“She Doesn’t Know Basic Corporate Acronyms”: Oblivious Supervisor Reprimands Employee
Sometimes you hear something so insulting, so outrageous, it’s impossible not to intervene. You can’t just let that person go unpunished. Then you realize that you’re the only person around who took what was said as some kind of insult, leaving you feeling mighty stupid.
Today’s story is about a person who never did have that final realization, or at least never admitted it. A manager saw a suspicious “fu” note in an employee’s screen-share and decided to give them hell for it, without taking a moment to actually use their head.
More info: Reddit
Everyone could stand to gain something by not assuming things about other people from a single glance or misheard word
Image credits: Jack Sparrow (not the actual photo)
A woman took it to the antiwork community to share how her supervisor’s misunderstanding could have cost her job
Image credits: Flaky_Web_2439
Image credits: Paramount Television
While screensharing, the super noticed a “fu” note in a conversation about a customer and started questioning the employee
Image credits: Flaky_Web_2439
Image credits: New America (not the actual photo)
The employee couldn’t possibly guess what the problem was, as “fu” simply meant “follow up” and not anything naughty
Image credits: Flaky_Web_2439
The poster laughs about the situation now, but at the time her job was threatened by a oblivious manager
New hires usually are oblivious. I mean, training them is all part of the onboarding process, right? And most of the time, they are oblivious in the best way possible – they are nice, asking questions all the time, not assuming anything, and are a treat to be around as a rule.
They aren’t half as jaded and tired as older employees, so it’s nice to have a bit of that rub off on you.
But as every rule has exceptions to it, as do new guys. Once in a blue moon, you get a person who is rude, entitled, thinks they know everything far better than you, and on, and on, and on it goes.
In these cases you’re unsure of what to even do with this person. You can tell they won’t last long at work, but don’t know how to break it to them. It’s not your job anyway, so you try to pawn them off on someone else, hoping you won’t have to see them again soon.
You’re out of luck if you’re someone like the original poster (OP) of the story. It’s uncertain how long the manager spent with them, but from her overall lack of experience as a manager and at the company, it doesn’t seem like an overly long time.
I mean, if she’s new, I can’t blame her for raising an eyebrow at a literal “fu” in the middle of a message, but it’s her attitude that’s the problem, really. If she had taken a questioning tone, rather than assuming everything upfront, perhaps she wouldn’t have gotten heartily laughed at by her subordinate and maybe even stayed on in the company for a bit longer.
Image credits: Gobierno de Castilla-La Mancha (not the actual photo)
While being confused about corporate acronyms is nothing new, as many of them are created on the fly, rather than being ingrained in the public consciousness, a lot of people are really oblivious when it comes to even the most basic of shorthand.
Although, there is certainly another camp of people saying that it’s not the people who are at fault for not knowing all these silly acronyms, but rather their excess.
A Redditor on the Unpopular Opinion sub took a moment to vent about the extreme amount of random acronyms on the site that are not intuitive at all, gaining over 12k upvotes. In the comments, many, many people bashed their own companies for using shortenings for absolutely everything.
Someone in the comments even wrote up a humorous text filled with acronyms of all kinds and when someone asked for a translation, they got TLDR (too long; didn’t read) translated to “To Limp Dead Rats,” which is how I strive to address my business emails from now on.
It also seems that a lot of parents in the early 2000s and 2010s had a difficult time dealing with all the secret shorthand their kids were using in messages. That was how you got articles “explaining” them. I say “explaining” in quotes, as they’re doing an abysmal job of it.
This is how you get things like POS meaning “parent over shoulder”, SWAK – “sealed with a kiss” or GYPO – “get your pants off”. Now, I feel like I know teenagers quite well, having been one not THAT long ago. Believe you me – a teenager would rather spontaneously combust rather than use these. You can correct me in the comments, teens.
So, before you judge how someone else talks at work or informally, please try to make sure that the acronym you think they’re using has the same meaning you’re thinking of.
This post got over 14k upvotes on the antiwork sub and 800+ comments to boot. The commenters shared their own stories of being accused of crazy things while at work, saying that it could have been avoided only if people wouldn’t be so assumptive.
Share your own thoughts and horrible acronyms you’ve heard in the comments below!
The commenters shared stories of their own, where they were accused of total nonsense
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I'm with Many_Tank. F/U is the only way I've seen it written. Just like Air Conditioner is A/C. (The acronym "AC" is Alternate Current.)
Some programs are old and don't allow symbols so the "/" gets left out. I've worked on my ancient DOS systems run by billionaire companies
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Piece of trivia for all y'all... There's a difference between an acronym and an initialism. They're both formed by taking the initial letters of words, but an acronym is pronounced like a word. For example, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (N.A.S.A) is pronounced Na-Sah, not en-ay-es-ay. Initialisms, however, are spoken by saying each letter. Examples: F.B.I., C.I.A., A/C, TCP/IP, C.P.A., and R.N. So, if you say it like a word, it's an acronym. If you say each letter, it's an initialism.
A great example of why it's important to be clear in your communications. I would always call out anyone using a TLA that wasn't obvious to me, usually to find that somebody else in the same meeting also didn't know it. This was particularly true in an international (Swiss-based) company with many non-native Eglish speakers. UK and US colleagues making no concessions to others used to really get on my tits.
I had a boss who mentioned S.M.B. when talking about corporate marketing. I stopped her and said "In my world, S.M.B. means Server Message Blocks, which makes ZERO sense in this context." She laughed and informed me it meant Small and Medium-sized Business, which made MUCH more sense!
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I think she overreacted but at the same time, I think acronyms obfuscate communication. It creates an in-group (who know the code) and everyone else has to ask. I don’t use them at work because I need everyone (new and old) to understand what I write. Laughing at someone for not knowing something they haven’t been told is shîtty.
Think of it more as shorthand. Believe me if you have to write and read hundreds of these a day the shortened words are a godsend.
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Not getting acronyms doesn't make a person stupid. Tossing acronyms out right and left and expecting everyone to understand them does.
Getting into a new job and not asking before you make assumptions about a shorthand is very dumb though. Every company has their own shorthands and sometimes they seem strange to outsiders. That's not even completely coincidentally. Company specific shorthands make industrial spionage much harder. That's why they're so common and no one really fights them.
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I've never seen or heard of "fu" being "follow up". I'm 53, and worked in hospitals, the US Navy, higher education, and corporate environments since I was 16. However, I used logic and context clues to figure it out, while reading it, and wasn't sure how someone would think the fu was "f**k you".
I feel like I have seen it before but my brain isn't locking in on where. Military, transcribing medical records, years in IT doing call notes, few other things. Probably the IT part since it involved the most follow up. I've been retired for some years so stuff like that is fading. But as you pointed out, context matters a lot. With only 26 letters in our alphabet I've seen a few examples over the years that were legit but could look weird out of context. EDIT: Thinking more - could also have been the medical records. They had a lot of "thing", "treatment of thing", "follow up in x weeks to check on thing" type of entries.
Load More Replies... I will always remember my coworker who tried to school me about being 'sexist' when she overheard me talking to a customer about male and female cable ends / sockets. She did at least drop it after I pointed out it was industry standard and easy to google many examples.
Ugh, really! Talk about just stomping through life looking for things to be pissy about! I get beyond annoyed when I say for instance, "I need the male end of this particular cord" and the person looks at me like I have bats coming out of my ears. First, why are you attempting to help me with a cord/wire sitch if you don't even know common, industry and beyond terms..... Cuz that's giving red flags not to listen to anything you may have to offer..... And get the hell outta my way, I got cords to find, 😂
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Good job she doesn't work in our clinic. We use an acronym for Checked Urine, Needs Treatment. Orthodontists use it to, but for them it means Change Upper Ni-Ti (which is a type of wire apparently)
Wire components being nickel (Ni) and Titanium (Ti)?
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The auto shop where I work abbreviates assembly to "assy". It took me a bit to figure that out.
Once she asked and received a reasonable explanation, that should have been the end of it. That she didn't believe her coworker was a huge mistake. After all, it's not the same as SNAFU or FUBAR!
This is why using an acronym shouldn’t be used, especially in a medical situation as misunderstandings could literally cost a life. Just because it makes sense to you doesn’t mean it does to others. Stop being lazy and write the whole word when communicating with others. For your own notes, do what you want.
In some companies it does, in Germany it's the official abbreviation for Braunschweig because it's their town mark on license plates.
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To be fair, FU can be interpreted as fornicate you. To avoid such ambiguousness, just type those abbreviations out ... No reason to claim your five microseconds of fame on BP
Yeah. I’ve also seen someone use flup instead, to avoid the whole “fu”usage. I’ve worked in corporate settings for years and it still took me a min to realize “fu” was the same as “f/u”. Though, I also didn’t assume it was someone sneaking profanity in.
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Overall, don't use acronyms in business settings. That is how you alienate new hires and make them feel stupid, when OP is the idiot here. An acronym can convey so many things, so it is preferred to write the acronyms in full words. For those defending OP, you clearly haven't worked in offices where efficient and clear communication is key, and acronyms do not help at all. Don't be lazy, write the words in full.
Medical acronyms are crazy, but none are fun except the one mentioned above!
Lol I used to write it as "f/u" and I had a boss question it too. Lol had to change it to "fo/up"
Sounds like she is totally FUBAR. Now go look that up!😂😂
Acronyms are dotted (or forward slash/) Non dotted are expressions. So I guess you did a FU: F**k(ed) Up.
I mean i do use PoP/POO for proof of purchase and proof of ownership. Huh. I like the POO. But in th company where i werk we all use these
I willingly admit that I'm an SOB when I'm a patient. I would feel the need to up my game if they didn't write it down
Yeah, I dunno I disagree, it's written F/U by any corporate employees I know, so just because you got lazier, than the already lazy, everyone should of just known that?? Nah. Having said that, I'll take "Things that never happened" for $200 Alex.
Sounds like another made up story. Anyone with an ounce of sense would clearly not write it that way. Might as well write the acronym for Client Understood Notice Terms...
not sure which company you work for but corporate follows professional English. acronyms are used for the team names or some difficult long names / processes. thank god your manager left the college group.
Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause if it leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put on K.P.
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corporations have *nothing* on the government! we always joked that we knew when they were serious because they made an acronym! and have you ever noticed how awkwardly many bills of legislation are named? take the first letter of each word - it's always an easy-to-say acronym.
uhhh, yes, FU or F/U can be medical code for follow-up. I typically use FV in my appointment notes for followup visit. Often notes look something like "6mo FV, OB per CR in EIB" because alllll the acronyms and it does help shortening down "6-month follow-up visit, overbook per Dr. C... R... in Epic In-Basket."
For your notes that’s perfectly fine but if you’re sharing them with a colleague then you are asking for misunderstanding even though they are common in your field.
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My drink at Tim Hortons is French Vanilla which more often than not looks like FU instead of FV written on the top.
Staff hasn't had their coffee yet. Please forgive
Load More Replies... I'm with Many_Tank. F/U is the only way I've seen it written. Just like Air Conditioner is A/C. (The acronym "AC" is Alternate Current.)
Some programs are old and don't allow symbols so the "/" gets left out. I've worked on my ancient DOS systems run by billionaire companies
Load More Replies... Piece of trivia for all y'all... There's a difference between an acronym and an initialism. They're both formed by taking the initial letters of words, but an acronym is pronounced like a word. For example, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (N.A.S.A) is pronounced Na-Sah, not en-ay-es-ay. Initialisms, however, are spoken by saying each letter. Examples: F.B.I., C.I.A., A/C, TCP/IP, C.P.A., and R.N. So, if you say it like a word, it's an acronym. If you say each letter, it's an initialism.
A great example of why it's important to be clear in your communications. I would always call out anyone using a TLA that wasn't obvious to me, usually to find that somebody else in the same meeting also didn't know it. This was particularly true in an international (Swiss-based) company with many non-native Eglish speakers. UK and US colleagues making no concessions to others used to really get on my tits.
I had a boss who mentioned S.M.B. when talking about corporate marketing. I stopped her and said "In my world, S.M.B. means Server Message Blocks, which makes ZERO sense in this context." She laughed and informed me it meant Small and Medium-sized Business, which made MUCH more sense!
Load More Replies... I think she overreacted but at the same time, I think acronyms obfuscate communication. It creates an in-group (who know the code) and everyone else has to ask. I don’t use them at work because I need everyone (new and old) to understand what I write. Laughing at someone for not knowing something they haven’t been told is shîtty.
Think of it more as shorthand. Believe me if you have to write and read hundreds of these a day the shortened words are a godsend.
Load More Replies... Not getting acronyms doesn't make a person stupid. Tossing acronyms out right and left and expecting everyone to understand them does.
Getting into a new job and not asking before you make assumptions about a shorthand is very dumb though. Every company has their own shorthands and sometimes they seem strange to outsiders. That's not even completely coincidentally. Company specific shorthands make industrial spionage much harder. That's why they're so common and no one really fights them.
Load More Replies... I've never seen or heard of "fu" being "follow up". I'm 53, and worked in hospitals, the US Navy, higher education, and corporate environments since I was 16. However, I used logic and context clues to figure it out, while reading it, and wasn't sure how someone would think the fu was "f**k you".
I feel like I have seen it before but my brain isn't locking in on where. Military, transcribing medical records, years in IT doing call notes, few other things. Probably the IT part since it involved the most follow up. I've been retired for some years so stuff like that is fading. But as you pointed out, context matters a lot. With only 26 letters in our alphabet I've seen a few examples over the years that were legit but could look weird out of context. EDIT: Thinking more - could also have been the medical records. They had a lot of "thing", "treatment of thing", "follow up in x weeks to check on thing" type of entries.
Load More Replies... I will always remember my coworker who tried to school me about being 'sexist' when she overheard me talking to a customer about male and female cable ends / sockets. She did at least drop it after I pointed out it was industry standard and easy to google many examples.
Ugh, really! Talk about just stomping through life looking for things to be pissy about! I get beyond annoyed when I say for instance, "I need the male end of this particular cord" and the person looks at me like I have bats coming out of my ears. First, why are you attempting to help me with a cord/wire sitch if you don't even know common, industry and beyond terms..... Cuz that's giving red flags not to listen to anything you may have to offer..... And get the hell outta my way, I got cords to find, 😂
Load More Replies... Good job she doesn't work in our clinic. We use an acronym for Checked Urine, Needs Treatment. Orthodontists use it to, but for them it means Change Upper Ni-Ti (which is a type of wire apparently)
Wire components being nickel (Ni) and Titanium (Ti)?
Load More Replies... The auto shop where I work abbreviates assembly to "assy". It took me a bit to figure that out.
Once she asked and received a reasonable explanation, that should have been the end of it. That she didn't believe her coworker was a huge mistake. After all, it's not the same as SNAFU or FUBAR!
This is why using an acronym shouldn’t be used, especially in a medical situation as misunderstandings could literally cost a life. Just because it makes sense to you doesn’t mean it does to others. Stop being lazy and write the whole word when communicating with others. For your own notes, do what you want.
In some companies it does, in Germany it's the official abbreviation for Braunschweig because it's their town mark on license plates.
Load More Replies... To be fair, FU can be interpreted as fornicate you. To avoid such ambiguousness, just type those abbreviations out ... No reason to claim your five microseconds of fame on BP
Yeah. I’ve also seen someone use flup instead, to avoid the whole “fu”usage. I’ve worked in corporate settings for years and it still took me a min to realize “fu” was the same as “f/u”. Though, I also didn’t assume it was someone sneaking profanity in.
Load More Replies... Overall, don't use acronyms in business settings. That is how you alienate new hires and make them feel stupid, when OP is the idiot here. An acronym can convey so many things, so it is preferred to write the acronyms in full words. For those defending OP, you clearly haven't worked in offices where efficient and clear communication is key, and acronyms do not help at all. Don't be lazy, write the words in full.
Medical acronyms are crazy, but none are fun except the one mentioned above!
Lol I used to write it as "f/u" and I had a boss question it too. Lol had to change it to "fo/up"
Sounds like she is totally FUBAR. Now go look that up!😂😂
Acronyms are dotted (or forward slash/) Non dotted are expressions. So I guess you did a FU: F**k(ed) Up.
I mean i do use PoP/POO for proof of purchase and proof of ownership. Huh. I like the POO. But in th company where i werk we all use these
I willingly admit that I'm an SOB when I'm a patient. I would feel the need to up my game if they didn't write it down
Yeah, I dunno I disagree, it's written F/U by any corporate employees I know, so just because you got lazier, than the already lazy, everyone should of just known that?? Nah. Having said that, I'll take "Things that never happened" for $200 Alex.
Sounds like another made up story. Anyone with an ounce of sense would clearly not write it that way. Might as well write the acronym for Client Understood Notice Terms...
not sure which company you work for but corporate follows professional English. acronyms are used for the team names or some difficult long names / processes. thank god your manager left the college group.
Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause if it leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put on K.P.
Load More Replies... corporations have *nothing* on the government! we always joked that we knew when they were serious because they made an acronym! and have you ever noticed how awkwardly many bills of legislation are named? take the first letter of each word - it's always an easy-to-say acronym.
uhhh, yes, FU or F/U can be medical code for follow-up. I typically use FV in my appointment notes for followup visit. Often notes look something like "6mo FV, OB per CR in EIB" because alllll the acronyms and it does help shortening down "6-month follow-up visit, overbook per Dr. C... R... in Epic In-Basket."
For your notes that’s perfectly fine but if you’re sharing them with a colleague then you are asking for misunderstanding even though they are common in your field.
Load More Replies... My drink at Tim Hortons is French Vanilla which more often than not looks like FU instead of FV written on the top.
Staff hasn't had their coffee yet. Please forgive
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