A quick heads up to the Macquarie Dictionary: if you’re interested in adding a word to the next edition you could do worse than the in-vogue verb “Adlerised”, which has been popping up in the media lately after eponym Louise Adler’s part in the MLC principal sacking affair.

In its profile of Adler this year, The Power Index wrote that “Adlerised” meant using persuasiveness to get people to agree to do things they hadn’t planned on doing (usually writing a book). Paul Howes says he was “Adlerised” when writing his election diary Confessions of a Faceless Man.

The Age has since picked up on it, implying the term means to sack someone unceremoniously. Noel Turnbull used the word in Crikey this week, writing that less-than-sympathetic people use it to describe the “distinctive Adler management style”.

But according to Crikey chairman Eric Beecher (who claims to be the inventor of the word), the recent interpretations are incorrect. He says he coined the term after being gradually worn down by the MUP boss to do her bidding.

“I would define being ‘Adlerised’ as being persuaded, not necessarily gently, to do something by a person who applies charming determination to achieve her objective,” he told us.

Crikey contacted Macquarie Dictionary to ask how the word might make it into print but received no response by deadline.