If you’ve ever worked in an English-speaking office, you’ve probably wondered why nobody is wearing hats, moving goalposts or putting out actual fires.
Welcome to workplace English! These informal expressions are heard every day in meetings, emails and coffee-break conversations.
- Cut corners – to do something in the easiest and cheapest way, often badly
- Call it a day – to stop working on something
- Go the extra mile – to put in more effort or do more than what is expected
- Take a rain check – to postpone or reschedule a plan or invitation
- Show someone the ropes – teach someone the details of a task or a procedure
- Drop the ball – to make a mistake or fail to do something properly
- See the light – to finally understand something that you didn’t before
- To be in the dark – to not know something that other people know about
- Touch base – make brief contact
- Keep me in the loop – keep me informed
- Get the ball rolling – start the project
- Hit the ground running – start effectively from day one
- Pull your weight – do your fair share of the work
- Wear many hats – have several different roles
- On the same page – agree or share the same understanding
- Back to the drawing board – start again after failure
- Move the goalposts – change the rules unfairly
- Think outside the box – be creative
- Firefighting – dealing with constant urgent problems
- Elephant in the room – an obvious issue nobody mentions
How many have you heard? Let me know in the comments.