HR COMPETENCIES TERMS

Question 1

Accounts Payable

Answer 1

Money an organization owes its vendors and suppliers.

Question 2

Accounts Receivable

Answer 2

Money an organization’s customers owe the organization.

Question 3

Active Listening

Answer 3

Communication technique to increase the engagement between communicators and their audiences. Involves two-way communication and attention to nonverbal signs.

Question 4

Affinity Diagramming

Answer 4

Data-sorting technique in which a group categorizes and subcategorizes data until relationships are clearly drawn.

Question 5

Assets

Answer 5

Financial, physical, and sometimes intangible properties an organization owns.

Question 6

Balance Sheet

Answer 6

Statement of an organization’s financial position at a specific point in time. (snapshot) Showing assets, liabilities, and shareholder equity.

Question 7

Bribery

Answer 7

Exchange of anything of value to gain greater influence or preference.

Question 8

Business Case

Answer 8

Presentation to management that establishes that a specific problem exists and argues for a proposed solution.

Question 9

Business Intelligence

Answer 9

Ability to use information to gain a deeper understanding of an organization and make sound business decisions.

Question 10

Cash Flow Statement

Answer 10

Statement of an organization’s ability to meet its
current and short-term obligations, showing
incoming and outgoing cash and cash reserves in operations, investments, and financing.

Question 11

Civil law

Answer 11

Legal system based on written codes (laws,

rules, or regulations).

Question 12

Code of conduct

Answer 12

Principles that guide decision making and

behavior in an organization.

Question 13

Common law

Answer 13

Legal system in which each case is considered
in terms of how it relates to legal decisions that
have already been made; evolves through
judicial decisions over time.

Question 14

Confidentiality

Answer 14

Treatment of personal information that has been

disclosed to another person or organization.

Question 15

Conflict of interest

Answer 15

Situation in which a person or organization may
benefit from undue influence due to involvement
in outside activities, relationships, or
investments that conflict with or have an impact
on the employment relationship or its outcomes.

Question 16

Cultural intelligence

Answer 16

Capacity to recognize, interpret, and
behaviorally adapt to multicultural situations and
contexts.

Question 17

Culture

Answer 17

Basic beliefs, attitudes, values, behaviors, and
customs shared and followed by members of a
group, which give rise to the group’s sense of
identity.

Question 18

Delphi technique

Answer 18

Technique that progressively collects
information from a group of anonymous
respondents.

Question 19

Due process

Answer 19

Concept that laws are enforced only through

accepted, codified procedures.

Question 20

Emotional intelligence (EI)

Answer 20

Ability to be sensitive to and understand one’s

own and others’ emotions and impulses.

Question 21

Enterprise resource

planning (ERP)

Answer 21

Business management software, usually a suite
of integrated applications, that a company can
use to collect, store, manage and interpret data
from many business activities.

Question 22

Equity

Answer 22

Amount of owners’ or shareholders’ portion of a

business.

Question 23

Extraterritoriality

Answer 23

Extension of the power of a country’s laws over
its citizens outside that country’s sovereign
national boundaries.

Question 24

Feedback loop

Answer 24

In communication, structuring a message to
include opportunities for correction or
clarification. This requires two-way
communication.

Question 25

Focus group

Answer 25

Small group of invited persons (typically six to
twelve) who actively participate in a structured
discussion, led by a facilitator, for the purpose
of eliciting their input.

Question 26

Force-field analysis

Answer 26

Group decision-making tool designed to analyze
the forces favoring and opposing a particular
change. A factor is weighted, and the factors on
each side are summed and compared.

Question 27

Framing

Answer 27

Process of constructing a message so that an
audience sees communicated facts in a certain
way and is persuaded to take a certain action.

Question 28

Global mindset

Answer 28

Ability to take an international perspective,

inclusive of other cultures’ views.

Question 29

Gross profit margin

Answer 29

Ratio of gross profit to net sales.

Question 30

High-context cultures (complex)

Answer 30

Societies or groups characterized by complex,
usually long-standing networks of relationships;
members share a rich history of common
experience, so the way they interact and
interpret events is often not apparent to
outsiders.

Question 31

Income statement

Answer 31

Statement that reports revenues, expenses, and
profits for a specified period of time, for
example, quarterly or annually.

Question 32

J curve

Answer 32

Visualization of the impact of change on
productivity. When change is introduced, there
is typically a decrease in productivity and then a
gradual return to—or, ideally, a surpassing of—
previous levels of productivity.

Question 33

Jurisdiction

Answer 33

Right of a legal body to exert authority over a
given geographical territory, subject matter, or
persons or institutions.

Question 34

Liabilities

Answer 34

Organization’s debts and other financial

obligations.

Question 35

Low-context cultures (not as complex)

Answer 35

Societies in which relationships have less
history; individuals know each other less well
and don’t share a common database of
experience, so communication must be very
explicit.

Question 36

Mean

Answer 36

Average score or value.

Question 37

Median

Answer 37

Middle value in a range of values.

Question 38

Mind mapping

Answer 38

Data-sorting technique in which group members
add related ideas and indicate logical
connections, eventually grouping similar ideas.

Question 39

Mode

Answer 39

Value that occurs most frequently in a set of

data.

Question 40

Motivation

Answer 40

Factors that initiate, direct, and sustain human

behavior over time.

Question 41

Multi-criteria decision

analysis (MCDA)

Answer 41

Group decision-making tool in which the group
defines the characteristics of a successful
decision and then scores each alternative
against those criteria.

Question 42

Negotiation

Answer 42

Process by which two or more parties work

together to reach agreement on a matter.

Question 43

Net profit margin

Answer 43

Ratio of net income (gross sales minus

expenses and taxes) to net sales.

Question 44

Networking

Answer 44

Process of developing mutually beneficial

contacts through the exchange of information.

Question 45

Noise

Answer 45

In communication, any factor that can disrupt
the sending and receipt of a message—for
example, physical factors such as loud
environments, cultural factors such as a
distinctive accent, or cognitive factors such as
the use of unfamiliar jargon.

Question 46

Nominal group technique

NGT

Answer 46

Technique in which participants each suggest
ideas through a series of rounds and then
discuss the items, eliminate redundancies and
irrelevancies, and agree on the importance of
the remaining items.

Question 47

Nonverbals

Answer 47

Components of a message apart from its words.
This could include physical gestures and
posture and vocal tones, volume, and speed.

Question 48

Online analytical

processing (OLAP)

Answer 48

Processing applications that store data in a
multidimensional “cube,” which enables users to
analyze data quickly in a variety of different
ways.

Question 49

Principled negotiation

Answer 49

Process in which negotiators aim for mutual
gain, emphasizing the need to focus on the
problem instead of personal differences and on
mutually beneficial outcomes.

Question 50

Ratio analysis

Answer 50

Comparing the sizes of two variables to produce
an index or percentage; commonly used to
analyze financial statements.

Question 51

Reliability

Answer 51

Extent to which a measurement instrument

provides consistent results.

Question 52

Root-cause analysis

Answer 52

Type of analysis that starts with a result and
then works backward to identify fundamental
cause.

Question 53

Rule of law

Answer 53

Concept that stipulates that no individual is
beyond the reach of the law and that authority is
exercised only in accordance with written and
publicly disclosed laws.

Question 54

Scenario/what-if analysis

Answer 54

Statistical method used to test the possible
effects of altering the details of a strategy to see
if the likely outcome can be improved.

Question 55

Social intelligence

Answer 55

Ability to create connections or rapport with

others.

Question 56

Stakeholder concept

Answer 56

Concept that proposes that any organization
operates within a complex environment in which
it affects and is affected by a variety of forces or
stakeholders who all share in the value of the
organization and its activities.

Question 57

Standard deviation

Answer 57

Distance of any data point from the center of a
distribution when data is distributed in a
“normal” or expected pattern.

Question 58

Transparency

Answer 58

Extent to which an organization’s agreements,
dealings, information, practices, and
transactions are open to disclosure and review
by relevant persons.

Question 59

Trend analysis

Answer 59

Statistical method that examines data from
different points in time to determine if a variance
is an isolated event or if it is part of a longer
trend.

Question 60

Unweighted mean

Answer 60

Raw average of data that gives equal weight to

all values, with no regard for other factors.

Question 61

Validity

Answer 61

Extent to which a measurement instrument

measures what it is intended to measure.

Question 62

Value

Answer 62

The benefit created when an organization
meets its strategic goals; measure of
usefulness, worth, or importance.

Question 63

Value chain

Answer 63

The process by which an organization creates

the product or service it offers to the customer.

Question 64

Variance analysis

Answer 64

Statistical method for identifying the degree of
difference between planned and actual
performance or outcomes.

Question 65

Weighted mean

Answer 65

Average of data that adds factors to reflect the

importance of different values.