The department that turned firing into a growth opportunity.
The process of identifying who will take over key roles when current leaders leave, retire, or ascend to a higher plane of executive retreat. In practice, it means everyone secretly knows who the backup is except the backup, who finds out the day their predecessor quits.
Full-Time Equivalent, a unit of measurement that reduces human beings to fractions. You might be 1.0 FTE, 0.5 FTE, or, if you're on three cross-functional committees, approximately 3.7 FTE squeezed into one salaried body.
Modifications or adjustments enabling employees with disabilities to perform essential job functions, required under the ADA unless they cause 'undue hardship.' It's the legal framework for accessibility that shouldn't need legal framework.
The practice of openly sharing salary ranges, compensation formulas, or actual employee pay—radical honesty that supposedly reduces wage gaps but makes everyone uncomfortable at company parties.
Illegally treating employees as independent contractors to avoid taxes, benefits, and labor protections. It's wage theft with extra steps and a business model for the gig economy.
A notice period where departing employees remain on payroll but are barred from working or accessing company resources, preventing them from sharing secrets with competitors. Paid time off for being too dangerous to keep around.
The corporate buzzword for giving employees just enough authority to feel important without actually changing power structures or decision-making hierarchies. This feel-good initiative involves delegating responsibility (but rarely resources) while management maintains veto power over everything important. It's what happens when companies want engagement without surrendering actual control—autonomy theater at its finest.
A legally permissible reason to discriminate in hiring based on characteristics like age, sex, or religion because they're essential to the job. Abbreviated as BFOQ, the rare loophole in anti-discrimination law.
Paid time off that's definitely not a vacation, given while the company investigates whether you did something fireable. It's the corporate equivalent of "go to your room while we decide your punishment."
A fancy rebrand of 'recruiter' that sounds like someone who hunts rare Pokémon instead of scrolling through LinkedIn all day. The terminology inflation makes the job sound strategic and elite, when really it's still just trying to fill Jennifer's position after she left for better pay.
The art of making an employee's job so unpleasant they quit voluntarily, avoiding the legal and financial costs of termination. It's constructive dismissal with a euphemistic name and plausible deniability.
A ruthless performance management system that ranks all employees against each other and automatically fires the bottom performers, regardless of absolute performance levels. It's corporate social Darwinism with spreadsheets.
Employment practices that appear neutral but disproportionately harm protected groups—essentially discrimination by spreadsheet rather than intent. It's illegal even when accidental, requiring employers to prove business necessity.
The public advertisement of an open position, often legally required even when there's already an internal candidate selected. Corporate theater pretending the decision isn't already made.
A structured model defining the skills, knowledge, and behaviors required for success in various roles. It's HR's attempt to reduce the art of doing a job well into a checklist.
The structured framework defining job levels, career paths, and salary ranges across an organization. Essentially the blueprint that explains why someone with the same job title makes $20k more than you.
A career development structure offering advancement paths for both management and technical roles, allowing specialists to grow without becoming managers. It's HR's admission that not everyone wants to lead people.
That document you spend hours perfecting to summarize your entire professional existence into one or two pages, which recruiters will skim in approximately six seconds. It's supposed to showcase your skills and experience without lying too obviously, formatted in a way that's both ATS-friendly and human-readable. The verb form means to continue something you paused, like your career after explaining that two-year gap.
Someone currently employed and not actively job hunting, but potentially open to the right opportunity. Recruiters love them because they're harder to get and therefore must be better, like that restaurant with no reservations.
The formal process of passing power, position, or property from one party to the next, whether it's a CEO, a monarch, or your aunt's prized ceramic cat collection. In corporate and political circles, succession planning is the art of ensuring the ship doesn't sink when the captain retires. Also known as "musical chairs for grown-ups with actual consequences."
The perpetual HR challenge of finding, hiring, and occasionally yeeting employees to keep a business running smoothly. It encompasses everything from recruitment strategies to headcount planning, basically ensuring you have enough humans doing the right jobs at the right time. When companies say they have "staffing issues," it means they're either drowning in applications or desperately clinging to whoever shows up.
The corporate world's version of "we're not sure about you yet," a trial period where new employees walk on eggshells while pretending everything is fine. It's essentially dating before marriage, except instead of meeting the parents, you're trying to prove you won't accidentally reply-all to the CEO. One wrong move and you're out faster than you can say "cultural fit."
The corporate-friendly term for deliberately leaving someone or something out, whether it's an insurance policy fine print gotcha or the social dynamics of not inviting Kevin to the planning meeting. In HR contexts, it's the thing companies are sued for when they accidentally-on-purpose leave certain people out of opportunities. Organizations now have entire departments dedicated to preventing exclusion while their employee resource groups meet during everyone's lunch break.
Using data and statistics to make workforce decisions, transforming HR from gut feelings into spreadsheets. It's great until you realize they're tracking your bathroom breaks and email response times.