stakeholder touch point” meetings. There were travel itineraries—off-site corporate events, customer visits, team visits, day trips, globe-trotting trips, and those “boss-is-there-so-I-better-be-there” trips. We needed a meeting before the meeting—to review the agenda, and a meeting after the meeting—to review the “action items”.

What got crowded out were the results, concrete results matched prior commitments with measurable outcomes, results that would be implemented and improved upon. What got crowded out was also the time needed to produce any results, maybe didn’t get crowded out, but over to the side of the calendar that should have been marked “me time” and “family time”.

I believe a calendar with a considerable amount of white space is a prerequisite for being productive. I believe it is worth every minute of a weekly 30-minute meeting with oneself to review the past week’s activities: did they produce any value?

When it comes to being productive, result matters over activity, and quality matters over quantity.

3. Work-Life Balance

For many years, “work-life balance” has been touted as a show of success, especially for working women.

What exactly is work-life balance? Spliting your time 50/50? Having a satisfied boss and a happy family?

Is that even possible?

The most popular “proof” of achieving work-life balance is to simultaneously have a career and a family—for a woman, it usually means being a working mother. On the surface, this seems to be a simple balancing act while in reality, it is much more complicated than the image of a glamorous woman in business suit with a giddy child in tow (and later that child attends an Ivy school). Behind every successful “model”, there are many stories of struggles, heartaches, and even unspeakable miseries. For the majority of the everyday working class, work-life balance is an elusive goal.

I gave myself a passing grade on my work-life balancing act during my corporate years.

When my son was in college, one day I was touting how I had always been there for him during his years of growing up—I attended events big or small, inside and outside of the school despite always having a full-time job and juggling a travel schedule. In a matter-of-fact but calm tone, he offered me his perspective: You were there but not present. I could hear the pain, and it made me quiet. Underneath the surface of “being there”, I was more often absent-minded than engaging. I was seldom enjoying and living in the moment but instead was checking and responding to emails and messages on my phone which was always on; I spent countless weekends and nights traveling for work; I always said yes to work requests and never had a clear boundary between work and my life outside of work.

If I were to dive back into the working world, I’d like to replace the word “balance” with “boundary”.

As an employee, define your boundaries—work hard when it’s during work hours and then leave work behind when it’s time for yourself and family and friends. Turn off mobile devices for work when you are off work. Never be afraid to make it clear with your boss and the people you work with about your boundaries.

As a manager, you should be glad to know that an employee who is capable of defining his or her boundary between work and life and not afraid to make it known to you is an intelligent, happy, healthy, and result-producing employee. A productive employee.

A serene afternoon, Washougal River Greenway Trail, May 2024

Reflecting on these three words has made me realize the profound impact language can have on shaping our perspectives and beliefs, often without us even realizing it. For those who are navigating personal and professional lives, it's crucial to be mindful of the words we use and the hidden messages they may carry. We can cultivate a positive and empowering culture by being conscious of our language, both within ourselves and in the environments we inhabit. I invite you, my dear reader, to reflect on the words that have shaped your own experiences and changed along your growth journey, and consider which ones you might want to eradicate or redefine for a more fulfilling and authentic life.

Do you have words that you’d like to purge from your vocabulary?

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