(noun) a thing to, well, watch out for, as in “Are there any major watch-outs as we execute this plan?”; this catchall term refers to risks, obstacles, deficiencies, competitive threats, etc., but avoids referencing anything negative directly, favoring a more cutesy approach; creation of this jargon follows a common pattern in the business world in which verbs are converted into nouns1 (cf. the ask, the solve, value-add), generating a stock of trite phrases that start to comprise their own parallel mode of communication, one that is difficult to comprehend for those not immersed in the social dialect of the users
- In broader English this shifting of words between lexical categories is as old as the language itself, though it more often involves changing nouns to verbs. Business jargon seems to tilt in the opposite direction, away from direct use of action words, which may contribute to jargon’s reputation as being obfuscatory rather than helpful. ↩