Gen Z slang has fully infiltrated corporate Slack. The standup is now half MLE, half MBA, and the average 50-something director can't tell whether "the dashboard is mid" is praise or criticism (it's criticism). This is a translation key — what each word means in office context, with an example sentence you might actually hear in a meeting.
For deeper background on where most of these came from, see AAVE and internet slang.
The translation table
| Slang | What it means | In a meeting |
|---|---|---|
| rizz | Charisma. Specifically, charm that lands. | "Their pitch had no rizz — we passed." |
| mid | Mediocre, with disdain. Stronger than 'okay'. | "The new dashboard is mid." |
| no cap | No lie. Genuinely. | "That deck slapped, no cap." |
| slay | Crushed it. Did something impressive. | "You slayed that all-hands." |
| bet | Agreed / okay / for sure. | "Bet, see you in standup." |
| bussin' | Excellent — usually about food. | "This catering is bussin'." |
| deadass | Genuinely / for real. | "Deadass, the customer asked for that feature." |
| lowkey | Slightly / kind of / under the radar. | "I'm lowkey worried about Q3." |
| sus | Suspicious / dodgy. | "That vendor's pricing is sus." |
| gatekeep | Withhold information to maintain status. | "Don't gatekeep the auth bug fix." |
| situationship | Undefined romantic involvement. Sometimes used metaphorically about projects. | "This roadmap is in a situationship with reality." |
| delulu | Delusional, often self-deprecating. | "I was delulu thinking we'd ship Friday." |
| demure | Modest / controlled / professional. Often ironic. | "Very mindful, very demure." |
| main character | Acting like the protagonist of every scene. | "Stop main-charactering the retro." |
| NPC | Non-player character; someone going through the motions. | "Don't NPC the postmortem — actually engage." |
| Ohio | Cursed / off-putting / surreal. | "This Jira ticket is so Ohio." |
| aura | Vibes / energy / charisma score. | "That demo had positive aura." |
| ick | Sudden, irreversible loss of attraction (to a person or product). | "The new logo gave me the ick." |
| L / W | Loss / Win, used as one-character reactions. | "Shipping today: W. Pre-launch QA: L." |
| ratio'd | Outweighed in replies/quotes by negative feedback. | "His tweet got ratio'd by our community." |
| vibe coding | Building software intuitively, often with AI assistance. | "Spent the weekend vibe coding a side project." |
| ai slop | Low-effort AI-generated content. | "That landing page is pure ai slop." |
| canon event | An unavoidable formative experience. From Spider-Verse. | "Getting yelled at by your first PM is a canon event." |
| girlboss | Once a compliment, now mostly ironic. Aspirational woman in business. | "Stop trying to girlboss your way through this." |
| gaslight | Make someone doubt their own perception. | "The launch metrics are not gaslighting me." |
| touch grass | Take a break / go outside. Said to chronically online people. | "You've been on Slack for nine hours — touch grass." |
| chronically online | Spending too much time online to retain perspective. | "That feedback is chronically online." |
| iykyk | If you know, you know. In-group reference. | "The 4pm Friday deploys, iykyk." |
| based | Confidently expressing an unpopular but correct opinion. | "Based take on the meeting bloat." |
| cooked | Doomed / in trouble / overworked. | "After that incident, the on-call is cooked." |
Three rules for managers
- Don't try to use them. Nothing telegraphs distance from your team like a 47-year-old VP saying "this is so demure" in a town hall. Recognize, translate, move on.
- Read tone, not just words. Most Gen Z slang is heavily ironic. "That deck ate" might be sincere praise; "that deck slayed, queen" is almost certainly mockery. Volume of stacked slang is a sarcasm indicator.
- Ask without judgment. If you don't know what something means, ask. Pretending you do is worse than asking; the team will respect a manager who'd rather understand than guess.
Why this glossary will be wrong in two years
About a third of these will be retired by 2027 (see our 2027 retirement list). Gen Alpha is already replacing some with their own vocabulary — skibidi, sigma, fanum tax. By the time those bleed into your Slack, you'll need a new translation key.
For now, this one covers most of what's currently flying around. Bookmark it; share it with your tech lead.