Guffipedia
Lucy Kellaway’s dictionary of business jargon and corporate nonsense
Oven-ready projects
Translation into plain English Almost-finished projects
Perpetrator Nigel Wilson, Legal & General (spotted by Prof BCK Patel)
Usage example “Liquidity isn’t a problem. There are not enough ‘oven ready’ infrastructure projects."
Lucy’s commentary "Oven ready" has been around for some time in business, and is always disappointing as the things being popped into the oven never get the digestive juices flowing. This example is remarkable not simply because one doesn't want to eat an infrastructure project, but because of the sheer size of oven required in which to cook a motorway/runway etc.
