German has Lösung, a solution — from lösen, to loosen or dissolve, the same verb used for untying a knot or solving an equation.
Deal exists in German only as an English loanword, and it carries what it was borrowed for: something quick, clever, and possibly not quite clean. Er hat einen Deal gemacht is not admiration.
German organisations appoint a Prozessverantwortlicher for each process, named in the quality system, responsible for its definition, review and improvement. The process has a person attached to it in the same way a product line does.
American standard operating procedures are frequently documented after the work has been done successfully several times, by the person who did it. The document records a practice rather than prescribing one, and everybody involved knows which came first.
Go big or go home. More bang for your buck. Supersize it. Bigger is better.
Four ordinary American phrases, all approving, all about quantity of output. There is no equivalent family of approving phrases about consuming less.
American customer service, IT support and project management define escalation as a named stage with its own criteria, timers and owners. A ticket escalates. An issue gets escalated. The verb is neutral in American usage. Escalating is a procedure being followed correctly, not a relationship breaking down.
Can I offer some feedback? Do you want advice, or do you just want to vent? Would it be helpful if I… Not my place to say. It’s none of my business. Just my two cents.
Six American formulations, and each one either requests permission before advising or apologises for advising without it.
The last is the tell. Two cents is the smallest coin offered — the speaker is pricing their own unrequested opinion at almost nothing.
Aus Prinzip — on principle. Said in German as a complete justification for a position.
Grundsätzlich — fundamentally, as a matter of principle. It opens a great many German sentences, and signals that what follows is derived rather than improvised.
Das ist so vorgesehen — that is how it is provided for. Not how it is done. How it was laid down in advance.
Freie Hand lassen — to leave a free hand.
Das ist Sache des Fachmanns — that is the specialist’s affair.
Da rede ich ihm nicht rein — I don’t talk into that.
Machen lassen — to let someone get on with it.
Four ordinary German expressions, all approving, all describing a client who has stepped back.
An American product category with its own aisle: razors, cameras, cutlery, containers, contact lenses. The word is a selling point rather than a criticism, and what is being sold is the absence of an obligation.
American companies publish them: any employee may go to any level of management with a concern, without permission from the level in between. The policy exists because the chain of command would otherwise block the route. It is a formal exception to hierarchy, announced in advance.