One of the benefits of retirement, is the freedom to converse without the use of acronyms.
During my career with a large, multi-national corporation, I found that most of the communication included the use of acronyms. We had forms for everything imaginable and each of the forms had an assigned acronym - some examples: BP (Business Plan), BSP (Bi-Weekly Stock Purchase) etc. Believe it or not, there was even a form called an AVO (Avoid Verbal Orders)! It was part of the company's culture to ensure that all programs, forms, policies etc had an acronym assigned to it.
I remember during one of the Quarterly Staff Meetings (QSM) at Head Office (HO), a discussion concerning our Dealers (DLR) and Warehouse Distributors (WD) complaining about our use of these acronyms - and the fact that none of our customers knew what any of the acronyms meant. It was decided that we would publish a list of our company's acroynms - complete with accompanying definitions. That was several years before my retirement and to my knowledge, they are still working on compiling the list.
Back to retirement. I now have time to ponder some of the mysteries of the world including the increasing use of acronyms in society. Why have companies changed their names and company logos to acronyms? For example, RBC (Royal Bank of Canada), HBC (Hudson Bay Company), KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) etc. Will any of the younger generation ever know what these and other acronyms mean? Do any of the older generation even know what A&W stands for - an acronym from the 50's? My guess is Albert & Wong but it's only a guess!
And what about older folks trying to understand the new acronyms such as LOL, LMAO, BFF, MILF and WTF?
And BTW, does anyone knows what my cable television PVR stands for - please?
TTTYL!
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