honcho
UK /ˈhɒn.tʃəʊ/ · US /ˈhɑn.t͡ʃoʊ/ noun, verb
Forms honchos honchoes honchoing honchoed
Synonyms
Etymology
From Japanese 班(はん)長(ちょう) (hanchō, “squad leader”), from 19th c. Mandarin 班長 /班长 (bānzhǎng, “team leader”). Probably entered English during World War II: many apocryphal stories describe American soldiers hearing Japanese prisoners-of-war refer to their lieutenants as hanchō.
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 — from the Wiktionary entry “honcho”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details