GLOSSARY OF MANAGEMENT AND BUSINESS TERMS
Accident: An undesired event that results in physical harm to a person or damage to property.
Accounts Payable: Money an organization owes its vendors and suppliers.
Accounts Receivable: Money an organization's customers owe the organization.
Action Plans: Detailed steps a unit, department, or team will take to achieve short-term objectives.
Active Listening: The communication technique that requires the listener to fully concentrate, understand, and respond to the speaker to ensure that messages are being related completely and properly.
Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA): An act that prohibits discrimination in employment for persons age forty and over except where age is a bona fide occupational qualification.
Alternative Staffing: The use of alternative recruiting sources and workers who are not regular employees; also known as Flexible Staffing.
Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA): The act that prohibits discrimination against a qualified individual with a disability because of the disability of such individual.
Assets: Financial, physical, and sometimes intangible properties an organization owns.
Balance Sheet: The statement of a firm's financial position at a particular time.
Balanced Scorecard: A measurement approach that provides an overall picture of an organization's performance as measured against goals in finance, customers, internal business processes, and learning and growth.
Base Pay: The basic compensation an employee receives, usually as a wage or salary.
Behavioral Interview: A type of interview that focuses on how an applicant previously handled real work situations.
Bias: The result that occurs when an individual's values, beliefs, prejudices, or preconceived notions distort their decisions and actions.
Break-Even Analysis: Analysis that shows a point where total revenue associated with a program is equal to the total cost of the program.
Business Continuity Planning: A management process that identifies potential threats and impacts to an organization, and provides a framework for ensuring that it is able to withstand disruption, interruption, or loss of normal business functions/operation.
Capacity: The ability of an organization's operations department to yield output.
Career Development: The process by which an individual progresses through a series of stages in their careers, each of which is characterized by relatively unique issues, themes, and tasks.
Career Planning: Actions and activities that individuals perform in order to give direction to their work life.
Cause-and-Effect Diagram: A diagram that maps out a list of factors that are thought to affect a problem or a desired outcome.
Centralization: The degree to which decision-making authority is restricted to higher levels of management in an organization.
Civil Rights Act of 1991: The act that expands the possible damage awards available to victims of intentional discrimination to include compensatory and punitive damages; gives plaintiffs in cases of alleged intentional discrimination the right to a jury trial.
Closed Questions: Questions that can usually be answered with yes or no.
Coaching: On-going meetings between supervisors and employees to discuss the employee's career goals.
Code of Ethics: Principles of conduct within an organization that guide decision-making and behavior.
Collective Bargaining: The process by which management and union representatives negotiate the employment conditions for a particular bargaining unit for a designated period of time.
Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA): An agreement or contract negotiated through collective bargaining process.
Committee: A group of people who come together for the accomplishment of a specific organizational objective.
Common Law: Dictates that custom and usage have the force of law, even if not specifically found in legislatively enacted, codified, written laws.
Competencies: The set of behaviors encompassing skills, knowledge, abilities, and personal attributes that are critical to successful work accomplishment; critical success factors needed to perform a given role in an organization.
Competency Model: The set of job competencies that together make up a profile for success for a particular job.
Compressed Workweek: A work schedule that compresses a full week's work into fewer than five days.
Constructive Confrontation: An intervention strategy that focuses on behavior and performance.
Constructive Discharge: The result that occurs when employer makes working conditions so intolerable that an employee has no choice but to resign.
Consumer Price Index (CPI): The instrument that measures change over time for costs of a group of goods and services.
Control: To an operations department, an after-the-fact evaluation of a company's ability to meet its own specifications and its customers' needs.
Cost-Benefit Analysis: A ratio that allows management to determine the financial impact particular activities and programs will have on a company's profitability.
Counseling: A form of intervention in which the emphasis is on the cause of a problem rather than on job performance.
Critical Thinking: The process of making inferences and judgments about the credibility of messages and information communicated to us.
Decentralization: The degree to which decision-making authority is given to lower levels in an organization's hierarchy.
Defamation: Injuring someone's reputation by making a false and malicious statement; may be spoken (slander) or written (libel).
Developmental Activities: Activities that focus on preparing employees for future responsibilities while increasing their capacity to perform their current jobs.
Direct Compensation: Pay that is received by an employee, including base pay, differential pay, and incentive pay.
Directive Interview: A type of interview in which the interviewer poses specific questions to a candidate and keeps control.
Disability: A physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities such as bathing, dressing, and so on.
Disability Benefits: Monthly benefits paid under Social Security to workers (and eligible dependents) younger than the Social Security retirement age if they have a disability.
Disaster Recovery Plan: Guidelines and procedures to be used by an organization for the recovery of data lost due to severe forces of nature, such as earthquakes, fires, tornadoes, floods, or hurricanes.
Disparate Impact: The result that occurs when the selection rate for a protected class (protected under non-discrimination laws) is significantly less than the rate for the class with the highest selection rate; also known as adverse impact.
Disparate Treatment: The result that occurs when protected classes are intentionally treated differently from other employees or are evaluated by different standards.
Distance Learning: The process of delivering educational or instructional programs to locations away from a classroom or site.
Diversity: Differences in characteristics of people; can involve personality, work style, race, age, ethnicity, gender, religion, education, functional level at work, and so on.
Duty of Good Faith and Fair Dealing: The imposition on each party in a contract an obligation for honesty in the conduct of the transaction.
E-Learning: The delivery of formal and informal training and educational materials, processes, and programs via the use of electronic media.
Emotional Intelligence (EI): The ability of an individual to be sensitive to and understanding of the emotions of others and to manage their own emotions and impulses.
Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs): Company-sponsored programs that deliver a variety of health-related services, which are provided by licensed professionals or organizations and offer employees a high degree of confidentiality.
Employment Branding: The process of positioning an organization as an “employer of choice” in the labor market.
Employment Offer: The formal process that makes the hiring decision official; should immediately follow the final decision to hire a candidate; formally communicated through offer letter.
Employment-at-Will: The common-law principle stating that employers have the right to hire, fire, demote, and promote whomever they choose for any reason unless there is a law or contract to the contrary and that employees have the right to quit a job at any time.
Environmental Scanning: The process that surveys and interprets relevant data to identify external opportunities and threats.
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC): The federal agency responsible for enforcing non-discrimination laws and handling alleged complaints.
Equal Pay Act (EPA): The act that prohibits wage discrimination by requiring equal pay for equal work.
Equity: The amount of owners' or shareholders' portion of a business.
Essential Function: A primary job duty that a qualified individual must be able to perform, either with or without accommodation; a function may be considered essential because it is required in a job or because it is highly specialized.
Ethics: A system of moral principles and values that establish appropriate conduct.
Executive Search Firms: External recruiting method; firms seek out candidates, usually for executive, managerial, or professional positions.
Exempt Employees: Employees who are excluded from the Fair Labor Standards Act overtime pay requirements.
Extrinsic Rewards: Rewards such as pay, benefits, bonuses, promotions, achievement awards, time off, more freedom and autonomy, special assignments, and so on.
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA): The act that regulates employee overtime status, overtime pay, child labor, minimum wage, record-keeping, and other administrative concerns.
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA): The act that provides employees with up to twelve weeks of unpaid leave to care for family members or because of a serious health condition of the employee.
First-Impression Error: A type of interviewer bias in which an interviewer makes snap judgments and lets first impressions (either positive or negative) cloud the interview.
Flexible Staffing: The use of alternative recruiting sources and workers who are not regular employees; also known as Alternative Staffing.
Flextime: A work schedule that requires employees to work an established number of hours per week but allows starting and ending times to vary.
Formula Budgeting: The form of budgeting in which an average cost is applied to comparable expenses and general funding is changed by a specific amount.
Fraudulent Misrepresentation: The intentional deception relied upon and resulting in injury to another person.
Functional Structure: An organizational structure that defines departments by what services they contribute to the organization's overall mission.
Gantt Chart: A project-planning tool that graphically displays activities of a project in sequential order and plots them against time.
Generation X: The group of people born roughly between the years of 1965 and 1980.
Generation Z: The group of people born roughly between 1997 and 2014.
Goal: A clear statement, usually in one sentence, of the purpose and intent of a department, a project, or a program.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP): The estimate of the total value of goods and services produced in a country in a given year.
Gross Profit Margin: The measure of the difference between what it costs to produce a product and the selling price.
Group Interview: A type of interview in which multiple job candidates are interviewed by one or more interviewers at the same time or where multiple people in an organization interview a single job candidate.
Halo Effect: A type of interviewer bias in which interviewer allows one strong point in a candidate's favor to overshadow all other information.
Horn Effect: A type of interviewer bias in which the interviewer allows one strong point that works against candidate to overshadow all other information.
Hostile Environment Harassment: A type of harassment that occurs when sexual or other discriminatory conduct is so severe and pervasive that it interferes with an individual's performance; creates an intimidating, threatening, or humiliating work environment; or perpetuates a situation that affects the employee's psychological well-being.
Human Capital: The combined knowledge, skills, and experience of a company's employees.
Implied Contract: Exists when an agreement is implied from circumstances even though there is no express agreement between employer and employee.
In Loco Parentis (“in place of a parent”): The term used in expansion of FMLA coverage to employees who stand in place of a parent with day-to-day responsibilities to care for and financially support a child or who have a day-to-day responsibility to care for or financially support a person who stood in loco parentis for them.
Incentive Pay: A form of direct compensation in which employers pay for performance beyond normal expectations to motivate employees to perform at higher levels.
Incident: Any deviation from an acceptable standard.
Income Statement: The financial statement explaining revenues, expenses, and profits over a specified period of time, usually a year or a quarter.
Incremental Budgeting: The form of budgeting in which the prior budget is the basis for allocation of funds.
Indirect Compensation: A form of compensation commonly referred to as benefits.
Internal Equity: The result that occurs when people feel that performance or job differences result in corresponding differences in pay rates.
Intrinsic Rewards: Meaningful work, good feedback on performance, autonomy, and other factors that lead to high levels of satisfaction in the job.
Inventory: To an operations department, an organization's major asset after physical buildings and equipment.
Involuntary Termination: The type of termination that occurs when employers discharge particular employees for cause (e.g., poor performance or violations of employer policy).
Job Analysis: The systematic study of jobs to determine what activities and responsibilities they include, relative importance and relationship with other jobs, personal qualifications necessary for performance of jobs, and conditions under which work is performed.
Job Burnout: The depletion of physical/mental resources caused by excessive striving to reach an unrealistic work-related goal.
Job Description: A summary of the most important features of a job, including required tasks, knowledge, skills, abilities, responsibilities, and reporting structure.
Knowledge: One's level of learning characterized by ability to recall specific facts.
Leadership: The ability of an individual to influence a group or another individual toward the achievement of goals and results.
Learning Organization: An organization characterized by a capability to adapt to changes in environment.
Learning Styles: Ways individuals learn and process ideas.
Liabilities: An organization's debts and other financial obligations.
Lifelong Learning: The ongoing pursuit of knowledge for either personal or professional gain.
Long-Term Objectives: The specific results, accomplished in three to five years, that an organization seeks to achieve in pursuing its mission.
Management: Those individuals who direct day-to-day organizational operations.
Marketing: The process of planning, pricing, promoting, and distributing goods and services to satisfy organizational objectives.
Matrix Structure: An organizational structure that combines departmentalization by division and function to gain the benefits of both.
Mediation: The method of nonbinding dispute resolution involving a third party who helps disputing parties reach a mutually agreeable decision; also known as conciliation.
Mentoring: A developmentally oriented relationship between two individuals.
Merit Pay: A situation in which an individual's performance is the basis for either the amount or timing of pay increases; also called performance-based pay.
Millennials: The group of people born roughly between the years 1981 and 1997. Also known as Generation Y.
Mission Statement: A statement that specifies what the company does, who its customers are, and the priorities it has set in pursuing its work.
Motivation: Factors that initiate, direct, and sustain human behavior over time.
National Labor Relations Act (NLRA): The act that protects the rights of employees to organize unhampered by management; also known as Wagner Act.
National Labor Relations Board (NLRB): The agency that has authority to conduct union representation elections and investigate unfair labor practices.
Needs Assessment: A process by which an organization's needs are identified in order to help the organization accomplish its objectives; also called needs analysis.
Negligent Hiring: The hiring of an employee who the employer knew or should have known, based on a reasonable pre-hire investigation of the employee's background, posed a risk to others in the workplace.
Negligent Retention: The retention of employees who engage in misconduct both during and after working hours.
Nondirective Interview: A type of interview in which interviewer asks open questions and provides general direction but allows applicant to guide process.
Nonexempt Employees: Employees covered under FLSA regulations, including overtime pay requirements.
Occupational Illness: A medical condition or disorder, other than one resulting from an occupational injury, caused by exposure to environmental factors associated with employment.
Occupational Injury: An injury that results from a work-related accident or exposure involving a single incident in the work environment.
Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA): The act that established the first national policy for safety and health and continues to deliver standards that employers must meet to guarantee the health and safety of their employees.
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA): The agency that administers and enforces the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970.
Offer Letter: A document that formally communicates the employment offer, making the hiring decision official.
Older Workers Benefit Protection Act (OWBPA): The act that amended the Age Discrimination in Employment Act to include all employee benefits; also provided terminated employees with time to consider group termination or retirement programs and consult an attorney.
On-Boarding: The process of new employee integration into the organization; often lasts up to six months or a year.
On-the-Job Training (OJT): The training provided to employees at the work site utilizing demonstration and performance of job tasks to be accomplished.
Open-Ended Question: A question that can't be answered with a yes or no (for example, “Tell me about how you_____________.”).
Organizational Culture: Shared attitudes and perceptions in an organization.
Organizational Development (OD): The process of enhancing the effectiveness of an organization and the well-being of its members through planned interventions.
Organizational Exit: The process of managing the way people leave an organization.
Organizational Learning: Certain types of learning activities or processes that may occur at any one of several levels in an organization.
Organizational Unit: Any discrete component of an organization in which there is a level of supervision responsible and accountable for the selection, compensation, and so on, of employees within the unit.
Orientation: The initial phase of employee training that covers job responsibilities and procedures, organizational goals and strategies, and company policies.
Outplacement: A systematic process by which a laid-off or terminated employee is counseled in the techniques of career self-appraisal and in securing a new job that is appropriate to their talents and needs.
Outsourcing: A flexible staffing option in which an independent company with expertise in operating a specific function contracts with a company to assume full operational responsibility for the function.
Overtime Pay: The required pay for nonexempt workers under FLSA at one-and-a-half times the regular rate of pay for hours worked over forty hours in a workweek.
Panel Interview: A type of interview in which structured questions are spread across a group; the individual who is most competent in the relevant area usually asks the question.
Patterned Interview: A type of interview in which the interviewer asks each applicant questions that are from the same knowledge, skill, or ability area; also called a Targeted Interview.
Performance Appraisal: A process that measures the degree to which an employee accomplishes work requirements.
Performance Management: The process of maintaining or improving employee job performance through the use of performance assessment tools, coaching, and counseling as well as providing continuous feedback.
Performance Standards: Expectations of management translated into behaviors and results that employees can deliver.
Policy: A broad statement that reflects an organization's philosophy, objectives, or standards concerning a particular set of management or employee activities.
Positional Negotiation: The type of negotiation in which people lock themselves into positions and find it difficult to move away, parties lose sight of the underlying problems to be resolved, and emphasis is placed on winning the position.
Prescreening Interview: A type of interview that is useful when an organization has a high volume of applicants for a job and face-to-face interviews are needed to judge prequalification factors.
Principled Negotiation: The type of contract negotiation based on four premises: 1) separate the people from the problem, 2) focus on interests, not positions, 3) invent options for mutual gain, and 4) insist on objective criteria.
Procedure: A detailed, step-by-step description of the customary method of handling an activity.
Process-Flow Analysis: A diagram of the steps involved in a process.
Product: What an organization sells to make a profit.
Program Evaluation Review Technique (PERT) Chart: A project management tool used to schedule, organize, and coordinate tasks within a project.
Progressive Discipline: A system of increasingly severe penalties for employee discipline.
Project: A series of tasks and activities that has a stated goal and objectives, a schedule with defined start and end dates, and a budget that sets limits on the use of monetary and human resources.
Project Team: A group of people who come together for a specific project.
Proprietary Information: Sensitive information owned by a company that gives the company certain competitive advantages.
Protected Class: People who are covered under a federal or state discrimination law; groups protected by EEO designations include women, African-Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, Asian-Americans, people age forty or older, the disabled, veterans, and religious groups.
Qualitative Analysis: Analysis based on research that uses openended interviewing to explore and understand attitudes, opinions, feelings, and behavior.
Quantitative Analysis: Analysis that seeks to obtain easily quantifiable data on a limited number of measurement points.
Quid Pro Quo Harassment: A type of sexual harassment that occurs when an employee is forced to choose between giving in to a superior's sexual demands and forfeiting an economic benefit such as a pay increase, a promotion, or continued employment.
Reasonable Accommodation: Modifying the job application process, work environment, or circumstances under which job is performed to enable a qualified individual with a disability to be considered for the job and perform its essential functions.
Regulation: A rule or order issued by a government agency; often has the force of law.
Request for Proposal (RFP): A written request asking contractors to propose solutions and prices that fit a customer's requirements.
Resume: A document prepared by job candidate (or a professional hired by a candidate) to highlight a candidate's strengths and experience.
Retaliatory Discharge: A result of an employer punishing an employee for engaging in activities protected by the law (e.g., filing a discrimination charge or opposing unlawful employer practices).
Retention: The ability to keep talented employees in an organization.
Return on Investment (ROI): A calculation that compares the money earned (or lost) on an investment to the amount of money being invested.
Reverse Mentoring: The practice of pairing older workers with younger ones so they can educate each other (rather than the mentor always being the older worker).
Risk Management: The use of insurance and other strategies in an effort to prevent or minimize an organization's exposure to liability in the event a loss or injury occurs.
Safety: Freedom from hazard, risk, or injury.
Safety Committees: Committees composed of workers from different levels and departments who are involved in safety planning and programs.
Salary: A uniform amount of money paid to a worker regardless of how many hours are worked.
Sales: The business function responsible for selling an organization's product to the marketplace.
Scheduling: To an operations department, the act of detailed planning; based upon incoming orders, order history, and forecasts of future demand.
Security: Physical/procedural measures used to protect people, property, and information in the workplace.
Selection: The process of hiring the most suitable candidate for a vacant position.
Selection Interview: An interview designed to probe areas of interest to interviewer in order to determine how well a job candidate meets the needs of the organization.
Seniority: A system that shows preference to employees with the longest service.
Serious Health Condition: As defined in the FMLA, a condition that requires inpatient hospital, hospice, or residential care or continuing physician care.
Sexual Harassment: Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature.
Short-Term Disability (STD) Coverage: Coverage that replaces a portion of lost income for a specified period of time for employees who are ill or have nonwork-related injuries.
Short-Term Objectives: Milestones that must be achieved, usually within six months to one year, in order to reach long-term objectives.
Sick Leave: A specified period of time during which employees who are ill or have non-work-related injuries receive their full salary.
Span of Control: A reference to the number of individuals who report to a supervisor.
Staff Units: Work groups that assist line units by performing specialized services, such as human resources, finance, procurement, or legal.
Staffing: The function that identifies organizational human capital needs and attempts to provide an adequate supply of qualified individuals for jobs in an organization.
Standards: For an operations department, the yardstick by which the amount and quality of output are measured.
Stereotyping: The type of interviewer bias that involves forming generalized opinions about how people of a given gender, religion, or race appear, think, act, feel, or respond.
Strategic Management: Processes and activities used to formulate business objectives, practices, and policies.
Strategic Planning: The art and science of formulating, developing, implementing, and evaluating cross-functional decisions that enable an organization to achieve its objectives.
Strategic Thinking: The process in which people think about, assess, view, and create the future for themselves and others.
Strategies: The methods that provide the direction that enables an organization to achieve its long-term objectives.
Stress: A mental and physical condition that results from a real or perceived threat and the inability to remove it or cope with it.
Stress Interview: A type of interview in which interviewer assumes an aggressive posture to see how a candidate responds to stressful situations.
Structured Interview: A type of interview in which interviewer asks every applicant the same questions; also called a Repetitive Interview.
Succession Planning: The process of systematically identifying, assessing, and developing leadership talent.
Supply Chain: A global network used to deliver products and services from raw materials to end customers through an engineered flow of information, physical distribution, and cash.
SWOT Analysis: A vehicle for collecting information on an organization's current strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
Talent Management: Systems designed to develop processes for attracting, developing, retaining, and utilizing people with the required skills and aptitude to meet current and future business needs.
Targeted Interview: A type of interview in which interviewer asks each applicant questions that are from the same knowledge, skill, or ability area; also called a Patterned Interview.
Team Interview: A type of interview used in situations in which the position relies heavily on team cooperation; supervisors, subordinates, and peers are usually part of the process.
Telecommuting: Working via computing and telecommunications equipment.
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964: The act that prohibits discrimination or segregation based on race, color, national origin, religion, and gender in all terms and conditions of employment.
Total rewards: All forms of financial returns that employees receive from their employers.
Training: The process of providing knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) specific to a task or job.
Transformational Leadership: A leadership style that motivates employees by inspiring them to join in a mutually satisfying achievement.
Turnover: An annualized formula that tracks number of separations and total number of workforce employees for each month.
Union: Formal association of employees that promotes the interests of its membership through collective action.
Values: A set of principles that describes what is important to an organization, dictates employee behavior, and creates the organization's culture.
Vicarious Liability: The legal doctrine under which a party can be held liable for the wrongful actions of another party.
Virtual Organization: A short-term alliance between independent organizations in a potentially long-term relationship to design, produce, and distribute a product.
Vision Statement: A vivid, guiding image of an organization's desired future.
Wellness Programs: Preventive health programs offered by employers designed to improve the health and physical well-being of employees both on and off the job.
Workforce Planning: The process an organization uses to analyze its current base of employees and determine steps it must take to prepare for future skill and labor needs.
Work-Related Disability: A physical condition (accident or illness) that is caused, aggravated, precipitated, or accelerated by work activity or the work environment.
Workweek: Any fixed, recurring period of 168 hours (7 days x 24 hours = 168 hours).