I've been in many difference sized companies and in many different environments where we've used terms interchangably, Testing Terms, Development Terms and Process types have been overloaded in one place or another. Test types from Acceptance, Feature to Unit Tests I've seen used in multiple ways in different companies and I've stuck with a few that I probably should not have and others I've tried to change immediately when I heard them. It's tough and at times the groups have resisted, and in some places I had to give up since it was an uphill fight. What I've done is try the following:
- Terminology Dictionaries, either documents or wiki's - makes it easy to direct people as to what a term means and with a wiki you can link in sources
- Group Think - get everyone together and try to hash out definitions - doesn't work well with big groups but often gets interesting conversations going
- Dicussion Threads - if you have Discussion Forums in the company its an alternative to a wiki and gives everyone a chance to add their comments
- Talk to the originators of the term - try and understand the origination and see if its valid, or maybe change at the source
I've seen this come up in other QA Forums as well, where someone new encounters a term they don't understand and questions the wider community. Terms are subjective, and often localized as well, but I believe the strategies in how to deal with these are fairly common.