Download SHRM-CP Terms Study Guide 2024: Comprehensive Guide to Human Resource Management and more Exams Sociology in PDF only on Docsity! SHRM-CP Terms Study Guide 2024 ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) ✔ Amendments to Americans with Disabilities Act covering the definition of individuals regarded as having a disability, mitigating measures, and other rules of construction to guide the analysis of what constitutes a disability. ADDIE model ✔ Five-step instructional design process that governs the development of learning programs. Adverse impact ✔ Type of discrimination that results when a neutral policy has a discriminatory effect; also known as disparate impact. Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) ✔ Act that prohibits discrimination in employment for persons age 40 and over. Alternative dispute resolution (ADR) ✔ Umbrella term used to describe a number of problem-solving and grievance resolution approaches. Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ✔ Act that prohibits discrimination against a qualified individual with a disability because of his/her disability. Analytics ✔ Tools that convert metrics to be used for decision support by adding context or further subclassifying comparison groups. Andragogy ✔ Study of how adults learn. Applicant tracking software (ATS) ✔ Software that provides an automated way for organizations to manage the recruiting process. Apprenticeship ✔ Relates to technical skills training; often a partnership between employers and unions. Arbitration ✔ Procedure in which disputes are submitted to one or more impartial persons for final determination. Assessment centers ✔ Assessment tools that provide candidates a wide range of leadership situations and problem-solving exercises. Assignees ✔ Employees who work outside their home countries. At-will employment ✔ 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 employees have the right to quit a job at any time. Auditory learners ✔ People who learn best by relying on their sense of hearing. Balanced scorecard ✔ 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. Balance sheet ✔ Statement that reports the financial position of the organization at a specific point in time; shows assets, liabilities, and shareholder equity. Behavioral interview ✔ Type of interview that focuses on how applicants previously handled real situations. Benchmarking ✔ Process that compares performance levels and/or processes of one entity with those of another to identify performance gaps and set goals aimed at improving performance. Benefits ✔ Payments or services provided to employees to cover issues such as retirement, health coverage, sick pay/disability schemes, life insurance, and paid time off. Bias ✔ Occurs when an appraiser's values, beliefs, or prejudices distort performance ratings. Big data ✔ High-volume, high-velocity, and high-variety information assets that require innovative forms of information processing for enhanced insight and decision making. Blended learning ✔ Planned approach to learning that includes a combination of instructor-led training, self-directed study, and/or on-the-job training. Codetermination ✔ Form of corporate governance that requires a typical management board and a supervisory board and that allows management and employees to participate in strategic decision making. Collective bargaining ✔ 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 ✔ Agreement or contract negotiated through collective bargaining process. Common law ✔ 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. Communication ✔ The ability to effectively exchange information with stakeholders. Comparable worth ✔ Concept that states that jobs requiring comparable skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions filled primarily by women should have the same job classification and salary as similar jobs filled by men. Compa-ratio ✔ Pay rate divided by the midpoint of the pay range. Compensation ✔ All financial returns (beyond any benefits payments or services), including salary and allowances. Competencies ✔ Clusters of highly interrelated attributes, including knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) that give rise to the behaviors needed to perform a given job effectively. Competency-based interview ✔ Type of interview in which interviewer asks questions related to competencies for the position and asks candidates to provide examples of times they demonstrated the competencies. Compliance program ✔ System for ensuring that policies and procedures addressing issues identified in the code of conduct are presented to and understood and acted on by everyone in the organization and for evaluating the results of those efforts. Conciliation ✔ Method of nonbinding dispute resolution involving a third party who tries to help disputing parties reach a mutually agreeable decision; also known as mediation. Conflict of interest ✔ Situation in which a person or organization has the potential to be influenced by two opposing sets of incentives. Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) ✔ Act that provides individuals and dependents who may lose medical coverage with opportunity to pay to continue coverage. Constructive discipline ✔ Form of corrective discipline that implements increasingly severe penalties for employees; also called progressive discipline. Consultation ✔ The ability to provide guidance to organizational stakeholders. Contingency plan ✔ Protocol that an organization implements to respond to an unplanned but identified risk event. Contrast effect ✔ Error that occurs when strong candidates who interview after weak ones appear even more qualified than they actually are because of the contrast. Contrast error ✔ Error that occurs when an employee's rating is based on how his or her performance compares to that of another employee rather than objective standards. Control chart ✔ Chart that illustrates variations from normal in a situation over time. Core competencies ✔ Skills, knowledge, and abilities that employees must possess in order to successfully perform job functions that are essential to business operations. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) ✔ Recognition of the impact a corporation has on the lives of its stakeholders (including shareholders, employees, communities, customers, and suppliers) and the environment; can include corporate governance, corporate philanthropy, sustainability, and employee rights and workplace safety. Cosourcing ✔ Arrangement in which an enterprise and a vendor share different tasks within a larger complex, often strategic responsibility. Cost-benefit analysis ✔ Ratio of value created to cost of creating that value; allows management to determine the financial impact particular activities and programs have on an organization's profitability. Cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) ✔ Periodic compensation payment given to eligible employees regardless of their performance or organizational profitability; usually linked to inflation. Critical evaluation ✔ The ability to interpret information with which to make business decisions and recommendations. Critical path ✔ Describes the shortest amount of time required to complete a project, taking into account all project task relationships—for example, whether task C must be completed before Task E, and whether Tasks A and B can be completed at the same time. Cultural noise ✔ Failure to recognize responses of a candidate that are socially acceptable rather than factual. Cultural relativism ✔ Concept that argues that ethical behavior is determined by local culture, laws, and business practices. Culture ✔ Set of beliefs, attitudes, values, and behaviors shared by members of a group and passed down from one generation to the next. Dashboards ✔ Reporting mechanisms that aggregate and display metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs). Database ✔ Data structure that stores organized information (numeric information as well as sound clips, pictures, and videos). Database management system (DBMS) ✔ Variety of software applications that electronically manage stored data. Dedicated HR ✔ Employees' commitment to an organization; willingness to put in effort that promotes the effective functioning of the organization. Employee life cycle (ELC) ✔ Activities associated with an employee's tenure in an organization. Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA) ✔ Act that generally prevents employers engaged in or affecting interstate commerce from using lie detector tests either for preemployment screening or during the course of employment, with certain exemptions. Employee resource group (ERG) ✔ Voluntary group for employees who share a particular diversity dimension (race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc.); also known as affinity group or network group. Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ✔ Act that established uniform minimum standards for employer-sponsored retirement and health and welfare benefit programs. Employees ✔ Individuals who exchange work for wages or salary; in the U.S., workers who are covered by Fair Labor Standards Act regulations as determined by the IRS. Employee surveys ✔ Instruments used to collect and assess employee perceptions about the work environment. Employment branding ✔ Process of positioning an organization as an "employer of choice" in the labor market. Employment practices liability insurance (EPLI) ✔ Type of liability insurance covering an organization against claims by employees, former employees, and employment candidates alleging that their legal rights in the employment relationship have been violated. Encryption ✔ Conversion of data into a format that protects or hides its natural presentation or intended meaning Enterprise resource planning (ERP) ✔ 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. Environmental scanning ✔ Process that involves a systematic survey and interpretation of relevant data to identify external opportunities and threats and to assess how these factors affect the organization currently and how they are likely to affect the organization in the future. e-procurement ✔ Use of electronic communications and transaction processing when buying (or contracting for/tendering) supplies and services. Equal Employment Opportunity Act ✔ 1972 act that amended Title VII and gave the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission authority to implement its administrative findings and conduct its own enforcement litigation. Equal Pay Act (EPA) ✔ Act that prohibits wage discrimination by requiring equal pay for equal work. Essential functions ✔ Primary job duties that a qualified individual must be able to perform, either with or without reasonable accommodation. Ethical Practice ✔ The ability to integrate core values, integrity, and accountability throughout all organizational and business practices. Ethical universalism ✔ Concept that argues that there are fundamental ethical principles that apply across cultures. Ethics ✔ Set of behavioral guidelines by which all directors, managers, and employees of an organization are expected to behave to ensure appropriate moral and ethical business standards, typically beyond the letter of the law. Exempt employees ✔ Employees who are excluded from FLSA minimum wage and overtime pay requirements. External equity ✔ Situation in which an organization's compensation levels and benefits are similar to those of other organizations that are in the same labor market and compete for the same employees. Extraterritoriality ✔ Extension of the power of a country's laws over its citizens outside that country's sovereign national boundaries. Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACT Act) ✔ Act that provides some relief to employers using third parties to conduct workplace investigations Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) ✔ Act that protects privacy of background information and ensures that information supplied is accurate. Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ✔ Act that regulates employee status, overtime pay, child labor, minimum wage, record keeping, and other administrative concerns. Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) ✔ Act that provides employees with up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for family members or because of a serious health condition of the employee. Faragher v. City of Boca Raton ✔ Court ruling that distinguished between supervisor harassment that results in tangible employment action and supervisor harassment that does not. First-impression error ✔ Type of interviewer bias in which interviewer makes snap judgments and lets first impression (either positive or negative) cloud the interview. Flat-rate pay ✔ Provides each incumbent of a job with the same rate of pay, regardless of performance or seniority; also known as single-rate pay. Focus group ✔ Small group (normally six to twelve) invited to actively participate in a structured discussion with a facilitator. Force-field analysis ✔ Type of analysis in which factors that can influence an outcome in either a negative or positive manner are listed and then assigned weights to indicate their relative strengths. Formalization ✔ Refers to the extent to which rules, policies, and procedures govern the behavior of employees in an organization. Front-back structure ✔ Organizational structure that divides an organization into "front" functions, which focus on customers or market groups, and "back" functions, which design and develop products and services. ✔ Society or group where people have close connections over a long period of time and where many aspects of behavior are not made explicit, because most members know what to do and think from years of interaction. Histogram ✔ Graphic representation of the distribution of a single type of measurement; data is represented by a series of rectangles of varying heights. Horn effect ✔ Occurs when an employee receives an overall low rating because of one weakness. Hostile environment harassment ✔ 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. HR audit ✔ Process to measure the effectiveness and efficiency of HR programs and positions. HR Expertise (HR Knowledge) ✔ The knowledge of principles, practices, and functions of effective human resource management. Human resource information system (HRIS) ✔ Systematic tool for gathering, storing, maintaining, retrieving, and revising HR data; also known as a human resource management system (HRMS). Hybrid structure ✔ Organizational structure that mixes elements of the functional, product, and geographic structures. Identity alignment ✔ Extent to which diversity is embraced in management of people, products/services, and branding. Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) ✔ Act that prohibits discrimination against job applicants on the basis of national origin or citizenship; establishes penalties for hiring illegal aliens and requires employers to establish each employee's identity and eligibility to work. Incentive pay ✔ Form of direct compensation where employers pay for performance beyond normal expectations to motivate higher performance. Incentives ✔ Payments in return for the achievement of specific, time-limited, targeted objectives. Inclusion ✔ Extent to which each person in an organization feels welcomed, respected, supported, and valued as a team member. Income statement ✔ Statement that reports revenues, expenses, and net income (profit) for a specified period—for example, quarterly or annually. Independent contractors ✔ Self-employed individuals hired on a contract basis for specialized services. Industrial actions ✔ Various forms of collective employee actions taken to protest work conditions or employer action. Information management (IM) ✔ Use of technology to collect, process, and condense information with a goal of efficient management of information as an organizational resource. Insourcing ✔ Transferring a previously outsourced function back in-house. Intellectual property (IP) ✔ Creations of the mind such as inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names, images, and designs used in commerce; as much an asset as is physical property. Intercultural wisdom ✔ Capacity to recognize, interpret, and behaviorally adapt to multicultural situations and contexts; also called cultural intelligence. Internal equity ✔ Situation in which employees feel that performance or job differences result in corresponding differences in rewards that are fair. Intrinsic motivation ✔ Desire to do things because they matter, because we like it, because they're interesting, or because they are part of something important. ISO 9000 standards ✔ Series of standards, developed/published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), that define, establish, and maintain a quality assurance system for manufacturing and service industries. Job analysis ✔ Systematic study of jobs to determine what activities (tasks) and responsibilities they include, personal qualifications necessary for performance of the jobs, the conditions under which the work is performed, and the reporting structure. Job classification ✔ Job evaluation method in which descriptions are written for each class of jobs; individual jobs are then put into the grade that best matches their class description. Job-content-based job evaluation ✔ Job evaluation method in which the relative worth and pay opportunities of different jobs are based on an assessment of their content and their relationship to other jobs within the organization. Job description ✔ Written description of a job and its requirements, including required tasks, knowledge, skills, abilities, responsibilities, and reporting structure. Job enlargement ✔ Broadening the scope of a job by expanding the number of different tasks to be performed. Job enrichment ✔ Increasing the depth of a job by adding responsibilities such as planning, organizing, tracking, and completing reports. Job evaluation ✔ Process that determines the value and price of a job in order to place and compare it within an organization as well as attract and retain employees in a competitive environment. Job ranking ✔ Job evaluation method that involves establishing a hierarchy of jobs from lowest to highest based on each job's overall value to the organization. Job rotation ✔ Movement between different jobs. Job specifications ✔ Written statements of the necessary qualifications for the job incumbent. Judgmental forecasts ✔ Use of information from past and present to predict future conditions. Jurisdiction Low-context culture ✔ Society in which people tend to have many social connections but of shorter duration and where behavior and beliefs may need to be described explicitly so that those coming into the cultural environment know how to behave. Lump-sum increase (LSI) ✔ One-time payment made to an employee; also called performance bonus. Metrics ✔ Performance parameters based on the relationship between two or more measures. Mission statement ✔ Statement that specifies what activities an organization intends to pursue and what course management has charted for the future; a concise statement of its strategy. Mobile learning ✔ Digitized instructional content delivered to wireless mobile devices (e.g., smartphones, tablet computers, notebooks, and digital readers). Mode ✔ Value that occurs most frequently in a set of data. Moral hazard ✔ Situation in which one party engages in risky behavior knowing that it is protected against the risk because another party will assume any resulting loss. Motivation ✔ Factors that initiate, direct, and sustain human behavior over time. Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) ✔ Decision-making tool in which a team determines critical characteristics of a successful decision; a matrix is used to score each alternative and compare results. Multinational enterprise (MNE) ✔ Organization that owns or controls production or services facilities in one or more countries other than the home country. Multiple linear regression ✔ Statistical method that can be used to project future demand; more than one variable is utilized. National Defense Authorization Acts (NDAA) ✔ Acts that expanded FMLA leave for employees with family members who are covered members of the military. National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius ✔ Supreme Court ruling that PPACA requirement that individuals purchase health insurance was constitutional but that requirement that states expand Medicaid was not. National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) ✔ Act that protects the rights of employees to organize unhampered by management; also known as Wagner Act. National origin ✔ Refers to the country (including those that no longer exist) of one's birth or of one's ancestors' birth. Negative emphasis ✔ Type of interviewer bias that involves rejecting a candidate on the basis of a small amount of negative information. NLRB v. Weingarten ✔ Landmark 1975 labor relations case that dealt with the right of a unionized employee to have another person present during certain investigatory interviews. Nominal group technique ✔ Group of individuals who meet face-to-face to forecast ideas and assumptions and prioritize issues. Nonexempt employees ✔ Employees covered under FLSA regulations, including minimum wage and overtime pay requirements. Occupational illness ✔ Medical condition or disorder, other than one resulting from an occupational injury, caused by exposure to environmental factors associated with employment. Occupational injury ✔ Injury that results from a work-related accident or exposure involving a single incident in the work environment. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) ✔ Agency that administers and enforces the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act ✔ 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. Offboarding ✔ Process of managing the way employees leave the organization. Offshoring ✔ Situation in which a company relocates processes or production to an international location by means of subsidiaries or third-party affiliates. Older Workers Benefit Protection Act (OWBPA) ✔ Act that amended ADEA to include all employee benefits; also provided terminated employees with time to consider group termination or retirement programs and consult an attorney. Onboarding ✔ Programs that help employees develop positive working relationships with coworkers; encompass orientation as well as the first months of an employee's tenure in a position. On-the-job training (OJT) ✔ Training provided to employees at the work site utilizing demonstration and performance of job tasks. Organizational culture ✔ The basic beliefs and customs shared by members of an organization that contribute to an organization's sense of its identity. Organizational development ✔ Process of enhancing the effectiveness and efficiency of an organization and the well-being of its members through planned interventions. Organizational exit ✔ Process of managing the way employees leave the organization. Organizational learning ✔ Certain types of learning activities or processes that may occur at any one of several levels in an organization. Organizational values ✔ Beliefs that are important to an organization and often dictate employee behavior. Orientation ✔ Process in which a new employee becomes familiar with an organization as well as his or her department, coworkers, and the job. Outsourcing ✔ Buying services externally rather than producing them internally. Overtime pay Portal-to-Portal Act ✔ Act that defines what is included as hours worked and is therefore compensable and a factor in calculating overtime. Pregnancy Discrimination Act ✔ Act that prohibits discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions. Premiums ✔ Payments in return for the achievement of specific, time-limited, targeted objectives. Primacy error ✔ Occurs when an appraiser gives more weight to an employee's earlier performance and discounts recent occurrences. Principal-agent problem ✔ Situation in which an agent (e.g., an employee) makes decisions for a principal (e.g., an employer) potentially on the basis of personal incentives that are not aligned with the agent's incentives. Process alignment ✔ Extent to which underlying operations such as IT, finance, or HR integrate across locations. Process-flow analysis ✔ Diagram of the steps involved in a process. Productivity-based pay ✔ Pay based on the quantity of work and outputs that can be accurately measured. Product structure ✔ Organizational structure in which functional departments are grouped under major product divisions. Quid pro quo harassment ✔ 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. Reverse innovation ✔ Innovations created for or by emerging-economy markets and then imported to developed-economy markets. Risk ✔ The effect of uncertainty on objectives; outcomes may include opportunities or threats. Risk appetite ✔ Amount of risk the organization or function is willing to pursue or accept to attain its goals. Risk control ✔ An action taken to manage a risk. Risk management ✔ Identification, evaluation, and control of risk that may affect an organization, typically incorporating the use of insurance and other strategies. Risk position ✔ An organization's desired gain or acceptable loss in value. Risk scorecard ✔ Tool used to gather individual assessments of various characteristics of risk (e.g., frequency of occurrence, degree of impact/loss/gain for the organization, degree of efficacy of current controls). Risk tolerance ✔ Amount of uncertainty an organization is willing to pursue or to accept to attain its risk management goals. Rule of law ✔ 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. Scatter diagram ✔ Illustration that depicts possible relationships between two variables. Scenario/what-if analysis ✔ Statistical method used to test the possible effects of altering the details of a strategy to see if the likely outcome can be improved. Selection ✔ Process of vetting the most suitable candidate for a position. Selection interviews ✔ Interviews designed to probe areas of interest to the interviewer in order to determine how well a job candidate meets the needs of the organization. Selection screening ✔ Analyzing candidates' application forms, curriculum vitae, and r_sum_s to locate the most-qualified candidates for an open job. Seniority ✔ System that shows preference to employees with the longest service. Service-level agreement (SLA) ✔ Part of a service contract where the service expectations are formally defined. Shared services HR model ✔ HR structural alternative in which centers with specific areas of expertise develop HR policies in those areas; each unit can then select what it needs from a menu of these services. Simple linear regression ✔ Projection of future demand based on a past relationship; involves a single variable. Simulations ✔ Assessment tools that provide candidates a wide range of leadership situations and problem-solving exercises, including in-basket tests, financial or business data analysis, leaderless group discussions, interview simulations, role plays, and psychological inventories. Single-rate pay ✔ Provides each incumbent of a job with the same rate of pay, regardless of performance or seniority; also known as flat-rate pay. Situation judgment tests (SJTs) ✔ Assessment tools that present prospective leaders with sample situations and problems they might encounter in a work environment. Six Sigma ✔ A set of techniques and tools for quality process improvement. Social media ✔ Variety of online Internet technology platforms and communities that people use to communicate and share information and resources. Social movement unionism ✔ Type of union activity that focuses on social topics such as antidiscrimination, environmental actions, and HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention. Software as a service (SaaS) ✔ Software that is owned, delivered, and managed remotely and delivered over the Internet to contracted customers on a pay-for-use basis or as a subscription based on use metrics. ✔ Direct and indirect remuneration approaches that employers use to attract, recognize, and retain workers. Total rewards strategy ✔ Plan or method implemented by an organization that provides monetary, benefits in kind, and developmental rewards to employees who achieve specific business goals. Trade union ✔ Group of workers who coordinate their activities to achieve common goals (e.g., better wages, hours, and working conditions; job security; training) in their relationship with an employer or group of employers; also called trade union. Training ✔ Process of providing knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) specific to a task or job. Transfer of learning ✔ Effective and continuing on-the-job application of the knowledge and skills gained through a training experience. Trend analysis ✔ Trend analysis Trend and ratio analyses ✔ Use of statistics to determine whether relationships exist between two variables. Triple bottom line ✔ Economic, social, and environmental impact metrics used to determine an organization's success. Turnover ✔ Annualized formula that tracks number of separations and total number of workforce employees per month. Unfair labor practice (ULP) ✔ Violation of rights under labor-relations statutes. Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) ✔ Act that protects the employment, reemployment, and retention rights of persons who serve or have served in the uniformed services. Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures ✔ Procedural document designed to assist employers in complying with federal regulations prohibiting discrimination. Unitarianism ✔ Belief that employers and employees can act together for their common good. Unweighted average ✔ Raw average of data that gives equal weight to all factors, with no regard to individual factors such as the number of incumbents or organizations. Validity ✔ Ability of an instrument to measure what it is intended to measure. Value ✔ The benefit created when an organization meets its strategic goals. Value chain ✔ The process by which an organization creates the product or service it offers to the customer. Value drivers ✔ Actions, processes, or results that are needed to deliver a desired value. Variance analysis ✔ Statistical method that identifies the degree of difference between planned and actual performance. Vesting ✔ Process by which a retirement benefit becomes nonforfeitable. Vicarious liability ✔ Legal doctrine under which a party can be held liable for the wrongful actions of another party. Vision statement ✔ Vivid, guiding image of an organization's desired future, the future it hopes to attain through its strategy. Visual learners ✔ People who learn best by relying on their sense of sight. Weighted average ✔ Average of data that takes other factors such as the number of incumbents into account. Weingarten rights ✔ Union employees' right to have a union representative or coworker present during an investigatory interview. Well-being ✔ Physical, psychological, and social aspects of employee health. Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act ✔ Act that requires some employers to give a minimum of 60 days' notice if a plant is to close or if mass layoffs will occur. Workforce analysis ✔ Systematic approach to anticipate human capital needs and data HR professionals can use to ensure that appropriate knowledge, skills, and abilities will be available when needed to accomplish organizational goals and objectives. Workforce management ✔ All activities needed to ensure that the skills, knowledge, abilities, and performance of the workforce meet current and future organizational and individual needs. Workforce planning ✔ Process of analyzing the organization's workforce and determining steps required to prepare for future needs. Work/life balance (WLB) ✔ Umbrella term used to describe a variety of benefit-related initiatives to help employees effectively manage work, family, and personal life without extreme stress or negative impact. Works councils ✔ Groups that represent employees, generally on a local or firm level; primary purpose is to receive from employers and to convey to employees information that might affect the workforce and the health of the enterprise. Workweek ✔ Any fixed, recurring period of 168 consecutive hours (7 days times 24 hours = 168 hours).