Corporate lingo: What's up with this "el" thing?

Question

At my new job I'm having contact with corporate culture for the first time and I've noticed that when people are referring to someone in another company they say, for example, "El Chris" instead of just Chris. And on certain websites I've seen the senior management referred to as "El Management." How did this get started? Is it widespread? If you're a person who does this, what does it mean? Thanks.

Answer 1

Well, El, comes form the Spanish words meaning masculine. If it were feminine then it would be like this: Ella