Business Management Glossary A–Z — Business Management

Business Management Glossary — 139 Definitions

All terms defined in the guide's 29 sections, listed alphabetically.
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Porter's Five Forces: Analysis of competitive intensity: rivals, new entrants, substitutes, buyer/supplier power.
Message adaptation: Adjusting your discourse (level of detail, tone) to the audience and situation.
Alignment: Coherence between individual goals and team/company goals: the strength of OKRs.
Leading (Animer): Mobilizing, motivating and coordinating the team day-to-day: the human dimension of management.
Autonomy / maturity: Combination of a team member's competence and motivation on a given task.
Authority vs formal authority: Formal authority comes from title; real authority (leadership) is earned through trust and example.
Workplace wellbeing: Quality of life and health at work, fostering engagement and sustainable performance.
Balance sheet: Snapshot of assets at a point in time: what you own (assets) and what you owe / equity (liabilities).
Budget: Quantified forecast of resources and expenses over a period; a steering tool via variance tracking.
Business Model Canvas: Visual representation of the business model in 9 blocks, on a single page (Osterwalder).
Process mapping: Representation of the steps in a process, to spot inefficiencies, duplication and bottlenecks.
Certification: Formal recognition of specialized competence (project management, agile, coaching…).
Fixed / variable costs: Fixed: independent of volume (rent, salaries). Variable: change with activity (materials, commissions).
Cohesion: Strength of the bonds uniting the team: trust, mutual support, sense of belonging.
Managerial communication: All of the manager's exchanges (informing, explaining, listening, uniting): at the heart of the role.
Income statement: Movie of activity over a period: revenue − expenses = net income (profit or loss).
Change management: Human support through a transition (tool, organization, strategy) to ensure adoption.
Trust: Foundation of the team: built through example, fairness, reliability and listening.
Trust by default: Granting trust by default, an essential foundation for remote management.
Conflict: Opposition between people (ideas, methods, personalities, interests). Inevitable, it is managed rather than avoided.
Constructive conflict: Disagreement that, when well managed, generates better ideas and strengthens the team.
Clear instructions: Explicit objective, expected outcome, resources, constraints and deadline, so delegation succeeds.
Change curve: Emotional stages of a transition (denial, resistance, exploration, acceptance), inspired by grief.
Deciding / controlling: Deciding: choosing and setting direction. Controlling: measuring results and adjusting (not micromanaging).
Delegating style: The manager grants autonomy and responsibility. Ideal with competent, autonomous team members.
Delegation: Entrusting a task or responsibility to a team member, with the autonomy and framework to succeed.
Skills development: Helping team members grow by assigning progressively more demanding missions.
Strategic diagnosis: Analysis of the internal and external situation to inform decisions and directions.
Directive style: The manager decides, sets the framework and monitors. Useful in emergencies, crises or with beginners; risky if permanent.
Directing / Coaching: Directing: strong guidance for a beginner. Coaching: guidance + explanation/support to progress.
Power distance: Degree to which a culture accepts unequal power: affects relationship with managers and decision-making.
Diversity: Variety of profiles and cultures in a team: a source of richness when well managed.
Sustainability: Ability to perform over time while preserving human and environmental resources.
Team dynamics: All interactions and collective energy of a group, evolving over time.
Budget variance: Difference between planned budget and actuals; to be analyzed to steer and correct.
Active listening: Listening with the intent to fully understand the other person, showing it, before responding.
Empathy: Understanding the other's feelings and viewpoint: a key managerial skill.
Engagement: Involvement and energy a team member puts into work; fueled by purpose, recognition, climate.
Annual review: Formal yearly appraisal: results, skills, goals for the coming year.
Recruitment interview: Structured exchange to assess a candidate's skills, motivation and fit.
Career development interview: Interview dedicated to growth and development (skills, training, career plan).
Supporting / Delegating: Supporting: support with growing autonomy. Delegating: trust and autonomy for a mature team member.
Hybrid equity: Ensuring remote team members have the same place as those on site (information, voice, opportunities).
ESG: Environment, Social, Governance: the three pillars for assessing corporate responsibility.
Ethnocentrism: Tendency to judge other cultures by one's own standards, taken as the norm. The trap to avoid.
Hygiene factors (Herzberg): Salary, conditions, security: their absence demotivates, but their presence does not sustainably motivate.
Motivators (Herzberg): Recognition, responsibility, growth, purpose: the true drivers of sustainable engagement.
Feedback: Feedback on work or behavior, aimed at improvement. Positive (reinforcing) or corrective (redirecting).
Workforce planning (GPEC): Forward-looking management of jobs and skills: anticipating future needs and closing gaps.
Important but not urgent: The manager's key quadrant (vision, team development, anticipation), always threatened by urgency.
Lagging / leading indicator: Lagging: what was achieved. Leading: actionable drivers that explain it.
Influence: Ability to gain buy-in without relying on formal authority: the foundation of leadership.
Onboarding: Successful welcome and integration of a new hire: decisive for success and retention.
Emotional intelligence: Ability to recognize and manage one's own emotions and those of others (self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, relationships).
KPI (Key Performance Indicator): Measure linked to an objective, used to track performance and decide.
Actionable KPI: Indicator you can actually act upon, as opposed to a passive or “vanity” metric.
Leadership: Providing direction: inspiring, mobilizing around a vision, driving change.
Situational leadership: Model (Hersey-Blanchard): adapting your style to the team member's level of autonomy/maturity on a task.
The 4Ps: Product, Price, Place, Promotion: the basic levers of the marketing mix.
Management: The art of achieving objectives through and with others, by organizing, leading, deciding and controlling.
Remote / hybrid management: Managing teams partly or fully remote: through trust and results, not presence.
Cross-cultural management: Managing people from different cultures by considering their codes and adapting your approach.
Results-based management: Steering by deliverables and achieved objectives, rather than time present or visible activity.
Responsible management: Integrating ethics, fairness and sustainability into decisions and managerial posture.
Manager: Person responsible for a team and its results; their role is to get things done through others and help them succeed.
Margin: What remains from sales after deducting certain costs (gross margin, commercial margin…).
Contribution margin: What remains from sales after variable costs, to cover fixed costs and generate profit.
Eisenhower Matrix: Urgent/important grid in 4 quadrants to prioritize: Do, Schedule, Delegate, Eliminate.
MBA: Master of Business Administration: generalist management degree (strategic vision, network, perspective).
Mediation: Intervention by a third party (often the manager) to help parties find a solution themselves.
Mentoring / coaching: Mentoring: support by an experienced peer. Coaching: structured support toward one's own solutions.
DESC method: Describe facts → Express feelings → Specify request → Consequences (positive expected outcomes).
Micro-management: Excessive control of every detail: it cancels the benefits of delegation and demotivates.
Mission (purpose): Why the company exists, beyond profit: the fundamental meaning of its activity.
Manager's mission: Why the manager is there: achieving results through the team, assuming all these roles.
Hofstede's model: Framework describing cultural dimensions (power distance, individualism/collectivism, uncertainty avoidance…).
Kotter's model: 8 steps to lead change: urgency, coalition, vision, communication, obstacles, quick wins, anchoring.
Tuckman's model: Team development stages: forming, storming, norming, performing.
Business model: How a company creates, delivers and captures value — i.e., how it makes money.
Motivation: What drives engagement and best effort: energy born from purpose, recognition, autonomy.
Shared objective: Objective understood and owned by the team (not merely imposed), a condition for mobilization.
SMART objective: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-bound objective: concrete and manageable.
Objective vs key result: The objective says WHERE we are going (qualitative, ambitious); key results measure that we are getting there (quantitative).
OKR: Objectives and Key Results: an inspiring objective broken down into 2-4 measurable key results. Aligns the organization.
One-to-one: Regular manager–team member meeting: follow-up, listening, feedback, development. A key ritual.
Organizing: Structuring work, allocating tasks and resources to achieve objectives efficiently.
Customer focus: Putting the customer and their satisfaction at the center of every organizational decision.
Strategic direction: Course of action derived from diagnosis: build on strengths, correct, seize, anticipate.
Customer journey: The customer's path, from discovering a need to purchase and loyalty.
Participative style: The manager involves the team in decisions. Boosts engagement; requires time and a mature team.
Stakeholders: All those affected by the company (employees, customers, society, environment), beyond shareholders alone.
Persuasive style: The manager decides but explains, argues and brings people on board. More engaging than directive while staying on course.
PESTEL: Macro-environment analysis: Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Ecological, Legal.
Development plan: Set of actions chosen to progress in managerial skills, over time.
Team meeting: Recurring meeting to align the team: priorities, progress, information, coordination.
Position vs interest: Position is what is demanded; interest is the real underlying need. Negotiating on interests opens solutions.
Reflective practice: Learning from experience by debriefing it (successes, failures): the primary source of progress.
Process: Sequence of activities transforming inputs into outputs (an order, a recruitment…).
Value proposition: What the company preciously brings to the customer, what sets it apart: the core of the model.
Protecting the team: Filtering urgencies and noise so the team can focus on essentials: a specific managerial role.
Maslow's hierarchy: Hierarchy of needs (physiological, safety, belonging, esteem, self-actualization) that drive motivation.
Open question: Question inviting elaboration (“how?”, “what do you think?”), which opens dialogue.
Corrective feedback: Corrective feedback: flagging a gap and expecting adjustment, respectfully and based on facts.
Recognition: Valuing efforts and successes: the most powerful and most underused motivation lever.
Recruitment: Process of attracting, assessing and selecting a new team member suited to the need and the team.
Paraphrasing: Restating in your own words what you understood to verify and show comprehension.
Customer relationship: All interactions with the customer, aiming at satisfaction and loyalty.
Profitability: Ratio between what is earned and what was invested: measures economic efficiency.
Resistance to change: Natural reaction to uncertainty and loss of bearings; to be understood, not tackled head-on.
Empowerment: Making a team member an actor responsible for a result, which engages and helps them grow.
Key resources / activities / partners: What is essential to deliver value: indispensable means, actions and alliances.
Net income: Difference between revenue and expenses: profit (positive) or loss (negative) over the period.
Retrospective: Collective review time: what went well/less well, to improve together.
Effective meeting: Necessary, well-framed meeting (objective, agenda, timing) leading to decisions and actions.
Psychosocial risks: Mental health risks linked to work: stress, burnout, harassment, ill-being.
Team ritual: Regular structuring appointment (team meeting, one-to-one, retrospective) that unites and aligns.
Remote rituals: Regular team meetings and one-to-ones that maintain connection and alignment despite distance.
Mintzberg's roles: Framework classifying managerial activity into 3 families: interpersonal, informational, decisional.
Decisional roles: Entrepreneur (initiating), disturbance handler (managing disruptions), resource allocator, negotiator.
Informational roles: Monitor (gathering), disseminator (sharing internally), spokesperson (communicating externally).
Interpersonal roles: Figurehead (representing), leader (animating), liaison (connecting): the relational dimension.
CSR: Corporate Social Responsibility: voluntary integration of social, environmental and ethical issues into operations.
Psychological safety: Climate where everyone can speak up, propose and make mistakes without fear: foundation of collective performance.
Segmentation: Dividing the market into homogeneous groups of customers to tailor offer and message to each.
Purpose: What connects work to a larger purpose; deep driver of engagement.
Alert threshold: Value that triggers vigilance or action when an indicator crosses it.
Break-even point: Activity level where all costs are covered: beyond it, you make money.
Revenue streams / cost structure: How the company makes money, and what value creation costs: the economic equation.
Functional structure: Organization by major functions (marketing, finance, production). Clear but sometimes siloed.
Matrix structure: Crosses functions and projects/products: dual reporting. Flexible but can create authority conflicts.
Organizational structure: How the company divides and coordinates work (functional, divisional, matrix…).
Management style: Way of exercising authority and interacting with the team. Four main styles, to be adapted to context.
Over-/under-supervision: Over-directing an autonomous person (demotivating) or delegating to someone not ready (setting them up to fail): both errors to avoid.
SWOT: Strengths/Weaknesses (internal) × Opportunities/Threats (external) matrix: synthetic, versatile diagnosis.
Dashboard: Synthetic view of key KPIs to steer at a glance and decide quickly.
Reflection time: Protected slots to step back (reflection, strategy), beyond managing urgencies.
Values: Principles guiding behaviors and decisions: the “how” of the company.
Quick win: Visible result achieved early, proving the benefits of change and sustaining buy-in.
Vision: Mobilizing image of the desired future, giving meaning and direction to action.