I heard yesterday that the word “App” was voted as the “Word of the Year” in 2010.  Makes sense.  It’s a nice word.  Not a new word (it’s short for “application”), but it gets the job done. 

Ho Hum.

If you’re going to have a Word of the Year you’d think it should be at least new.  What’s going to win next year, “ping?” or “tablet?” Please.  And I’m thinking we could really use some new words round here.  New words are important when the world just keeps on changing. 

Here are 4.  We need these.  They are in alphabetical order (for my friends at the Oxford English Dictionary), have phonetic spellings (for my linguistic phonology friends) and have a bit about what they mean for the rest of us. 

Authorical ( aw-thor-i-cal):  This is what you want to be.  Way better for sales people and marketers than just being an expert or an “authority” yet has the cool factor of being “historical” too.  When you are so credible for so long as a person (or a business) that people lean forward pen in hand, ready to write down your every wisdom or advice; you are Authorical.   Given the wild untrusting marketplace today that’s a great way to be.

Cryoritize (cry-or-ri-tize):  “Prioritize” the word, has become weak.  Today “Prioritize” unfortunately has come to mean more about “What you should do first” rather than what you should do instead of something else.  Lists get reshuffled but rarely get shorter.  What we need is to cryoritize.   It takes courage to cryoritize; people can get upset and people might even cry as their project, their idea, or their need gets cut.  But business is tough.  And it’s tougher when you only prioritize.

ICrutch: (eye-cruch) It is a terrible affliction.  It’s when one uses the Smartphone, the blackberry or the IPad to keep those eyes low and thus avoid talking to someone and stay tuned out.   It’s when one posts a blog instead of having a needed meeting. It’s weak and it’s selfish.  It’s when someone Texts when they should have picked up the phone or looked you in the eye.  Sufferers of ICrutch here see technology as a way to collapse their scary world instead of confidently expanding it.  

Intervaluepropositionalistically ( in-ter-val-you-propp-pohs-zish-shon-nal-liss-tick-al-lee )  Ah yes, finally a word that reflects when you are speaking about a product or service’s complete set of value propositions!  You can use the word in just about any ol’ meeting using phrases like “Intervaluepropositionalistically speaking, I’d say we have a real advantage here!” or “What a game changer, intervaluepropositionalistically speaking that is!”  AND the best part is, it gives the current longest word in common use (i.e. non-medical) “interdenominationalistically” (meaning across all faiths) a beat down as our new word is 32 letters long versus a measly 28! 

Here’s to hoping these words help you in a changing world and here’s to rooting for one of these guys to win Word of the Year in 2011.  Love it when a Rookie wins.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark