manage expectations 

corporate doublespeak for "we don't want to do our best, so let's make sure people think we're doing our best without revealing that we're not doing our best" -- anything in which you have to "manage expectations" means you could probably devote more time and effort to making things better, but you just don't feel like it

Marketing has to manage expectations of our new software package so that the boss doesn't make us do any more work.

manage expectations by Yet Another Josh Cohen January 13, 2007