linchpin vs pivot

linchpin

noun
  • A pin inserted through holes at the end of an axle or shaft, so as to secure a wheel or shaft-mounted device. 

  • A central cohesive source of stability and security; a person or thing that is critical to a system or organisation. 

verb
  • To adopt as, or serve as, a central cohesive source of stability and security. 

pivot

noun
  • A thing on which something turns; specifically a metal pointed pin or short shaft in machinery, such as the end of an axle or spindle. 

  • An element of a set to be sorted that is chosen as a midpoint, so as to divide the other elements into two groups to be dealt with recursively. 

  • Any of a row of captioned elements used to navigate to subpages, rather like tabs. 

  • A quarterback. 

  • The officer or soldier who simply turns in his place while the company or line moves around him in wheeling. 

  • Something or someone having a paramount significance in a certain situation. 

  • A circle runner. 

  • A shift during a general election in a political candidate's messaging to reflect plans and values more moderate than those advocated during the primary. 

  • A player with responsibility for co-ordinating their team in a particular jam. 

  • An element of a matrix that is used as a focus for row operations, such as dividing the row by the pivot, or adding multiples of the row to other rows making all other values in the pivot column 0. 

  • A pivot table. 

  • Act of turning on one foot. 

verb
  • To shift a political candidate's messaging during a general election to reflect plans and values more moderate than those advocated during the primary. 

  • To turn on an exact spot. 

  • To change the direction of a business, usually in response to changes in the market. 

How often have the words linchpin and pivot occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )