Guffipedia
Lucy Kellaway’s dictionary of business jargon and corporate nonsense
Behaviours
Translation into plain English Traits
Perpetrator Frans van Houten, Philips
Usage example "We are today announcing our new Philips behaviours: Eager to Win, Take Ownership and Team Up to Excel . . . Let's adopt our new behaviours today and apply them to everything we do - and bring Philips to the next level together!"
Lucy’s commentary Everything is depressing about this. Behaviour is a mass noun and has no plural - and Philips isn't a computer game on which one advances from level to level. Take Ownership? If staff take ownership of their minds they may surely find themselves disinclined to adopt these three "behaviours" which are bland clichés that don't suggest how one should behave on any given occasion.
