Like every industry and speciality, business processes and business management systems come with their own lingo, or jargon. Listed below are some of the many abbreviations and acronyms you are likely to come across when browsing through articles and material on this subject. Definitions are also included for your reference.
(roll/hover over the descriptions for more details)
These abbreviations and their definitions have been collected over many years through our own consulting services and exchanges of information.
Where an abbreviation has more than one meaning, the one that is most relevant to the subject matter of business management systems has been defined.
Business Methodology and Systems
ABDP – Attribute-Based Demand Planning
ALM – Asset Lifecycle Management
ATO – Assemble To Order
BAM – Business Activity Monitoring
BCM – Business Continuity Management
BI – Business Intelligence
BPI – Business Process Improvement
BPM – Business Process Management
BPO – Business Process Outsourcing
BA – Business Agility
CMMS – Computerised (Computerized) Maintenance Management Systems
CMS – Content Management System
CPI – Continuous Process Improvement
CRM – Customer Relationship Management
CRP – Capacity Requirements Planning
CTO – Configure To Order
DFSS – Design For Six Sigma
DM – Demand Management
EAI – Enterprise Application Integration
EAM – Enterprise Asset Management
EAS – Enterprise Application Search
EDM – Enterprise Decision Management
EPM – Enterprise Project Management
ERP – Enterprise Resource Planning
ETO – Engineer To Order
FMEA – Failure Mode and Effects Analysis
HRMS – Human Resource Management System
ITES – Information Technology Enabled Service
JIT – Just In Time
KPI – Key Performance Indicator
LMS – Learning Management System
LSS – Lean Six Sigma
MPS – Master Production Scheduling
MRP – Material Requirements Planning; also Material Resource Planning
MRP II – Manufacturing Resource Planning
MTO – Made To Order
PDM – Product Data Management
PIM – Product Information Management
PLM – Product Lifecycle Management
POS – Point of Sale
PPM – Project Portfolio Management
SCM – Supply Chain Management
SFA – Sales Force Automation
SIPOC – Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs, Customers
SOP – Sales and Operations Planning
SPC – Statistical Process Control
SRM – Supplier Relationship Management
TMS – Transport Management System
WMS – Warehouse Management System
Software Systems Related
BPEL – Business Process Execution Language
BPMN – Business Process Modelling Notation
EAI – Enterprise Application Integration
FOSS – Free and Open Source Software
ISV – Independent Software Vendor
ODBC – Open Database Connectivity
OLAP – Online Analytical Processing (data cubes)
SaaS – Software as a Service
SDLC – Systems Development Life Cycle
SOA – Service-Oriented Architecture
SQL – Structured Query Language
SSO – Single Sign-On
UML – Unified Modelling Language
