I’m sick of bloody buzzwords. Are you?
A short rant on how empty words are holding back health infrastructure.
I am sick of bloody buzzwords.
I am also guilty of using them - over and over, despite my best intentions.
Everywhere you look in health estate and infrastructure - in conferences, strategy documents, boardrooms - the same words keep popping up.
Integration. Resilience. Sustainability. Future-proofing. Digital. Adaptive estates. Neighbourhood health centres. Flexibility. Transformation. Optimisation. Place-based. Connectivity. Etc.
Say them enough, and they start to feel meaningful. But do they actually mean anything? And, if they do have meaning, do they mean the same thing to all of us?
I get it
I understand why we use them, and I’m not totally bashing them. They give us shorthand for solutions or systems that are messy. They create common understanding. They make things feel more manageable. They are something to get excited about and get behind. They reassure stakeholders that we have solutions.
I understand all that.
And yet, even with the best intentions behind their initial use, I can’t help but wonder - are they truly moving us forward, or just helping us pretend that we are?
My take
I’m endlessly fascinated by the power of language in health infrastructure - but that’s a story for another day. Right now, I just want to suggest this: Buzzwords feel powerful, but they’re seductive, lazy, and hollow.
And in the wrong hands, they might just be dangerous.
I am guilty too
I’ve used the words. I’ve nodded in meetings when someone started talking about ‘infrastructure integration’ or ‘future proofing the estate’ with no substance behind it. I’ve written reports stuffed with sections on ‘resilience’, ‘sustainability’, and ‘adaptive estates’. I’ve talked about ‘flexibility’ in a all-too-throw-away fashion.
And I know I’ll do it again - maybe inadvertently, or maybe because I have to.
Even as someone who actively hates buzzwords - the NHS speak, the consultant speak - I’ve done it all.
The truth?
It’s terrifying how easy it is to sound strategic whilst saying very little indeed.
Why it scares me so much
Because it’s a trap.
Buzzwords give the illusion of progress. We love them because they make complexity look manageable. They impress clients. They reassure consultants. They make everybody feel smart. They make strategies sound bold, even when actions are safe, minimal, or non-existent.
They’re seductive. They’re addictive. And that fleeting reassurance can blind us.
It hides the messy, human, difficult work that healthcare estates actually demands. It makes it look like everyone is on the same page, even when they’re not, and starts to breed complacency - clients thinking consultants have all the answers, consultants thinking clients know what they need. Everyone gets lost in a web of empty words.
Often, we’re just finding new words to attach to the same old things. Time and time again, we put infrastructure problems of enormous complexity into neat little boxes and label them to make them digestible. I get why we do it - but it feels empty.
Buzzwords obscure real opportunities across healthcare estate and undermine the true power of language to drive change.
And that makes me both angry and sad.
Labels aren’t the enemy (until they are)
At their heart, there’s nothing wrong with labels.
Like all language, they help give meaning to something bigger. And the original intention is usually logical and well-meant.
But labels and buzzwords become dangerous at the point they turn hollow. When they become warped echoes of someone else’s good idea. They seduce with simplicity, but in doing so, they limit thinking, reinforce control, and erase nuance.
Consider how this can play out in practice:
Integration - Stick the word over and over again in a strategy, suddenly it looks like connections exist.
Flexible - Talk about flexible building spaces as an ambition, but ignore horrendously inflexible contracts the same spaces are bound by.
Neighbourhood health centres - Naming, or building, a building doesn’t create the networks needed for successful neighbourhood health infrastructure - everything else in a neighbourhood does.
I’m not proposing we should stop using labels altogether. We just need to be honest about their limits, and maybe stop loving them quite so much. Surely the real work of healthcare estates happens in the messy middle? In the human, technical, and systemic realities behind the words.
A few thoughts to ponder
Are we using words because we need to, or because we think it’s what people want to hear?
How can we use language in strategy to spark real change?
Do the words point towards action, or are they replacing action with a façade?
How do we ensure health infrastructure is built on people, purpose, and stories, not jargon?
Are we using language to clarify, rather than obscure?
Beyond words
Stop chasing words. Either make language matter - or at least stop pretending it does.
More thoughts coming soon.