DP1 2022 Case Study Key Terms

Not-for-profit business

A not-for-profit business refers to a private sector organization that reuses any financial surplus to achieve its organizational goals, rather than distributing the surplus as dividends to its owners.

Ethical Issues

Ethics refers to the moral principles and values that form the basis of how business activity is conducted.

Investment

Investment refers to the capital expenditure of a business, i.e., the spending on acquiring, maintaining, and/or upgrading of fixed assets thereby broadening the firm's capital base.

Part-time employment

People in part-time employment work fewer hours per week than those with full-time jobs.

Promotion

Promotion refers to the method of communication marketing messages to customers, usually with the intention of selling a firm's products.

Prototype

Prototypes are trial or test products that are developed as part of the R&D process

Decision Tree

Quantitative decision-making tool that allows firms to calculate the probable values of different options if they are pursued

Sustainability

Sustainability is about using the planet's resources in such a way that future generations are not deprived of access to what the current and previsous generations have enjoyed.

Sustainability policies

Sustainability policies are the internal rules and guidelines about using a firm's resources in such a way that it conserves scarce resources and/or finding more efficient methods to produce goods and services.

Testing

Test marketing involves launching a product in small geographic area or small part of the target market for a new product in order to gauge the commercial viability of fully launching the good or service.

Price

The amount of money exchanged for a good or service

Variable costs

costs of production that change in proportion to the level of output

Indirect costs (overheads)

costs that don't link to production or sale of a specific product

Force field analysis

deals with the forces for and against change. Driving forces are the benefits of change (such as reduced costs or improved productivity) whilst restraining forces are the causes of resistance to change.

Internal stakeholder

directly involved in the running of the business

Resignation

This occurs when a person leaves their job. This might be due to better job opportunities with other employers, to take a career break, or due to staff grievances and dissatisfaction with the current employer.

Redundant

This occurs when workers are legally terminated from the organization because their job no longer exists, often due to financial problems faced by the employer.

Over-pricing

This pricing method is the act of setting a price over the actual value of the product, i.e., charging an excessive price for a particular product. It may be regarded as unethical in some situations and can have detrimental effects by alienating customers.

Financial support

This refers of external finance for an organization where an investor or donor gives the financial backing to the business, often in return for a share of the organization's future profits.

High profile

This refers to a person, product, brand or business having a position that attracts positive attention or encouraging publicity.

New ways of working

This refers to flexible working practices such as flexitime, part-time, teleworking, and working from home.

Equality Policies

This refers to formal rules and guidelines against the discrimination of people in the workplace, irrespective of their gender, race, religion, and martial status for example.

Aggressive marketing strategies

This refers to offensive marketing strategies intended to capture the attention of customers by actively pursuing their engagement.

Underused

This refers to spare capacity in an organization, so represents idle resources. Underused assets are signs of inefficiency and can be detrimental to a firm's cash flow.

Economically disadvantaged students

This refers to students from low-income households, irrespective of whether they are local students or overseas students who come from least developed countries.

Compensation

This refers to the act of providing a person with financial payments for the costs of damages or inconvenience incurred.

Consults

This refers to the business function of seeking the opinions, feedback, and/or advice from others in order to make more informed business decisions.

Operating cost

This refers to the day-to-day running costs of a business, such as payments for employees, rent, insurance, and utility bills.

Growth

This refers to the expansion of a business due to an increase in the size of the organization and/or growth in the industry.

Quality

This refers to the extent to which a product is for for its purpose, i.e., whether it meets the needs and wants of the customer by conforming to a certain standard.

External environment

This refers to the factors beyond the control of an organization yet have a direct impact on its operation and performance.

Trend

This refers to the general direction in which a variable, such as sales revenue, is developing or changing.

Inclusivity

This refers to the human resource practice or policy of providing equal opportunities for all employee, irrespective of gender, race, religion, physical or mental disabilities, or other demographic segmentation.

Marketing strategies

This refers to the management process of formulating an organization's marketing goals and activities to increase sales and to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.

Expenses

This refers to the money spent on, or the costs incurred in, producing a good or providing a service.

Appointment

This refers to the process of hiring suitable workers. The appointment process helps decision makers to select and hire the best person for a job vancancy.

Time Series Analysis

This technique attempts to predict sales level by identifying the underlying trend from a sequence of actual sales figures recorded at regular intervals

Brand awareness

how much people know and identify with the brand and its branding and products

External stakeholder

indirectly involved in the running of the business or are simply affected/interested in its activity

Fishbone diagram

is an organizational planning tool based on identifying and dealing with the root causes of a problem or issue facing a business.

Capital expenditure

is investment spending on fixed assets such as the purchase of land and buildings.

Flexitime

means the trend in using less core staff and more peripheral workers and subcontractors to improve the flexibility and productivity of the workforce

Loan capital

medium to long term sources of interest-bearing finance obtained from commercial lenders. Examples include mortgages, business development loans and debentures

Product

physical good or intangible service to fulfill needs and wants

Cost

refer to sum. of money incurred by a business in the production process

Revenue expenditure

refers to spending on the day-to-day running of a business, such as rent, wages and utility bills.

Revenue stream

refers to the money coming into the business from its various business activities

Price

amount customers pay for a good or service

Niche market

A narrowly selected target market segment.

Mission statement

A mission statement refers to a declaration of an organization's overall goal and its purpose. It forms the foundation for setting the aims and objectives of an organization.

Refurbish

This is the process reparining, cleaning and making good property or other assets or restore them to conditions as new.

Commercial production

This means that a product has been launched onto the market for sale after having been researched, developed, and tested beforehand.

Teleworking

a method of workforce planning whereby employees work in a location away from the workplace, such as those working from home or at a call centre.

Target market

a set of buyers sharing common needs or characteristics that the company decides to serve

Business Plan

A business plan is a written document detailing how an organization sets out to achieve its objectives and the strategies to achieve these goals.

Faculties

A faculty is a group of departments in an educational establishment, such as a university, specializing in academic disciplines or areas of knowledge.

Grants

A grant is a source of external finance often provided by the government or a charitable foundation to an individual or business entity for a specific purpose linked to social benefits of others in the community.

Cash-flow problems

A liquidity issue occurs when the amount of cash moving into a business is less than the money going out.

Market orientation

A marketing approach adopted by businesses that are outward looking by focusing on making products that they can sell, rather than selling products that they can make.

Employees

A type of internal stakeholder, employees are the people who work for a business to carry out specific tasks or roles within the organization.

University

A university is an institution that provides higher education services, awarding successful students with academic and research degrees.

Artificial intelligence

AI is an aspect of computer science focusing on the ability of smart machines to perform tasks that typically require human intelligence, such as voice commands on a smartphone.

Activists

Activists are external stakeholders that exist to influence and persuade organizations and governments to act in a socially responsible or publicly desirable way.

STEEPLE analysis

An analytical framework used to examine the opportunities and threats of the external environment (social, technological, economic, environmental, political, legal, and ethical environments) on business activity.

Unique selling point

Any aspect of or characteristic of a product that differentiates it from the competition. Firms will often want to stress this in their marketing.

Carbon footprint

Carbon footprint is a measure of the total greenhouse gas emissions caused by business activity. It can be attributed to an individual, business, event, or product.

Outflows

Cash outflows refer to the movement of cash out of an organization, such as the payment of wages and salaries, repayment of bank loans including interest charges, and/or taxes.

Change

Change refers to the modificiation or transformation in the way business is conducted as a response to internal factors or external influences. It arises when factors that influence the operations of an organization do not stay the same.

Contamination

Contamination is the presence of an undesirable component or an impurity within an environment.

Employment contracts

Employment contracts are legally binding agreements between an employer and employees which set out specific terms and conditions established for work-related matters.

Corporate social responsibility

Corporate social responsibility is the conscience of a business with consideration of the organization's actions on its various stakeholder groups and the natural environment. It also involves organizations monitoring and ensuring their compliance with the ethical standards of society.

Fixed costs

Costs that do not vary with the quantity of output produced

Dismissed

Dismissal occurs when a worker's contract of employment is terminated, i.e. they are no longer employed by the organization.

Human Resource Management

HRM is about the development of people and overall workforce planning. It includes the recruitment, selection, dismissal, training and development of employees.

Opportunity

In a SWOT analysis, opportunities refer to changes in the external business environment that create optimistic prospects for a business.

Operations

In the broadest sense, operations a business function is concerned with processing resources to provide the output of goods and/or services.

Management

Management encompasses several roles which include planning, commanding, controlling, coordination, and organizing human and capital resources to achieve organizational objectives.

Managers

Managers are the people responsible for the day-today running of the business or a department within the organization.

Marketing

Marketing is the management process of identifying, anticipating, and satisfying consumers' requirements in a profitable way. It involves meeting customers' needs and wants by focusing on ensuring the product, price, place and promotion are effective in encouraging sales of a good or service.

Place

Methods of distributing product to customers

Research

Research refers to the activities that a business conducts with the intention of making discoveries that can lead to commercial successes by adopting new processes and procedures in the workplace.

Renewable energy sources

Resources that are classified as renewable are natural resources that are replenishable through natural reproduction processes.

Board of trustees

Similar to the board of directors for a commercial for-profit organization, a board of trustees is the governing body of a non-profit organization.

Social Media

Social Media refers to any form of online platform that enable users to create and share interactive content or to participate in online social networking.

Staff turnover

Staff turnover measures the rate of change of human resources within an organization, per period of time. The more people who leave an organization per time period, the higher the labour turnover rate.

Articles of government of universities

There are the documented guidelines and principles that govern how universities operate.

Least developed countries

These are low-income countries with lower levels of economic growth and socio-economic development.

Fees

These are payments made to a professional body in exchange for advice or services.

Representatives

These are people elected as delegates or ambassadors to represent certain stakeholder groups in negotiations and decision-making processes.

Day to Day Issues

These are the operations or activies that a business and its workforce engage in on a daily basis in order to meet organizational goals.

Long-term plans

These are the strategic plans of an organization that set out the goals that are likely to take several years to accomplish.

Economic recession

This is a period of negative economic growth in a country.

Ecological sustainability

This is one of the three pillars in Elkington's triple bottom line, along with social and economic sustainability.

Expansion

This is the enlargement of a business due to an increase in the size of its operations.

Revenue

This is the income of a business derived from its daily operations, i.e. the total amount of income earned from the sales of a good or service over a period of time.

Training

Training is the process of developing the knowledge and skills of workers in order to enhance their confidence, competence, and commitment in the workplace.

Mass market

Undifferentiated marketing

Waste

Waste is a term for any business activity that is inefficient and does not add value to the production process.

Market segment

a group of consumers who respond in a similar way to a given set of marketing efforts

Total costs

sum of all variable and fixed costs of production