Jim.. one of my degrees is in Linguistics - I taught a University course in Socio-linguistics for a time. I have found that people who habitually rely on passive voice often cmomunicate through other cues that they fear blame, failure or fear confrontation. I realize that doesn't seem to apply in the case you mentioned, but if you look at other subtle cues within the sentences, you may see that the person is attempting to deflect attention away from themselves, for whatever reason.


Passive voice has come into common business usage as a result of public acceptance of 'spin' speak. It has seeped into daily usage and become the norm. It's a sympton of the larger lack of accountibility that has become tolerable in our culture. it has its place in legalese and in literature, but has become over-employed in common usage.