Let us begin by stipulating that we sound suspiciously like parrots when we repeat the same words, common phrases and clichés as all those around us. Here is just a sampling of some of the tritest of those clichés and bits of industry jargon that advisers tend to parrot to their clients.

“In our view …”

Well, I’m glad we cleared that up. If you had not specified that you were recording your own thoughts, I might have thought you were channeling Edgar Casey or Emily Brontë. (Some of you get a pass on this because your writing is being filtered through compliance people who foolishly think “in our view” is a protective phrase.)

“At the end of the day …”

Television’s many talking heads started using this phrase, and then it broke out into the general public and quickly became a cliché. We used to all say “in the final analysis.” When we finally tired of using that phrase