Boiling the Ocean


Also found in: Dictionary, Idioms.

Boiling the Ocean

In business, the act or practice of attempting a project that is impossible because it is too broad or poorly defined. For example, a grant proposal to build a youth center could be described as boiling the ocean if it does not specify what programs would be offered there. The term is used most commonly by persons trying to avoid projects of this nature.
References in periodicals archive ?
The largest impacts would have released enough energy to swathe the Earth in incandescent rock vapor, boiling the oceans and sending a sterilizing heat pulse into the crust to a depth of at least a kilometer.
New hope for life beyond earth
Financial browser ?
Full browser ?