Reports from the Resistance: Let’s Circle Back
Corporate jargon has its own dialect—and "let's circle back" is its anthem. This post breaks down the real meaning behind the phrases that stall change, bury decisions, and keep us endlessly syncing on things we’re never going to do.
Reports from The Resistance Journal Entry #324
There are many languages spoken in the modern workplace: Excel, Emoji, Jargon, Passive-Aggressive. But the most powerful dialect? Delay-speak.
Spoken fluently by executives, project teams, and middle managers alike, Delay-speak sounds collaborative but operates like molasses. Its sole purpose: to move the conversation just far enough into the future that no one remembers why it started.
Let’s break it down, shall we?
"Let’s circle back."
Translation: I will now use a verbal smoke bomb to disappear from this conversation and hope you forget it ever happened.
"Let’s put a pin in that."
Translation: Your point is valid and deeply inconvenient. We’re not equipped to deal with it, emotionally or politically.
"Let’s not boil the ocean."
Translation: You’re doing too much thinking. Please return to shallow waters where the budget can't reach you.
"Let’s bucket that."
Translation: We need to organize our chaos into abstract concepts so we can pretend it’s under control.
"Let’s table this for now."
Translation: We’re going to bury this in a Teams folder so deep it would take a Sherpa and a search warrant to find it.
These phrases are typically deployed during meetings that are already 17 minutes over time but nowhere near resolution. They travel in packs, supported by PowerPoint decks with titles like Next Steps and Emerging Opportunities, and are often backed up by someone saying, “This is great dialogue,” which is code for “I am terrified of this becoming a decision.”
Delay-speak is also how change initiatives die. Not with a bang, but with a backlog of action items that everyone agrees are important, but that mysteriously vanish behind more urgent fires, more visible KPIs, and that one SVP who just doesn’t believe in “soft stuff.”
And so we nod. We take notes. We create follow-ups for items we all know will be “reevaluated” next quarter, by which time the org will have reorg’d, the project will have pivoted, and the consultant will have been rotated out like a tired starter in the 7th inning.
But hey—at least we’re aligned.
On the calendar invite.
For a future sync.
To revisit the conversation.
We didn’t have.
About the thing.
We’re still not doing.
Circle back complete.
What To Do Instead
If you’re tired of swimming in circles, here are a few ways to break the cycle:
- Translate vague phrases into real actions. When someone says, “Let’s put a pin in that,” ask “Great—when should we revisit it, and who owns it?”
- Use time-bound follow-ups. “We’ll circle back in Q3” becomes “We’ll revisit this on July 15th. Adding it to the agenda now.”
- Normalize calling out ambiguity. Not rudely—but helpfully. “Can we clarify if this is a decision, a discussion, or a delay?”
- Make the invisible backlog visible. Surface all those “tabled” items in a working log, and review them monthly. Bonus points if you color-code the ghost projects.
- Reward clarity over performative consensus. Not everyone will agree—but at least they’ll know what’s happening. That’s how change actually moves.
Delay-speak is a symptom of a system allergic to clarity. Your job isn’t to shame people out of it—it’s modeling something better.
Final Thought
Every workplace has its euphemisms. But when every conversation ends with “circling back,” what you’re really doing is walking in place. If you're the one leading change, your job is to notice when momentum is being smothered by politeness, and start saying the quiet part out loud.
Decisions don’t get made in the rehash.
Progress doesn’t live in the parking lot.
Change doesn’t wait for perfect alignment.
It rewards the people willing to say, “Let’s not circle back. Let’s decide.”
Onward,
—The Resistance
ChangeGuild: Power to the Practitioner™
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No pins. No parking lots. Just progress.
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