Every day we publish a business word or phrase together with audio pronunciation, phonetics, definition and example sentences. This is a great way to improve your workplace vocabulary as well as your pronunciation. To receive ‘Business Word/Phrase of the Day’ by email, just subscribe to our newsletter from the link above.
OVERHEADS
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13 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- regular costs that a business must pay, such as electricity, salaries, etc.
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Example Sentence: Internet companies have much lower overheads.
OUTLOOK
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12 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- how the future looks based on current predictions.
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Example Sentence: The outlook for small firms has worsened in recent months.
ON SCHEDULE
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11 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- on time, according to a plan .
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Example Sentence: He says that the building project is still on schedule.
OBSTACLE
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10 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- something which makes it difficult to do something or get somewhere.
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Example Sentence: Companies say that corruption is still the biggest obstacle in the region.
MOGUL
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09 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- a very wealthy or powerful person in business.
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Example Sentence: He is described as the world’s most powerful media mogul.
MINUTES
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08 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- the official notes taken in a meeting.
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Example Sentence: The secretary took the minutes during the meeting.
LEVERAGE
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07 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- the power to influence somebody’s actions.
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Example Sentence: Big companies have a lot of leverage over their business partners.
LETTER OF CREDIT
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06 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- a letter from a bank that guarantees a payment to a specified person.
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Example Sentence: The seller requires a letter of credit to secure payment.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
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05 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- something that somebody creates which has value, esp. music, art, text, etc.
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Example Sentence: The designer claims that her intellectual property rights were infringed.
HEADHUNT
|
04 Apr 2023 |
Noun
- to search for the perfect person for a job and offer them a lot of money to do it.
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Example Sentence: He was headhunted for the position.
HAND IN YOUR NOTICE
|
03 Apr 2023 |
Phrase
- to officially tell your company that you are leaving the job.
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Example Sentence: He handed in his notice when he heard that he had got the new job.
GET INTO DEBT
|
02 Apr 2023 |
Phrase
- to get into a situation in which you owe people money.
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Example Sentence: It’s easy to get into debt if you have a credit card.
GET DOWN TO BUSINESS
|
01 Apr 2023 |
Phrase
- start doing the thing that you intend to do.
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Example Sentence: Let’s get down to business! What is the first item on the agenda?
EQUITY
|
31 Mar 2023 |
Noun
- the value of a company’s shares.
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Example Sentence: This quarter produced a return on equity of 8.85%.
DIVISION
|
30 Mar 2023 |
Noun
- a part of an organisation.
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Example Sentence: She heads the company’s worldwide sales division.
In order to be fluent in any language, you need to know enough vocabulary. When it comes to English for business and management, it is important to learn new Business English vocabulary, because it helps you say exactly what you mean.
However, having a list of the most important words is overwhelming. How can you study tens or hundreds of words when you are a busy professional?
*Note: This article may contain affiliate links, which means we may receive a small commission, at no cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link.
The key is to learn the vocabulary by introducing the words one by one or in sets and repeat them frequently. To help you to expand your vocabulary, I have started this Word of the Week category for Business English.
Every Wednesday, I will choose one important word, phrase or term that is useful for international communication. Over time, I hope this will increase your Business English vocabulary one word at a time.
As a bonus, at the end of the post, there are flashcards and other tools to study the new words right away! This way it will be easier to memorize the vocabulary. Give it a try!
I will explain the important features of the word or phrase and how you can use it in speaking and writing English:
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- What it means
- How it is formed
- How you pronounce it
- How you can use it
Be sure to subscribe to our newsletter and to follow Globify on Instagram and Pinterest to receive the Word of the Week!
To kick off this category, our Word of the Week is the useful English word launch, which can be both a verb and a noun.
What does “launch” mean?
Example 1
We are launching our new business this year.
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- We are starting a new business.
- We are beginning something new, such as a business.
- Synonym: to begin, to start
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Example 2
The secret to a successful product launch is planning.
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- It is important to plan well for the introduction of a new product to the market.
- If you offer, announce or sell something, such as a new product, for the first time, you need to plan well.
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What type of word is “launch”?
As you can see in the example sentences above, the word “launch” is both a noun and a verb:
Noun: a (product/business/brand/career/etc.) launch
The secret to a successful product launch is planning.
Verb: to launch (a product/company/career/website/campaign/etc.)
We are launching our new business this year.
How do you pronounce “launch”?
The pronunciation in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is:
/ˈlɑːntʃ/
You can visit this interactive phonemic chart if you are not sure about a sound:
Notice that you open your mouth and form a long vowel.
To practice pronunciation, try these free tools:
How can you use “launch”?
Here are some words you can use together with “launch”:
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- a company
- a career
- a website
- a product
- a campaign
- a brand
- a service
- a program
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How to study new vocabulary
To help you study the new words, I have created these flashcards. Below you can study the flashcards, practice spelling and take quizzes to memorize the new words:
Call To Action
Think about ways to use this word. Write one sentence with the word launch and share it by commenting below!
Happy learning!
Learn more new vocabulary:
Business English Vocabulary: input
Business English Vocabulary: whitepaper
Have you ever walked into a store and wondered how they paid to fill it with products to sell? The easy answer might be, «with the money they made from the things they sold last month,» and that’s partially true, but what about for brand new stores? There’s probably millions of dollars of inventory on the floor of many large retailers and hundreds of thousands of dollars of inventory on the floor of many small businesses. This working capital must be paid for — but how?
Many companies will take on debt to finance their inventories. Suppliers, eager to get business, will often offer credit terms, and each company decides how and when to take advantage of these through maintaining an Accounts Payable balance. This gap between paying for the products and receiving the money for selling them is called the cash conversion cycle.
Cash Conversion Cycle: the amount of time that passes between when a company spends money to buy an item and when they receive the money for selling it.
To calculate the cash conversion cycle, take the average number of days it takes to sell inventory, plus the average number of days it takes to receive payment for that sold inventory, minus the average number of days before paying for received inventory. In terms of accounting ratios, this is:
Cash Conversion Cycle = Days Inventory + Days Receivables – Days Payables
A typical company receives inventory, pays later for that inventory, sells the inventory, then receives payment for it.
The implications of the cash conversion cycle are powerful. To illustrate with an example, imagine a company that buys t-shirts for $10 and sells them for $15 – a very simple business. If they have a cash conversion cycle of seven days, this implies that for one week they have lost the $10 needed to purchase each t-shirt but have not yet received the $15 for selling them. Where do they get money to buy more t-shirts and maintain their inventory?
Financing this time through debt can impose a considerable cost on the company, especially for companies with very long cash conversion cycles. The longer the cash conversion cycle, the higher the interest paid on the debt.
Imagine a company that has a negative cash conversion cycle, like Amazon. By selling inventory quickly (low Days Inventory), receiving payment immediately for most sales (low Days Receivables) and putting off payment to suppliers for as long as possible (high Days Payables), their Cash Conversion Cycle is negative.
That means that Amazon actually gets paid for items they sell before they pay for them themselves. So, instead of paying interest to buy items for sale, they are receiving interest by holding cash in their bank account (or investing it in growing their company). This produces a powerful engine for cash generation and growth.
To learn more about the cash conversion cycles of Amazon and other organizations, take a look at this article from Forbes.
Interested in learning more about accounting as well as analytics and economics? Gain confidence in the fundamentals of business with CORe.
Learn More About CORe
Do you own a BE?
That’s a “business enterprise,” which sounds redundant only to non-enterprise-y people. Maybe yours is a small business enterprise (SBE), which, according to a top-ranked definition, is “a privately owned corporation, partnership, or sole proprietorship that has fewer employees and less annual revenue than a corporation or regular-sized business.” (It seems that where tax policy is concerned, the definition of “small” varies by country and industry and who knows what else.)
Maybe, on the other hand, yours is a woman-owned business (WBE). Or a minority-owned business (MBE). Or a veteran-owned business (VBE). Or a “disability-owned business” (DBE). (Can a disability own a business?)
Now suppose you want to talk about BEs collectively, and you wish to exclude large, majority-, male-, able-bodied, or nonmilitary BEs. You’re searching for an umbrella term.
And now you have one: XBE.
Not the XBE cryptocurrency. Not XBE the Xbox file extension. Not XBE LLC the Chicago-based software company, which is a—nounpile alert!—”horizontal construction optimization solutions provider.”
And no, the X isn’t the Roman numeral X or the “Rated X for adult content” X.
This is the algebraic X: an unknown or undefined variable.
Here’s how the global design firm CannonDesign, which creates “transformational places, plans and strategies that improve life,” uses XBE on its website:
“‘XBE’ encompasses small business enterprises, as well as minority-owned, women-owned, disability-owned, and veteran-owned business enterprises.”
And here’s more about CannonDesign’s Inclusive Partner Program:
Created in partnership with XBE firms across the country, CannonDesign’s Inclusive Partner Program galvanizes people and companies to create mutually beneficial partnerships that deliver more impact across the design industry. It aims to go far beyond typical XBE programs—which are often focused on meeting a client or project-specific requirement—by creating deep-rooted relationships that maximize shared opportunities, foster greater equity, spark genuine collaboration and provide fulfilling experiences for all involved.
CannonDesign is not alone. I found a cluster of XBE programs or directories in Indiana, including those at Indiana University, the city of Indianapolis and the state government. The Diversity Consortium, a management-consulting firm founded in 2020 in Greensboro, North Carolina, “was started to overcome decades of sluggish supplier diversity growth by enhanced visibility to vetted XBEs, incorporating sustainable supplier improvements, and mitigating COVID-19 supplier impact and social justice issues.”
It’s harder to find the origins of XBE (see above: all those non-business-enterprise XBEs). The Indiana files are undated. I did find an August 2016 newsletter from LeChase Construction, headquartered in Rochester, New York, that celebrates “the one-year mark of the LeChase XBE Program launch.” The newsletter gives an expansive definition of XBE:
As a reminder, “XBE” is our shorthand way of referring to various government programs developed to benefit small, socially or economically disadvantaged businesses, such as Minority or Women-Owned Business Enterprise (M/WBE), Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE), Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Businesses (SDVOB), Historically Underutilized Businesses (HUB), etc.
As for pinpointing when the whole “BE” trend got going, that’s only slightly easier. A 1978 publication from the U.S. Department of Energy discusses “small business and minority business enterprise participation in solar energy procurement activity,” and so far I haven’t found anything older. If anyone knows when the “SBE” initialism became commonplace, let me know in a comment.
My thanks to Marjanne Pearson for the CannonDesign info—she said it was the first time she’d seen “XBE” in print. Marjanne also told me about JEDI, an acronym she says architectural firms have been using. It stands for Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, and it may have originated with the J.E.D.I. Collaborative, which launched in 2019 in Potomac, Maryland.
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Related: My Visual Thesaurus column on “The X Factor.”
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