Discussion Forum—A Way with Words, a fun radio show and podcast about language

When farmers grow their crops, aren't the crops their business? Why do you think that "grow my business" doesn't mean "raise"? When I hear it, it is actually used in contexts to distinguish it from other ways of making business larger, such as merger & acquisition. The use of this term signals a more "organic" approach to making your business larger by investing in and caring for it, as a farmer tends his land and crops.

To me it is a metaphor with sound implications: in an era where "personnel" has been oddly dehumanized into "human resources," it is refreshing to hear some terminology that implies business is organic, rather than mechanical, and that management implies care, rather than math.

I agree that it makes sense.   I just dislike it, and maybe that's only because I'm not used to it.

It's not the same as growing crops, though, because the implication in growing wheat is not that you make the wheat bigger; rather growing wheat is raising wheat, which is not the same thing.   And maybe that's what I don't like about it; not that it doesn't make sense (it does), but that it sounds like someone adopted the usage in ignorance, not realizing the distinction.

Or maybe I'm just a whiner.   Young people these days just have no respect for tradition, that's what's wrong with them!   They go changing things willy-nilly, with no idea what the consequences may be, and as a result they end up sounding....   Like that.

Hm.   Ok, start here:   I have to agree with "grow hair"; I'd class it with growing crops.

I wouldn't use "grow a garden" in any of your examples; if it means raising the plants that are in my garden, then it's misused, and if it means enlarging the size of my garden plot then it's the usage that you say (and I agree) makes sense but that nevertheless grates on me a little, like "growing my business".

I think we're basically agreed—it's a new use of the verb—but I dislike it and you don't; c'est tout.   Oh, well; at least Jackie feels it too.

It's interesting that I have such clear notions on each of your examples, both last time and this; I'd have expected a little less certainty on my part.   Growing sideburns, a mustache, a beard, a pair, wings and a kidney all seem perfectly fine to me, no different from growing crops.   Growing my Christian life clearly marches under the same banner (you should forgive the expression) as growing my business.   I planted, Apollos watered, but....  

It depends on what you mean by "jargon", I suppose, but I think you're on to something.   It's clear that it's only a very minor transition from growing a mustache or corn to growing your business or garden—from encouraging something to mature to causing it to become larger.   As I tried to say before (and I'm not sure I'll do any better this time), I suspect that what bothers me about it is not that it's a bad transition, but that it is done unawares, without the speaker realizing that any change was involved.   I'm pretty sure that if someone had uttered the phrase with a twist of the mouth, an elbow in the ribs, a wry look or a "so to speak" thrown in, I'd have felt very differently about it.

And for that reason, discovering that it's archaic not modern is likely to make a big difference to my attitude henceforth.   I expect it means I'm too goldurned sensitive, but perhaps from now on I'll be able to laugh off the mistake by reminding myself that it is, after all, a return to an older usage.   Thanks for that, Glenn.