Meeting a consulting manager for the first time can make you wonder if they speak the language of the world we live in. With a vast sea of consulting lingo fired at you by them, a simple thing might turn into something impossible to understand. It may lead to confusion, misinterpretation and a feeling of distress. The best way to avoid confusion is to arm oneself with these 20 frequently used consulting phrases beforehand.
1. SWAG No, it isn’t related to the word swag doing rounds on social media, hashtagged with every selfie. It is in fact an acronym used for ‘Some Wild-Ass guess’ that the consultant is making about a particular situation or project without any firm analysis.
2. Drill down/ Deep Dive This is referred to doing an in-depth analysis and research regarding a project or situation. It requires considering every aspect from every angle in order to obtain a clear and correct picture of the project undertaken.
3. Boil the Ocean Boiling the ocean is an impossible task of course. So, what the phrase implies is that extra efforts are being put up into something that won’t fetch any result. It means over-analyzing any aspect that is just leading to waste of resources and time.
4. SWOT Analysis SWOT is an acronym Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threat. This analysis is done to quickly lay out all the main factors that affect the decision making process. It gives a clear picture of the present condition of a business venture.
5. Buckets Buckets simply refer to categories. That’s it. There is no reason, no explanation why its used. Maybe just because consultants just like to confuse you.
6. Bird’s eye view Bird’s eye view refers to the overall picture you get to see. The bigger picture that lets you see the overall impact of your decisions including the future results.
7. AOB It stands for Any Other Business. Its generally used to refer to any other matter that has to be discussed in a meeting. Its generally used when agenda of a meeting is being developed.
8. MECE Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive, is a grouping principle McKinsey came up with. It aims at collecting sub-sets of information that are mutually exclusive to each other but collectively provide all the required information. This prevents overlooking or overlapping of any important piece of information.
9. Blue Sky Thinking What does one see when he looks upon the sky? A limitless sea of blue with no boundaries. The phrase echoes the same sentiments. It refers to an unconventional, out-of-the-box thinking.
10. Takeaway Takeaway is generally used to specify the points that one can keep in mind after a meeting or presentation is completed. It essentially highlights the key-points or the gist of the message the consultant is trying to give.
11. Delta This is another example where the consultants just want to freak you out. Delta simply means Change.
12. Elevator pitch It’s the ability of a person to convince you about something in a short period of time, like time spent in an elevator. It’s making your point in a short and sweet manner.
13. Writing a deck Writing a deck has nothing to do with actual writing but with making a power point presentations. Any presentation containing more than 2-3 slides can be referred as a deck.
14. Bottom-up Never confuse this with the bottoms-up phrase used to drink a glass until finished. Bottom-up, in fact, is an approach used for analyzing a situation or company starting with its smallest unit. The analysis is taken up step by step to higher levels.
15. Fact pack Its a pack of the important facts that should be considered or kept in mind before planning out any strategy. It generally is obtained from the organization before the start of any project.
16. Low-hanging fruit Its used to describe any task that can be done as easily as picking a fruit from lower branches of trees. It refers to opportunities that can be easily exploited or problems that can be easily fixed.
17. Stand-up call It describes a quick and short meeting. Generally organized to share recent or important updates with the team working on a specific project or business venture.
18. On the beach It normally refers as a consultant being free at that particular time. But it doesn’t mean that they are on vacations. It means they will be sitting on their benches without doing anything for the company. Being on the beach might not be that good for your career in consulting.
19. Playing catch-up It means joining a project already in motion. This will require you catching up with the developments of the project till date and thus you will have a lot of catching up to do!
20. Close the loop As the phrase sounds, it indeed means closing a discussion or meeting by arriving at a common ground or decision. Its generally used in meetings or at the conclusion of a topic. With this, we close the loop!
