British bureaucrats have been warned: no more synergies, stakeholders or sustainable communities.

The body that represents the country’s local authorities has told its members to stop using management buzzwords, saying they confuse people and prevent residents from understanding what local governments do.

The Local Government Association, whose members include hundreds of district, town and county councils in England and Wales, on Friday sent out a list of 100 “non-words” that it said officials should avoid if they want to be understood.

The list includes the popular but vague term “empowerment;” “coterminosity,” a situation in which two organizations oversee the same geographical area; and “synergies,” combinations in which the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Officials were told to ditch the term “revenue stream” for income, as well as the imprecise “sustainable communities.” The association also said councils should stop referring to local residents as “customers” or “stakeholders.”

The association’s chairman, Simon Milton, said officials should not “hide behind impenetrable jargon and phrases.”

I hate these types of buzzwords.  I refuse to use them myself.  My vote on the word that needs to be banned first?

Methodologies.  Apparently that’s the plural form of method.  Silly me thought that the plural form of method was methods.  Apparently not enough syllables to make the speaker think they’re educated.

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