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I think the list is humorous, but I would like to see the shorthand this person who wrote it uses to convey concepts.

Because that is mostly what these are used for: shorthand.

People may not like it, but when someone says “Go for the low hanging fruit”, does not every thinking person know pretty well just exactly what that means?

It means “Address the aspects of this issue that are both easy to address and provide a meaningful benefit to solve the issue at hand.” It doesn’t mean if you have a hundred things affected, and you can do quick work to take five or ten off the list (not quick work to take one or two off the list) then you do that. then you only have 95 or 90 items affected with little effort. You find a few of those, and pretty soon, instead of 100 items affected, you may have only 60. Or, if you like the 80/20 rule, you may have 20 items needing hard work to solve.

The author of the article sneers at “low hanging fruit” but every person in nearly every endeavor I have encountered understands just exactly what that means without having a big, breathy, self-absorbed sentence.

I like the humor in disparaging them, but nearly all of these when used appropriately are useful. They are code that everyone understands.

So, when someone uses “800 pound gorilla”, everyone with a brain knows exactly the context rather than “The biggest entity in the industry who sets the standards whether we like them or not”.

There is a parallel with the famous “Brevity is the soul of wit” which might be accurately phrased to say “Brevity is the soul of communication”, as long as the necessary level of detail in the communication is adequately conveyed..

If a concept can be conveyed effectively with a single word or catchphrase, why use a paragraph to convey the same thing?

Note: This exception to the criticism explicitly excludes people who can ONLY communicate with these phrases and uses them to hide their ignorance or sound engaged. Like poor Dilbert’s Pointy-Haired Boss. And that is why people identify with the disparagement of The Pointy-Haired Boss. We all know who those people are who can only communicate using phrases like that.

I would say that, a rule of thumb is that if someone uses more than one or two of these in conveying an idea, they are indeed suspect, because these “overused” catchphrases are just that without the adequate scaffolding of real information built around them.