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Hey You, Welcome! Here’s your weekly dose roasting tech spin, bluster and puffery. Laugh at the cringe, unjam your message.
This week in:
Tech Waffle Torture - Culture rebrand flop
Shallow Values - Psychological Safety - until you fail, then get out!
Savage Takedowns - Forward: Valued at $1B - then locked patients in boxes
Pop culture cringe - Rachel Zegler shows us how to shove foot-in-mouth
LinkedIn templates - Cringey take on mindfulness plus a stupid Haiku
Dear Dr Comms - The experts sort out a micro-managing dictator
WTF - does Idempotent mean? Technical impotency or software celibacy?
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Tech Waffle Torture Explained - We tell you what corporate speak really means. You’re welcome.
Original Fluff - Awesome Culture Re-brand. Nailed it.
“Our workplace culture empowers every team member to bring their authentic self to work while embracing a high-performance mindset aligned to our shared purpose.”
Translated:
Authentic self = just not too authentic.
Empowered = you’ll own 5 roles with no pay rise.
High-performance = burnout is a KPI.
Shared purpose = vague slogan in the foyer.
Culture = whatever your manager says it is.
Meaningfully Shallow Values – You get them as short and sweet ugly truths
PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY
Speak Up. Be Heard. Be Blacklisted.
“We always welcome honest feedback then add names to the spreadsheet, titled, ‘High Maintenance Truth Tellers To Avoid’”.
You’re Safe To Fail… Until It Affects Metrics
“You can fail fast, but you’d better recover faster. Or exit stage left, sobbing into your branded company water bottle.”
We Honour Failure. With a (Metaphorical) Shovel.
“We buried the project, the team, and the Slack channel. We then gave a talk at a conference about what we had learned. The audience was inspired!”
Savage Takedowns – Spectator sport or heed the lesson
AI-Powered Doctor In A Box – Caring For Patients By Locking Them Up
In November 2024, Forward, a US healthcare startup once valued at $1 billion with over $650 million in funding, abruptly shut down its AI-powered CarePods - kiosk-sized clinics promising autonomous checkups. Despite rolling out only a handful, pods frequently malfunctioned: automated blood draws failed, people got stuck in the pods, and financing crashed under massive operating costs. As Business Insider noted, it was a “tech-first approach to the notoriously complex healthcare industry - a case of AI-fueled style over substance”.
Why it still matters:
AI’s real value lies in augmenting human expertise, not replacing it with a glorified vending machine. The result? A billion-dollar lesson in forgetting that healthcare is still, inconveniently, about humans. The communication failure? Selling a vision of care with no caregivers. For the next wave of AI inventors: Tech works best when it works with us and when the story you tell doesn’t treat care like a factory line.
Pop Culture Cringe – Out of touch comms worth your time
Rachel Zegler: From Disney Princess to Internet’s Villain
Rachel Zegler, the 24-year-old star of Disney's Snow White, caught heat after calling the 1937 original ‘dated’ and ‘weird,’ dismissing the love story, and wading into political controversy. Her off-script interviews and unfiltered takes triggered public backlash, forcing Disney into damage control as the film’s buzz deflated.
In B2B tech, this is like trash-talking your legacy CRM and mocking loyal customers publicly at tech events, forums and industry publications in a passive/aggressive attempt to get them to throw away their current tech and replace it with your shiny new AI-powered one. Not smart, just reputational self-harm.
Lesson: PR and public speaking training isn’t just for celebs. If you’re in the spotlight (yeh product roadshows count) learn how to speak! Like a classy professional. Sure, authenticity matters but so does disciplined communication.
LinkedIn Popularity Templates – Syrupy, self-congratulatory. Surprisingly effective.
Template 8: The ‘Learning to Look Up’ Post
Today, I did something radical. I paused. No inbox. No calendar invites. No metrics. Just me, the sky and a gentle breeze. And, a moment lost in time and space. For someone who’s always chasing, delivering, pushing hard, this felt foreign. And yet… freeing.
Because ambition without awareness is just motion.
As I stood beneath a tree, I wrote this:
Leaf drifts to still ground
Not failure - just the next phase
Even endings breathe
Grateful for the stillness. Hungry for what’s next. Open to it all.
#Presence #LeadershipInStillness #SkyBreather #AlwaysBeBecoming #HaikuOfTheDay
Copy, Paste as you visualise your mind, body and spirit merge as one.
Got some naval gazing or philosophical musing you’d like to turn into a syrupy LinkedIn post? Reply to this email with your request and I’ll do my best.
Dear Dr Comms – When spin fails, we call in the real professionals to fix our stuff-ups
Dear Dr Comms
A new Program Director recently came onboard the implementation project I’m part of and they make Stalin look like a laid-back team player. They dictate what work I should be doing even though they’re not my line manager, check in hourly like a prison warden, interfere with my actual expertise, and bark orders that contradict each other. I’m spending more time managing them than my actual job. I need to escape this control-freak cruise before I jump overboard. Yours, Micromanaged and Mincing Words
Dear Mince-About
Ah, yes, the classic ‘manager as GPS with no satellite signal’ problem. Let’s get you some cross-disciplinary wisdom:
⛵ Sailboat Captain:
“First, read the wind. Don’t fight every gust, tack strategically. Redirect the energy. Tell them, ‘Thanks for the steer, here’s the course I’m charting based on my expertise.’ Remember, calm voice, firm rudder.”
🧵 Tailor:
“They’re throwing you one-size-fits-all instructions. Time to take the tape measure back. Show how your fit-for-purpose skills deliver a better cut. Then stitch your boundaries with neat, visible seams.”
👓Optometrist:
“Clearly, their vision is off. Help them focus. Say, ‘Here’s what success looks like in my role. Let’s align our lenses before we go blindfolding progress.’ But if they keep squinting and meddling, book them an eye test - they need a clearer prescription.
Got a problem you wouldn’t trust the Comms Dr to fix? Reply to this email, I’ll loop in real experts.
What The Fluff (WTF)?! – Decoding tech, something that linguists, philosophers, and your boss refuse to do
Idempotent | An awkward slightly icky word that means “no matter how many times you do it, you get the same result.” A wonderful exercise to repeat if you enjoy banging your head against a brick wall. |
Sharding | This is where you break a database into smaller, faster parts, much like handing out brochures to ten interns to speed-walk them to the convention centre instead of carrying the box yourself. Efficient. Chaotic. No one arrives at the same time. |
Containerisa-tion | Unlike sharding, which breaks things apart to go faster, containerisation neatly boxes them up so they can run anywhere, except where you actually need them. A tribute to our belief that putting our stuff in boxes is progress, but we’re just moving from one fluorescent-lit purgatory to a slightly newer one. |
Layer 8 Insights – Regular deep dives that explore the human error in tech.
This edition, enjoy the expose of a tech company’s attempt at RTO, titled: Case Study: Eskrid’s Great Return & Immediate Revolt (6-minute read).
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