Michael Kisilenko recently shared something that caught my attention because it was funny, sharp, and a little too real:

"Next promotion when:
Repeats buzzwords.
Refuses follow-ups.

The roadmap is vibes.
But it works."

I read that and immediately thought: this is the uncomfortable truth many people recognize but rarely say out loud. We all want to believe promotions are a clean scoreboard of impact, craftsmanship, and results. Yet a lot of workplace advancement is really about perception management, risk signaling, and the ability to move through ambiguity without looking uncertain.

Michael's post is a joke, but it is also a compact description of a pattern: people who sound like leadership, avoid getting pinned down, and keep plans flexible often get rewarded. Not because they are always better, but because many organizations are built to reward certain signals.

The promotion game is often about signals, not substance

Michael's two bullets, "repeats buzzwords" and "refuses follow-ups," describe signals that can be mistaken for competence:

Buzzwords can act like membership badges. They tell the room you are aligned with what leadership says it wants.
Refusing follow-ups can look like confidence. It creates the impression that details are beneath you, or that you are thinking at a higher level.

"The roadmap is vibes" is funny because it names a real anti-pattern: strategy that feels directionally right but is not testable.

This is not to say every promoted person is faking it. Plenty of leaders communicate clearly and welcome scrutiny. But in many companies, especially fast-moving ones, the incentive system quietly prefers people who reduce discomfort in the room. Vague certainty can feel better than precise uncertainty.

Why buzzwords can outperform clarity

Corporate jargon gets mocked for a reason. It is often a substitute for thinking. But it also has utility.

Buzzwords compress complexity

In large organizations, language becomes shorthand. Saying "alignment," "north star," "stakeholder buy-in," or "execution velocity" can compress a long discussion into a familiar frame. The problem is that the shorthand can replace the underlying work.

Buzzwords reduce perceived risk

Clear statements create accountability. If you say, "We will ship X by May 15," people can check. If you say, "We are driving outcomes through a phased approach," you are harder to audit. In some cultures, being harder to audit is safer.

Buzzwords can signal proximity to power

People tend to mirror the language of the most influential leaders. If you talk like the executive team, you can be perceived as executive material, even before you have executive-level scope.

The takeaway is not "learn to BS." It is: understand that language is part of the evaluation system, and if you ignore that, you are playing with a handicap.

Why refusing follow-ups can look like leadership

Michael's second point is even more pointed: "refuses follow-ups." In a healthy culture, follow-ups are how work gets done. In an unhealthy one, follow-ups are how people get trapped.

Follow-ups create commitments

A follow-up question often turns a vague idea into an owned deliverable. If your status comes from appearing visionary, follow-ups are dangerous.

Some roles are evaluated on confidence, not correctness

In certain environments, especially those with political tension, being confidently wrong can outperform being cautiously right. That sounds irrational, but it happens when:

leaders reward certainty
teams punish ambiguity
mistakes are forgiven if you are senior enough
being "decisive" is valued more than being accurate

Avoiding follow-ups protects optionality

Optionality is powerful. When you avoid specifics, you can adapt later without admitting you changed your mind. Flexibility is good, but unowned flexibility becomes "vibes".

A hard truth: if a company cannot distinguish between "strategic ambiguity" and "lack of clarity," the person who dodges details can look like the one who is in control.

"The roadmap is vibes" and why it sometimes works

Roadmaps are promises about the future. The future is uncertain. So every roadmap includes some vibes. The issue is the ratio.

When a vibes-based roadmap is useful

Early-stage exploration where hypotheses are still forming
High-uncertainty product bets where learning is the deliverable
Teams that need direction and morale more than precision

In these cases, a directional narrative can be the right tool. The roadmap is less about dates and more about coherence.

When vibes become a problem

Dependencies require coordination and timing
Teams need staffing and budget decisions
Customers or partners expect commitments

A vibes-only roadmap can still "work" politically because it makes stakeholders feel progress without requiring the hard trade-offs. It can also work socially because it gives everyone language to repeat.

If you want the promotion without the act

Michael's post is satire, but it can be used as a diagnostic: if buzzwords and dodging follow-ups are rewarded around you, you need a strategy that protects your integrity while still being legible to the promotion system.

1) Translate impact into the language your org rewards

Do the real work, then package it in terms leaders recognize:

"Reduced cycle time" instead of "made the process less annoying"
"Improved retention" instead of "users stopped leaving"
"De-risked launch" instead of "found a bunch of bugs"

This is not lying. It is making your impact searchable in your company's mental model.

2) Be specific, but choose your level of specificity

You can avoid the trap of over-committing by being precise about the type of commitment:

Commit to a decision date, not a delivery date
Commit to a metric movement, not a feature list
Commit to a learning plan, not an outcome you cannot control

3) Welcome follow-ups, but manage them

Refusing follow-ups signals power, but answering them signals competence. A middle path is to channel follow-ups into structure:

"Great question. Let me capture it and respond in writing by Friday."
"We can go deep, but first: what decision will this enable?"

You stay accountable without getting dragged into endless detail.

4) Build a paper trail of clarity

If the culture rewards vibes, clarity becomes your differentiator, but only if it is visible:

send short recaps after meetings
document decisions and owners
define what "done" means

Ironically, the person who writes things down often becomes the de facto leader.

If you are a manager: stop promoting the vibe merchants

The most useful part of Michael's post is the mirror it holds up to leadership. If the people rising fastest are the ones who repeat buzzwords and refuse follow-ups, the system is selecting for theater.

What to change

Promote people who make plans testable, not just inspiring
Reward leaders who answer follow-ups with clarity and calm
Ask for measurable outcomes, then protect teams when reality changes
In performance reviews, score "quality of decisions" and "clarity of communication," not just "executive presence"

If you want fewer vibes, you have to make it safe to be specific.

A quick note on why this went viral (and what it teaches)

Michael's post spread because it does three things great LinkedIn content often does:

It is short enough to read instantly.
It names a shared pain without over-explaining it.
It carries a clean twist: "The roadmap is vibes. But it works."

There is also a lesson here for anyone writing about work: the posts that travel tend to compress a complex truth into a line people can repeat. That does not make them shallow. It makes them portable.

If you are building your own content strategy, consider this format:

name the behavior
name the uncomfortable incentive
end with a punchline that is also a diagnosis

Closing thought

Michael Kisilenko's joke lands because many people have watched clarity lose to confidence, and precision lose to politics. The goal is not to become cynical. The goal is to see the system clearly enough to navigate it, and if you have influence, to fix the incentives so the best signal becomes the real thing: consistent impact, explained in plain language, with follow-ups welcomed.

This blog post expands on a viral LinkedIn post by Michael Kisilenko, Anyx 👀. View the original LinkedIn post →