An exploration and explanation of the idiomsyncrasies of business (glossary of more than 500 expressions included)

 ‘The Lingua Franca of the Corporate Banker’ is designed to offer a seriously light-hearted view on corporate language, how it is regularly abused, used to confuse and why I would choose to ban it.

 

 Business is riddled with it and many ridicule it, giving me the privileged opportunity to lambast and lampoon it. I do not seek to be too judgemental or school ma’am-ish in my style, it certainly is not a lesson in grammar or sentence construction.

 

 Rather, I would hope to make a case for using clear and simple language in our communications, to explore why I got sucked into using buzzwords and why others too have fallen into similar traps.

Praise for Lingua Franca

Rowan Pelling, Daily Telegraph:

Recovered idiom abuser Julia Streets guides you laughing, gasping and weeping through the maze of corporate gobbledigook. 

This timely gem is required reading for anyone who has ever wanted to run amok with an axe when they hear the words "blue sky thinking."

Worth buying for the glossary alone. Every boardroom banality known to suit-kind is painstakingly documented and vigorously ridiculed.

Julia on Radio 4 explaining all!

Joanne Hart, Investments Editor, Mail on Sunday:

Julia Streets manages both to inform and entertain with this wonderful book that guides us through the gruesome maze of corporate jargon. Not just an amusing read, The Lingua Franca of the Corporate Banker, genuinely helps to decipher some of the most horrific phrases that have crept in to the corporate lexicon. From ‘open the kimono’ to ‘my bad’, this book will have you giggling at one moment, scribbling explanations the next and, finally, breathing a sigh of relief that you are not the only person to be appalled by phrases such as ‘reaching out’ and ‘blue sky thinking’ . An addictive read.

Philip Stafford, Financial Times:

A light-hearted book but one with a good question at its heart: why do we feel the need to conform to language we often ridicule and never use out of the office? Well-researched and readable, it also taught me quite a few phrases I never knew."

Lynne Parker, Funny Women:

The Lingua Franca of the Corporate Banker is a laugh out loud romp through the absurdities of corporate jargon and its impact on the business psyche. We’re all a part of the catchphrase generation born out of short-form media looking for a way for less words to mean more.  Streets examines our obsession with language, employs her instinct for comedy to brilliant effect and encourages anybody in business to see the funny side of life.  It leads you to ask: if they don’t laugh along, should they even be in business?

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Order now:

Book UK £8.99 + Postage and Packing

Published, November 2012.

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