Supriya Ghosh (Editor)

Glossary of business and management terms

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The following special terms are used in commercial business and the management of large organisations such as corporations.

Contents

Abbreviations

  • 24x7
  • BPO - Business process outsourcing
  • CAO - Chief Accounting Officer
  • CEO - Chief Executive Officer
  • CFO - Chief Financial Officer
  • CIO - Chief Information Officer, Chief Investment Officer and Chief Innovation Officer
  • CISO - Chief Information Security Officer
  • CMO - Chief Marketing Officer
  • COB - Close of business
  • COO - Chief Operating Officer
  • CPO - Chief People Officer also Chief Procurement Officer
  • CSA - Customer Service Advisor
  • CTO - Chief Technical Officer
  • CLO - Chief Legal Officer
  • CSW - Completed Staff Work
  • CxO - Any of the above chief officers, x being a placeholder. Chief [Placeholder] Officer.
  • EBITDA - Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization
  • EOB - End of business (day), i.e., by 5:00/6:00p in the U.S. (same as Close of Business)
  • EOD - End of day
  • FTE - full-time equivalent
  • FY - fiscal year
  • HIBBIS - Heads in Beds, Butts in Seats (Used in the hotel industry)
  • HR - human resources
  • KPI - Key performance indicators
  • NDA - Non-disclosure agreement
  • PCP - Previous corresponding period (Used when comparing sales over corresponding periods)
  • RFI - Request for Information (about goods/services to be supplied)
  • RFP - Request for Proposal
  • RFQ - Request for Quote
  • RFX - Request for information, proposal, or quotation, x being a placeholder
  • POS - point of sale
  • R&D - Research and Development
  • RIF - Reduction in Force
  • ROI - return on investment
  • SBU - Strategic Business Unit
  • SME - Subject Matter Expert / also Small to Medium Enterprise
  • TCO - total cost of ownership
  • USP - Unique Selling Proposition/Point
  • VP - Vice president
  • WC - Week Commencing
  • WE - Week Ending
  • YoY - Year over Year (current vs prior)
  • YTD - Year to date

    • Nouns

  • 50,000 foot view: Highest management overview
  • 30,000 foot view: Program management view
  • Benchmarking/Benchmark: Measuring against
  • Best practice: Tried and tested methology/process
  • Bottleneck: Where a process is held up
  • Blue sky thinking: Idealistic or visionary ideas - not always with practical application (source: BBC)
  • Cascade: Array of possible actions to take in response to a problem: protocol
  • Check in the box - complete the task
  • Cutting edge practices - "up to date", new methods
  • Dashboard -
  • Deliverable/s - end product
  • Downsize - reduce the number of employees through a layoff
  • End-user perspective: What a customer thinks of a product or service or how they feel having to or after using a product service. What is thought about one of your items or services sold by a third party
  • Flavor of the month - the current popular activity/person as directed by the company/client/management.
  • Golden handshake
  • Golden parachute
  • Hub: an idea which other ideas are linked to
  • Joined-up thinking: Discussing the viewpoints of each organization and coming to an agreement or compromise
  • Low-hanging fruit: Tasks that have the greatest positive effect for the least effort, used when promoting new projects to show the advantages.
  • Nesting
  • One belly button to push: Reduced number of suppliers
  • Operational excellence
  • Raft of measures: A collection of proposals or schemes
  • Talent - employees
  • Tent pole: the task or item most likely to delay a project or consume the most resources
  • Six Sigma -
  • Silo (Vertical and Horizontal) -
  • Silver bullet: One solution for everything
  • Stakeholders: every group or individual affected by the outcome of a decision
  • Under-pinning: The foundations of an idea, which helps another related scheme or proposal
  • Unique selling proposition (USP)
  • Womb to tomb: An idea or program that is killed before it has a chance to grow or flourish
  • Win-win solution: Providing a product or service which makes everyone happy

    • Verbs

  • Baked In: Same as "included," in principle. Something which has been "baked in" is implied to be impossible to remove.
  • Boil the Ocean: An effort or task which is perceived by the speaker to be impossible or impractical.
  • Build Capacity: Take actions which produce no useful output immediately, but increase the amount of useful work which can be done in the future.
  • Circle the wagons
  • Cover all directions of the compass: Try to make things acceptable for all stakeholders
  • Create the storyboard: Outline what the solution will look like
  • Deep dive: Get into the detail
  • Eating one's own dog food: Use the same product that is sold to your customers, especially if it's a bad product
  • Drink the Kool Aid - (from the Jonestown Massacre)
  • Have the vendor in our pocket: Keep a vendor / contractors paid
  • Land and expand: To sell a small solution and then grow it within the client's environment
  • Moving forward: Making progress on an idea or scheme
  • Pick the low-hanging fruit: Go for the easiest option
  • Power to the elbow: Get additional backup information to make your case stronger
  • Pushing the envelope: Going outside normal boundaries to achieve a target or goal (such as exceeding specifications)
  • Sing from the same hymn sheet: Show a united front or everyone understanding and saying the same thing to customers or service users
  • Touch base: To meet up with a colleague to discuss progress (from baseball)

    • Adjectives

  • Cross-Functional - resume jargon, music to management's ears
  • Customer-centric -
  • In the loop - knowing what's going on and being kept informed
  • Off the shelf - buying in a product or service already completed

    • Adverbs

  • In the weeds - view by staff who actually do the work

    • References

    Glossary of business and management terms Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA


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