ABSTRACT
When I was in my early 20s, I earned myself a reputation for asking ‘stupid’ questions. I was working in my first proper corporate position, in an internal sales support role. I was part of a team and attended regular meetings. Sometimes the meetings were about planning ahead and making forecasts. Sometimes they were more creative, aimed at generating new ideas for solving existing problems. I was curious about and questioned everything. I wanted to check and double-check what people meant when they talked about things like ‘raising the bar’ or ‘tightening our belts’. I wanted to be clear on jargon, vague terms or buzzwords like ‘profitability’ and ‘customer-centric’. When meetings invariably overran and I was still raising my hand to query another point, my colleagues would groan.
