List of business terms
The following terms are in everyday use in financial regions, such as commercial business and the management of large organisations such as corporations.
Verb phrases
| Verb phrase | Definition |
| Action that | Put something into practice |
| Baked in | Something which has been "baked in" is implied to be impossible to remove. Alternatively, "baked in" can refer to a desirable, although non-essential, property of a product being incorporated for the user's convenience. |
| Boil the ocean | Undertake an impossible or impractical task |
| Buck the trend | To follow an action against market tendencies |
| Build capacity | Take actions which increase the amount of work that can be done in the future. |
| Circle back | Discuss later |
| Circle the wagons | Defensive strategy to provide time to plan or produce a better solution |
| Cover all directions of the compass | Ensure the product specification covers everything |
| Create the storyboard | Outline what the solution will look like |
| Deep dive | Get into the detail |
| Drill down | Investigate in depth |
| Flogging a dead horse | Wasting efforts |
| Have the vendor in our pocket | Keep a vendor/contractors paid |
| Ideate | Come up with ideas |
| Land and expand | To sell a small solution and then grow it within the client's environment |
| Make hay | Productive or successful in a short time |
| Moving forward | Making progress on an idea or scheme |
| Move the goal posts | Change the criteria for success |
| Pick the low-hanging fruit | Go for the easiest options |
| Power to the elbow | Get additional backup information to make your case stronger |
| Pull the plug | Close a venture that is losing money or has no prospects of success |
| Punt | Relinquish responsibility |
| Pushing the envelope | Going outside normal boundaries to achieve a target or goal |
| Put this on your radar | Consider this |
| Scrub the numbers | Find errors |
| Sing from the same hymn sheet | Show a united front, or everyone understanding and saying the same thing to clientele. |
| Table the conversation | Reconvene at a later time |
| Test the water | 'Put your toe' into a market to determine its temperature. |
| Touch base | To meet up with a colleague to discuss progress |
| Touch base offline | Meet and talk |
| Tranch up the workload | Divide responsibilities |
| Trim the fat | Cut excess budgets, remove avoidable costs |
| Unscramble that egg | Take care of that mess |