I live in the midwest where we have a seasonal insect known locally as a "June Bug." These flying bugs are the size of small Buicks and have absolutely no aerial navigation skills. On warm summer evenings, these bugs can be observed in choreographed crazy straw flight patterns that usually end in spectacular crashes into windshields, window screens, or the drink on your lap. June Bugs are not pleasant visitors. Truth be known, June Bug is not their official name. The scientific name is something like "Giaganyous Wingous Cockroceous," which in English translates to "Giant Flying Cockroaches." The trouble is, many people have a hard time saying Giant Flying Cockroaches and would rather stick with the cuddly term June Bug - a necessary euphemism to say the least.

Now that the IT world is picking up, I have combed various online job sites and spent hours looking through the job description euphemisms. Here I'll translate some of them into their true meaning. Hope this helps.

Creative Benefit Package
The employee will be responsible for a greater share of medical insurance and all of dental. The corporation has eliminated sick, personal, and vacation days and created a "space bank" of days you are allowed to take off. In lieu of salary, you'll be offered company stock that currently is not worth much, and probably will not be worth much in the future.

Ethnically Diverse Environment
Most of your co-workers are foreign born and some don't speak English. As a matter of fact, most of your co-workers are in developing countries. You are expected to work around the clock and coordinate code reviews from Belfast to Bangalore.

Fast-Paced Environment
The company does not have nearly as much staff as it needs. Because of this, you will be expected to work around the clock (see Ethnically Diverse Environment). Forget about dinner with the family and weekends on the lake. Also, there is little time spent on project planning. You are expected to make hopeless decisions on the fly, that way when they don't work, the company can blame you. Remember anything is possible with an unlimited supply of expendable labor; just ask the Egyptians - they built the pyramids.

Equal Opportunity Employer
Mid-career males need not apply.

Offer Valuable Experience
This is a tough one. Organizations know that IT professionals like to stay current with new technologies, and some of us will do about anything to get a job that will give this to us. The trouble is that since companies know this, they can save a bit on salaries. After all, if asked which is more important, working with new technologies or money, what would you choose? You ungrateful money-grubber you.

Celebrate Diversity
Eventually you'll be expected to train a foreign-born replacement to do your job. The company is currently enjoying the "celebration" by replacing senior high-paid staff with cheaper workers.

Customer Focused
You'll work on the software support line. No matter what else is in the job description, expect to spend a majority of your time fixing the problems of others (see Fast-Paced Environment). There is no new development at this company. Expect to spend most of your time listening to crabby people telling you their problems.

Strong Communication Skills
Management is young and inexperienced and needs everything explained to them by a third-grade teacher. Forget high-level PowerPoint presentations. Instead of using charts, use prompts such as Barney puppets and Play-Doh. To keep everyone motivated, pump up the room with MTV on the overhead projector. Avoid Brittany though, she's so yesterday. In addition, you'll spend time on the phone with your offshore co-workers (see Ethnically Diverse Environment).

Cutting Edge
Rather than buying industry-standard tools and having to pay for those pesky vendor-support agreements, they have created their own - and nobody really understands how they work. The software may be so cutting edge that any experience using them will be worthless outside of the organization.

Strong Troubleshooting Skills
The conversion to Java did not work as planned and now nothing works. You will be expected to debug impossibly complex and half-converted systems.

Self-Starter
You are so sick of your current gig of (pick one):

• Working late
• Being unappreciated
• Flipping burgers
• Sleeping

Putting It All Together
With the euphemisms out of the way, the following job ad makes more sense.

ABC Corporation is seeking a self-starter with strong communication skills for our customer-focused cutting-edge projects. Candidate must also be an excellent troubleshooter and able to work in a fast-paced environment.

In addition to offering valuable experience, we offer an exciting, ethnically diverse working environment and celebrate diversity. Creative benefit package available. Equal Opportunity Employer.

Final Thoughts
I hope you enjoyed my tongue-in-cheek view of the improving job market. If you have a euphemism of your own, I would love to hear it.