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How to Create a Business Glossary: A Step-by-Step Plan

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Creating a business glossary is an essential step toward ensuring that all stakeholders in your organization have a clear understanding of the terminology, data definitions, and data lineage . Moreover, this will improve communication, reduce misunderstandings, and facilitate better decision-making.

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In this article, we will explore why is a business glossary important for your business, steps to create one, a few templates to get you off the block, and the best practices you need to keep in mind.

Let’s get started!

Table of contents #

8 Reasons why you need a business glossary
How to create a business glossary? Breaking down the steps
Business glossary templates: Examples to help you get started
Scaling the most practical business glossary template
Business glossary best practices: How to get it right
Books and online resources to learn about business glossaries
Rounding it all up
Related reads

8 Reasons why you need a business glossary #

Before we understand how to create a business glossary, let us try and understand why do we need it in the first place.

Today, businesses are increasingly leveraging vast amounts of data to drive decisions and strategies. As companies embark on their data-driven journey, a common understanding of business terms becomes vital. This is where a business glossary comes into play for the following reasons:

Ensures consistent terminology
Reduces ambiguity and misunderstandings
Improves data quality and integrity
Streamlines data governance processes
Facilitates better communication between teams
Enhances the effectiveness of data analytics
Supports regulatory compliance
Aids in onboarding and training

Let us now look into each of the above reasons in detail:

1. Ensures consistent terminology #

A business glossary provides a centralized reference for all business terms. When everyone in the organization uses the same definitions for terms, it ensures consistency across departments and systems. This uniformity prevents confusion and minimizes the risk of misinterpreting data.

2. Reduces ambiguity and misunderstandings #

Ambiguity can be a major roadblock in making informed decisions. When terms are clearly defined in a business glossary, stakeholders can avoid misinterpretations, ensuring that business strategies are based on accurate understandings.

3. Improves data quality and integrity #

Consistency in terminology often leads to higher data quality. When data sources are tagged and associated with precise definitions, it reduces the chance of data being misused or misinterpreted. As a result, businesses can trust the integrity of their data when making critical decisions.

4. Streamlines data governance processes #

Data governance involves managing and ensuring the quality, availability, and integrity of data across an organization. A business glossary acts as a foundational tool in this process, helping to define the rules and standards for data usage, classification, and handling.

5. Facilitates better communication between teams #

Different departments or teams might have different interpretations of the same term. A business glossary bridges this gap, providing a shared language that ensures all teams are on the same page, fostering more effective cross-functional collaboration.

6. Enhances the effectiveness of data analytics #

Data analytics relies on precise and consistent data. When analysts are assured of the consistency and clarity of terms, they can more confidently draw insights and make predictions, leading to more impactful data-driven strategies.

7. Supports regulatory compliance #

Many industries are bound by strict regulatory requirements concerning data management and reporting. A business glossary ensures that all terms are defined according to industry standards, aiding in compliance and minimizing risks associated with regulatory breaches.

8. Aids in onboarding and training #

For new employees or those moving to different roles within the organization, a business glossary acts as a valuable resource. It helps them quickly understand company-specific terminology, making the transition smoother and ensuring that they can contribute effectively in a shorter time frame.

A business glossary is an indispensable tool for data-driven businesses. With a shared understanding of terms and data across the organization, data-driven companies can ensure consistency, improve communication, and drive better decision-making.

In the next section, we will look into the steps of how to create a data dictionary.

How to create a business glossary? Breaking down the steps #

Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to get started with creating a business glossary:

1. Identify your stakeholders #

Determine who will be involved in the creation and maintenance of the business glossary. This could include representatives from the data, engineering, and Salesforce teams, as well as other relevant departments. Make sure that these stakeholders are committed to the project and understand its importance.

2. Define your scope #

Decide on the scope of the business glossary. This will likely include key terms and concepts related to travel & finance management, as well as any specific terms used by your organization. You can start with a smaller scope and expand it over time.

3. Collect and compile terms #

Gather a list of terms and concepts that need to be included in the business glossary. You can source these from existing documentation, such as data dictionaries, data models, and process flows, as well as by interviewing subject matter experts within your organization.

4. Define the terms #

Collaborate with your stakeholders to provide clear, concise definitions for each term. These definitions should be easily understood by both technical and non-technical users. Make sure to include any relevant context, such as how the term is used within the organization or in the industry.

5. Establish a governance process #

Develop a process for maintaining and updating the business glossary. This should include guidelines for adding new terms, updating existing definitions, and removing outdated terms. The governance process should also outline roles and responsibilities, such as who can propose changes and who has the authority to approve them.

6. Choose a platform #

Select a platform or tool to host your business glossary. This can be a dedicated glossary tool, a data catalog , or a simple wiki or document management system. Ensure that the platform is easily accessible to all stakeholders and allows for versioning and tracking changes.

7. Populate the glossary #

Enter the terms and their definitions into the chosen platform. Make sure that the information is well-organized and easy to navigate. Consider using categories or tags to group related terms.

8. Communicate and train #

Inform all relevant stakeholders about the existence of the business glossary and provide training on how to use it. Encourage everyone to refer to the glossary whenever they encounter unfamiliar terms or need clarification on definitions.

9. Maintain and update #

Regularly review and update the business glossary to keep it current and accurate. Encourage stakeholders to provide feedback and suggest changes as needed.

By following these steps, you’ll create a comprehensive and well-maintained business glossary that serves as a valuable resource for everyone in your organization.

Business glossary templates: Examples to help you get started #

Here are a few examples of business glossary templates to help guide you in creating your own. Each template provides a different approach to organizing and presenting terms and definitions.

Let’s dive in!

1. Simple Excel template #

A basic Spreadsheet/Excel template can be a good starting point for a business glossary. You can use software like Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets.

Term	Definition	Category	Last Updated	Updated By
Cost Center	A business unit responsible for managing and tracking costs.	Finance	2023-05-01	John Doe
Net Revenue	Total revenue minus the cost of goods sold.	Finance	2023-04-28	Jane Smith
Booking Class	A code used to categorize airline tickets by price & rules.	Travel	2023-04-25	Mike Brown

2. Wiki-style template #

A wiki-style template can be used if you prefer a more narrative approach to presenting terms and definitions. This can be created using tools like Confluence or an internal wiki system.

Cost Center

Category: Finance
Definition: A business unit responsible for managing and tracking costs.
Last Updated: 2023-05-01
Updated By: John Doe

Net Revenue

Definition: Total revenue minus the cost of goods sold.
Last Updated: 2023-04-28
Updated By: Jane Smith

Booking Class

Category: Travel
Definition: A code used to categorize airline tickets by price & rules.
Last Updated: 2023-04-25
Updated By: Mike Brown

3. Data catalog or dedicated glossary tool #

Data catalogs or dedicated glossary tools often come with built-in templates and features to help create and maintain a business glossary. These tools often provide search functionality, category organization, and version control.

Keep in mind that the chosen template should fit your organization’s needs and preferences. It should be easily accessible, simple to navigate, and allow for efficient maintenance and updates.

Scaling the most practical business glossary template #

Out of the three above-mentioned templates, the most scalable and actively maintained option would be using a data catalog or a dedicated glossary tool.

These tools are specifically designed for managing business glossaries and metadata , providing several advantages:

1. Scalability #

As your organization grows and the number of terms increases, these tools can handle the expanding volume of data without performance issues.

2. Advanced features #

Dedicated glossary tools often come with built-in features like search functionality, version control, customizable categorization, and access controls, which make it easier to manage and maintain the glossary.

3. Collaboration #

These tools allow multiple users to contribute to the glossary, suggest changes, and review updates, which promotes collaboration and helps keep the glossary current.

4. Integration #

Many data catalog and glossary tools can integrate with other data management systems, making it easier to align your business glossary with your organization’s data architecture.

While spreadsheet and wiki-style templates can be effective for smaller organizations or those with fewer terms, they may become more challenging to manage as the volume of data grows. Dedicated glossary tools offer a more robust and scalable solution that can better support the long-term needs of your organization.

Business glossary best practices: How to get it right #

A business glossary helps ensure the entire organization can understand, access, and apply common definitions to foster a cohesive and data-driven environment. To achieve this, there are some best practices one should adhere to:

Involve stakeholders from across the organization
Ensure clear and concise definitions
Standardize the format and structure
Prioritize continuous updates and maintenance
Foster accessibility and visibility
Use relatable examples and use cases
Categorize terms for easier navigation
Integrate with other data governance tools
Solicit feedback regularly
Implement a version control system

Now, let us look into each of the above best practices in detail:

1. Involve stakeholders from across the organization #

Collaborate with representatives from various departments when creating the glossary. Their insights ensure that the glossary covers all essential terms and reflects the understanding and needs of the entire organization.

2. Ensure clear and concise definitions #

Definitions should be easily understandable by all members of the organization, regardless of their technical background. Avoid jargon and ensure each definition is succinct yet comprehensive.

3. Standardize the format and structure #

To maintain consistency, it’s crucial to have a standardized format for definitions, including aspects like length, terminology, and structure. This makes it easier for users to find and understand terms.

4. Prioritize continuous updates and maintenance #

Business landscapes evolve, and so should the glossary. Regularly review and update the glossary to include new terms, refine existing definitions, and remove outdated entries.

5. Foster accessibility and visibility #

The glossary should be easily accessible to all team members, preferably through a centralized platform. Promote its existence and encourage employees to refer to it as a primary resource.

6. Use relatable examples and use cases #

Illustrative examples can make complex terms easier to grasp. Where possible, include real-world or company-specific examples to enhance clarity.

7. Categorize terms for easier navigation #

Organize terms into relevant categories or themes, allowing users to quickly locate terms related to specific topics or departments.

8. Integrate with other data governance tools #

A business glossary is a component of a broader data governance strategy. Integrate it with other tools like data dictionaries or metadata repositories to provide a holistic view of the organization’s data landscape.

9. Solicit feedback regularly #

Encourage users to provide feedback on the glossary. This can highlight areas for improvement, potential additions, or clarifications needed on existing terms.

10. Implement a version control system #

As updates are made to the glossary, it’s essential to track changes and maintain a history of revisions. This ensures transparency and allows users to understand the evolution of terms over time.

A well-structured and maintained business glossary is an invaluable asset for data-driven organizations. By following these best practices, businesses can ensure their glossary remains a relevant, user-friendly, and comprehensive tool for all stakeholders.

Books and online resources to learn about business glossaries #

Here are some books and resources that can help you learn more about business glossaries and how to create them:

“ Data Governance: How to Design, Deploy and Sustain an Effective Data Governance Program ” by John Ladley: This book provides a comprehensive guide to data governance, which includes a section on creating business glossaries.
“ The Data Catalog: Sherlock Holmes’ Data Sleuthing Adventures ” by Bonnie O’Neil and Lowell Fryman: This book covers data catalog concepts, which can help you understand how to create and maintain a business glossary within a data catalog.
“ Data Management for Researchers: Organize, maintain and share your data for research success ” by Kristin Briney: This book provides an overview of data management concepts, including data documentation and metadata, which are relevant to creating a business glossary.

Online Resources #

DAMA International (Data Management Association) - The DAMA website offers various resources on data management topics, including business glossaries. Consider becoming a member to access their library of resources, webinars, and the Data Management Body of Knowledge (DMBOK).
TDAN (The Data Administration Newsletter) - This online publication provides articles and resources on various data management topics, including business glossaries and data governance.
**Data Governance Professionals Organization - The DGPO is a membership-based organization focused on data governance, offering resources, webinars, and events that can help you learn more about business glossaries.
Online forums and communities - Platforms like LinkedIn and Reddit have dedicated groups or subreddits (such as r/datagovernance) where you can connect with other professionals, ask questions, and share resources related to business glossaries and data governance.

These books and resources should provide you with a solid foundation to learn about business glossaries and best practices for creating and maintaining them.

Rounding it all up #

Creating a business glossary is crucial to ensure clear communication, reduce misunderstandings, and facilitate better decision-making. To create a comprehensive glossary, you must identify your stakeholders, define the scope, collect and compile terms, define the terms, establish a governance process, choose a platform, populate the glossary, communicate and train, and maintain and update the glossary regularly.

A simple spreadsheet, wiki-style template, or a dedicated glossary tool are different options to create and maintain a business glossary. The selected template should be easily accessible, simple to navigate, and allow for efficient maintenance and updates. Regularly review and update the business glossary to keep it current and accurate.

If you are evaluating a business glossary tool for your team, do take Atlan for a spin - Atlan is more than a business glossary solution, it is a collaborative metadata management and data catalog tool that enables a shared understanding of data.

How to create a business glossary: Related reads #

What is Business Glossary ? - Definition, Example & 5 Common Challenges
What is a Business Data Glossary Template & How to Create One for Your Organization
Business Glossary vs. Data Catalog - Fundamentals, Use Cases, Examples & More
What Is a Data Glossary ? And Four Ways to Create a Useful One.
Glossary for Snowflake — Shared Understanding Across Teams
Data glossary - The second brain for your business
Business Glossary 101 : The Key to Data Discovery and Governance
Data Dictionary vs. Business Glossary : Definitions, Examples & Why Do They Matter?

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How to build a business glossary.

A business glossary is more than just a list of terms and definitions. The real benefit of a business glossary is that it can provide all the context around an asset so any user can understand what the asset is, who owns it, and how it has changed over time. By incorporating data governance into building a business glossary, organizations can create a common business language and give users the context they need to efficiently use data.

Be inspired by Lockheed Martin’s data-driven transformation with Collibra’s help. Read their customer story and learn how you can achieve similar results!

What are the challenges of building out a business glossary?

When rolling out a business glossary, organizations need the right tools to capture relevant definitions and relationships. They also need the right people, including subject matter experts who can contribute their tribal knowledge into a system of record. It’s about bringing all the context around the data and terminology into the business glossary, so employees can use it effectively.

Building out a business glossary requires a range of skills. An understanding of key business terms and processes is crucial. It is also vital to understand how those business terms are mapped to individual data elements, and which policies are applicable. It is therefore important that organizations draw on expertise from a range of functions to support their business glossary initiatives.

Because this process is so convoluted and requires involvement from so many different stakeholders, the biggest challenge that organizations face when building a business glossary is finding a place to start.

More often than not, organizations will try to tackle too much right from the beginning (for example, creating glossaries for multiple departments or addressing several use cases at first), but this just makes the process more complex and less scalable. The best way to address this challenge is to start small. Prioritize one use case at a time. And don’t reinvent the wheel; consider using standards such as ISO 27001 as a foundation for the business glossary.

Basics of a business glossary

Before building a business glossary, it is important to understand what it is and why organizations use them. Below are basic components of a enterprise business glossary:

Business terms and definitions – A list of data terms and their definitions. This may sound simple, but actually can become quite complex when different departments use the same terms to describe different concepts or different terms to describe the same concept. Having the terms clearly listed and accessible to all will facilitate communication and collaboration.
Reference data assets and data models – Reference data is data used to categorize other data, so it’s crucial to have reference data tied to business terms to provide context on its meaning.
Data governance policies – It is indispensable to have sufficient governance around a business glossary. This will ensure that assets in the business glossary meet organizational, industry, and regulatory standards.
Classifications – Categories for data (such as restricted or sensitive data for personally identifiable information) that help organize terms and structure the business glossary.
Data lineage – Maps that delineate what data is available, where it resides, how it flows, and who uses it.

Business glossary benefits

Business glossaries are a fundamental component of data governance programs and offer a range of benefits:

Improved understanding

Probably the clearest benefit of a business glossary is that it promotes understanding by ensuring everyone within an organization has access to clear, unambiguous definitions of business terms. In addition to business terms, business glossaries can also be expanded to include:

Key performance indicators (KPIs)
Objectives and key results (OKRs)
Other analytics relevant to the business.

Common business language

In addition to aiding understanding, business glossaries can drive consistency in interpretations, particularly when it comes to analytical business terms. For example, a term such as “customer churn” needs to be interpreted consistently for an organization to make valid comparisons across business units.

Accountability

In building out a business glossary, organizations need to find the right subject matter experts to accurately define each business term. In doing so, questions of ownership can also be answered concurrently, ensuring the right individuals are accountable for their specific domains.

Policy administration

For any large organization, it is vital to be able to set data policies at a logical level, and have those policies applied consistently across disparate physical data stores. A business glossary serves a key role within that abstraction. It allows specific business terms to be ascribed different levels of sensitivity – for example, classifying all ‘customer’ data as confidential – and ensures those properties can be applied consistently to all physical representations of those assets.

Steps for building a business glossary

Now that you understand the basics of a business glossary, here are the steps for actually building this glossary:

1. Identify critical data elements

A business glossary that goes across the enterprise can house thousands of elements and terms, but there is no need to boil the ocean when you are first building a business glossary. The first step of building a business glossary is identifying critical data elements. Consider using industry standards such as ISO 27001 and 11179 to identify and prioritize these elements.

2. Identify the owners and link those to the policies and criteria

Once you have identified these elements, you need to assign ownership to them. Who creates these elements? Who approves them? Who uses them and why?

3. Build out standard operating procedures

Next, you must create policies and standards around the elements. Here you should build and document processes to a ssure the quality and integrity of your data. At this point, you’ll see why ownership, roles and responsibilities are critical in establishing controls. Having the right experts in the room who can define appropriate thresholds allows you to avoid a “one-size-fits-all” approach that often dooms governance programs.

4. Drive adoption among the line of business (LOB)

The fourth step is driving adoption among the business users. The business glossary is only effective if people actually use it. In order to drive adoption, you must inform business users about the business glossary’s availability, educate them on how to find it and maximize its availability, and train them to follow the standards you put in place.

The purpose of a business glossary for your organization

A business glossary’s purpose is to define terminology and provide an authoritative source for the organization. All in all, organizations use business glossaries to

Create a shared language – Define and standardize roles, responsibilities and terms to facilitate a common understanding within and across teams
Promote visibility and transparency – make it easy for everyone to discover how data is used, how it’s transformed, and how to access it
Ensure consistency – Get everyone on the same page to facilitate collaboration

A business glossary helps organizations create a business ontology, allowing employees to understand various business terms and how they relate to each other. Organizations should build a business glossary to create a shared language around data and, therefore, enable employees to communicate, collaborate, and make meaningful data-driven decisions.

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What is a Business Glossary? Definition, Examples, Template

Before I dive into what a business glossary is and how best you can develop one for your organization, I want to use a famous example that shows the consequences of what happens when terms and definitions aren’t universally understood.

When Elon Musk decided to proceed with his plan to acquire Twitter for $44 billion, the deal almost fell apart because of a single metric. When examining monetizable daily active users (mDAUs), Musk questioned Twitter's calculations that claimed just 5% percent of users represented fake accounts—which couldn't be monetized. Musk predicted this number to be much higher.

When Twitter provided information regarding the methodology they used to calculate this metric, it transpired that the company was using survey data from just 100 respondents, five of which turned out to be fraudulent accounts. So what went wrong? While the term mDAU was standardized, the definition needed to be clarified, not every party concerned had a say in how the metrics were calculated, and at least one concerned party felt the methods for obtaining the data needed to be revised.

Organizing business terms and establishing a standardized model for how business users reference and define them can be a significant pain point for companies. A business glossary is an efficient, scalable, and reliable way of curating and standardizing critical business terminology for every stakeholder in an organization. That's why it has become crucial to every comprehensive data governance strategy.

Definition of a Business Glossary

Non-standardized business terms are a huge problem for companies, especially as the number of data sources and applications used by different departments grows. Business users can't work independently or collaborate on analytics tasks when there is no cohesion because the risk of flawed data is too high. And the fallout from skewed data can significantly impact brand integrity, data adoption, and compliance commitments.

A business glossary is a tool for curating your business terms and providing standardized definitions. With this authoritative source, users can rest assured that they have the right business terminology at their disposal. Curating a business glossary has become an essential part of every forward-thinking data governance strategy, and as such, there are a series of tried and tested steps that lead to the development of a reliable business glossary framework.

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Back to Basics - What Goes Into a Business Glossary

Remember that a business glossary is a place to store information about your data, but from a business or end-user perspective. A successful business glossary is going to include business terminology that refers to organizational data, and definitional information about that terminology.

Names Let's start with names of glossary elements. These could be words, phrases, acronyms, or anything that identifies a business concept for or about which we have data. In higher education we have data about applicants for admission, about student academic history, about classes scheduled and taught, about graduation or transfer information, etc. Most organizations, higher education or not, have information about employee history and performance, payroll and benefits, accounts payable and receivable, etc. It's also common to store information about alumni activities, donors and donations, facilities, fixed assets, etc.

In some cases the name of the glossary element is obvious because we always call it the same thing. And in some cases it’s obvious because the glossary element name is the same as the label for the data in its main database source. Even in this case, however, our recommendation is to use natural language conventions rather than machine conventions, i.e., no underscores, no abbreviations, etc.

In other cases the name is less obvious, perhaps because more than one office uses the same word or phrase to refer to different things, or because they use different names for what is essentially the same thing. So naming conventions are something you will have to deal with as you design and build your business glossary.

A simple naming and/or organizing convention might involve including the name of the office or business unit that uses the terminology, or if the term is widely used, then the office that is responsible for maintaining the data and managing its usage. Data about people who apply to be admitted as students is managed by your Admissions Office; data about people who apply for employment is probably managed by Human Resources. At a minimum we probably have two different definitions of “Applicant,” so a simple first step might be to identify one as “Admissions Applicant” and another as “Position Applicant” or something similar.

Of course, this practice can go many different directions and your phrasebook can look quite different as well, which is another argument for associating definitions with an office or unit so everyone can quickly tell which group of people is responsible. If I have questions or suggestions, or if I need access to data, I know where to go with these requests. (This responsibility for defining business glossary elements is one of the many things expected of data stewards, and in our view it’s one of the most important as well!) This naming distinction is more and more crucial as we pile up more and more data sources and tools to pick through data.

Definitions A business glossary works in much the same way as a writer's glossary: it helps us pick out and use the right words/names in our conversations about institutional data. So while a concise definition, such as you might find in a regular dictionary, is valuable, we believe it's also worth including information that answers questions like "why do we care about this data?" and "how does it factor into our work?" We can and often should go even further: Where does the data come from? How does it change over time? For derived values, what are the steps to derive? For calculations, what is the basis for those calculations? For variations on a theme, what are the key differences between the variations? If a data concept is known by multiple names, what are those synonyms? So in our view there’s room for a fair amount of detail in your business definition.

Let’s go back to our Human Resources office. If we want to know how desirable our organization is as an employer, we might want to know how many people applied for open positions during the past fiscal year. But wait: what does it mean to apply for a position? Does it mean to fill out an on-line application, even if the person doesn’t supply a resume or cover letter? That person would not be considered a serious candidate, would they? This could depend on the type of position and the posting requirements. We should confirm with HR before embarking on too much analysis. So our definition of “Position Applicant” may include some business rules that must be recognized before we generate any data summaries.

Technical Information Now, we can trust that our BI analysts know this information, or that they will always check with both the person making the data request and the business glossary. In a perfect world, both are true. But sometimes our HR analyst is on vacation and someone else must fill this request. Sometimes our analyst is brand new! Sometimes our data stewards have updated definitions because business operations have changed. Sometimes we are allowed to produce reports from our transactional systems, and other times we need to use another source. That sounds like a lot of variables to hope to go the right way every time. What if we just include the relevant technical information in our business glossary?

Again, this could be done several ways. The business glossary could contain a link to an element or multiple elements in an on-line data dictionary. Or it could reference a series of existing publications that contain the technical documentation we need. Or our technical definition could be a relevant snippet of code, or the name of a function or procedure. What’s critical is that analysts and other interested parties can find this information quickly and easily, and that it is consistent with our functional information.

Other Elements While you might want to store all manner of additional attributes, we will just highlight a couple of elements. Frequently, the sharing of information about individuals is governed by privacy regulations or preferences. The scope of these regulations can be elusive, and the way they affect specific database elements is not always clear. Privacy and confidentiality flags are a start, but including some kind of privacy code to elements in your business glossary doesn’t require much additional effort and may well help to keep your organization’s name out of the wrong kind of headlines!

Other benefits: we often tend to think of data quality management as a set of activities outside defining data, but consider the kinds of questions about data quality that can be resolved if the issue reporter has access to a robust, up-to-date business glossary. If my glossary tells me about expected formats, potential ranges of values, historical variations, and so on, then what looks erroneous on first glance may well have a reasonable expectation. By the same token, a complete entry for any given data element can also confirm when data quality really is a problem!

Thanks for reading this quick tour of the kinds of information we have found valuable in compiling business glossaries. Our product, the Data Cookbook , was designed with these needs in mind, and is at its heart a nimble, scalable business glossary. Hundreds of organizations have found it a useful way to capture, organize, and store information about their data, and we invite you to take a look at it. In future posts we’ll consider some methods of identifying what data needs to be described in your glossary, and some common avenues for getting started with your business glossary, whatever tools you use. Other resources regarding business glossary can be found in this blog post .

(image credit StockSnap_QUR0CQODB2_backtobasics_BP #1097)

About the Author

Aaron joined IData in 2014 after over 20 years in higher education, including more than 15 years providing analytics and decision support services. Aaron’s role at IData includes establishing data governance, training data stewards, and improving business intelligence solutions.

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Business Glossary Guide

Updated : January 2023
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Informatica business glossary overview.

Glossary Structure Example
Glossary Administrators
Glossary Content Managers
Glossary Consumers
Business Glossary Interface
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Finding Glossary Content Overview
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Look Up by Asset
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Business Glossaries - The What, the Why, and the How [Webinar + Presentation + Article]

10th December, 2019

A couple of weeks ago I had an honor to host a webinar with George Firican , a data governance & BI director at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, public speaker and founder of Lights on Data - educational blog and consulting services on data management and BI.

The webinar was titled Business Glossaries - The What, the Why, and the How and it is a good introduction into the concept of business glossaries - what they are, why each organization needs to have one, and what are the steps to implement it.

You can watch the recording from this webinar in a video attached below and read a top level summary in article below or in George's PowerPoint presentation for this webinar.

Watch webinar recording:

Watch the presentation:

So what are those business glossaries people are talking about?

Business Glossary - The What

Business glossary definition.

A collection of business terms with their unique definitions and other useful related information

Similar terms

Here are the terms you might have encountered, that are somewhat similar to the business glossary .

Business Dictionary
Business Vocabulary
Data Catalog
Data Dictionary
Business Lexicon
Business Data Dictionary
Business Semantics
Business Metadata
Metadata Repository
Business Catalog
Business Compendium

Business Glossary vs Business Dictionary

In Business Glossary the terms are unique and term has only one definition
In Business Dictionary the same term (e.g. Customer) can have multiple definitions

Business Glossary - The Why

If you want the detailed explanation of the benefits of the business glossary, please read George's article titled "What is the Business Value of a Business Glossary?" .

Short list is the following - Business Glossary:

Facilitates understanding
Improves communication across organization
Enhances training
Established ownership of the terms
Increases trust in data
Improves productivity of analytics and decision making

Business Glossary - The How

OK, so now that you know why you should get a Business Glossary right away, here is a plan to follow to implement a glossary.

1. Get buy-in

Make a business case - focus on benefits or key pain points
Get a sponsor - make sure he's high up in a hierarchy
Get a budget - ideally as a part of existing project

2. Adopt best practices

Attributes of business glossary - term name & definition, other attributes
Establish and follow naming and definition guidelines
Define process / workflow

3. Choose and gather content

Choose scope of glossary (topic & terms) and gather existing information.

4. Get a tool

Build in-house or
get a specialized tool (e.g. Collibra, Dataedo )

I hope the webinar got you enough information to give you fuel to start implementation a business glossary in your organization.

Listen to the webinar

If you want more content, here's more for you:

Upcoming webinars
Watch other past webinars
Dataedo Business Glossary documentation

If you'd like to create your own business terms, organize them into a hierarchy, map to data assets and share with your team then:

Give Dataedo Business Glossary a try (for free)

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Build and Share Business Glossary with Dataedo

Data Governance 101: How to Build a Business Glossary

Effective communication requires the use of a common language — or a shared understanding of exactly what a term, concept, or definition means, within all its uses and applications. All too often, however, given different backgrounds or presumptions, people do not share exactly the same understanding — and communication breaks down.

Ultimately, these misunderstandings can negatively impact an entire organization — and if everyone thinks they’re being perfectly understood, the cause might not ever be known, tracked, addressed, or solved

What Is a Business Glossary?

To the rescue: a business glossary — one of the many key resources that data governance programs produce to promote understanding and shared usage of language across an enterprise.

A robust business glossary defines key business terms and concepts based on a company-wide consensus — and establishes relationships between those terms and definitions that the whole organization can comprehend, use in daily operations, and report on regulatory compliance.

Beyond the audit requirements, the business glossary is meant to serve as a centralized knowledge set that documents:

the definition and usage of the business term amongst the different Lines of Business,
the physical instantiation of the data including the authoritative source,
acceptable data quality rules for measuring the business terms,
and the owners and partners responsible for creating and defining the usage of the term.

Unfortunately, creating a business glossary — which often marks the starting point of any effective formalized data governance program — is usually still seen as a manual, labor-intensive task. It doesn’t have to be.

Business Glossary Challenges

Why is building and maintaining a business glossary so difficult to achieve? If you ask any S&P 500 company, you’ll hear some common reasons:

The knowledge to create a business glossary resides in the minds of many individuals across the business and among IT professionals.
Even after we create an impressive 500-data element list with complete definitions, authoritative sources, data quality rules, and sample data, the metadata is already stale.
The business glossary has become obsolete upon completion since no one in the business will actually utilize this information for compliance with any new regulations.

All of these difficulties boil down to one central challenge: It is a time-consuming, labor-intensive, manual effort to collect, curate, and maintain the information in a business glossary.

Who Manages a Business Glossary?

While creating and maintaining a business glossary is the domain of the data steward , Chief Data Officer, and data governance office in general, many more parties are involved.

The governance program needs to rally these parties to engage in multiple efforts. Let’s take a look at what these efforts (traditionally, that is) involve.

asking for subject matter experts to document and input their definitions into a centralized spreadsheet
requiring that technology owners and operation teams contribute their understanding of the business term into the business glossary
repeating the effort until all stakeholders can weigh in and agree upon the final definition and usage
negotiating and communicating a process to agree upon the final information to be documented in the glossary
negotiating and communicating a process for ongoing changes and updates

And it doesn’t stop there.

Even after the different metadata describing the terms is documented, multiple tiers of approvers must provide input and review the glossary to ensure that all points of view on each business term are captured. It’s common for business terms to go through multiple iterations and changes — and for the process to include steering committees to review and sign-off on the definition.

Considering the vast number of data elements that must be included in a comprehensive business glossary — as well as the time and buy-in it takes for consensus at the enterprise level — manual approaches are wildly inefficient.

Furthermore, with such a prolonged, manual, and intensive effort to build a business glossary, the glossary can quickly become stale with outdated information. As additional copies of data are created, the physical instantiations of the business terms are not all captured in a manually curated business glossary — nor are all the relevant business data quality rules.

Business Glossary Vs. Data Dictionary

Business glossaries are designed to be broadly accessible across an organization. They’re geared toward business users — not technical users — and contain logical concepts that anyone in the organization can easily understand and apply. This includes information like definitions, descriptions of use, data owners, and more.

The purpose of a business glossary therefore differs from a data dictionary, which is designed for an organization’s technical users, includes column-level names and corresponding definitions, and is usually under the purview of a system owner of the database source.

Data dictionaries come in the form of spreadsheets, schemas, tables, and columns — whereas business glossaries provide context in easily accessible textual form that can quickly provide meaning to the data dictionary. However, in most cases, the two resources work together and should correspond.

The Role of a Business Glossary for Compliance

In addition to aligning company understanding, organizations use business glossaries to connect governance and compliance efforts. The glossary can be used to demonstrate adherence to data policies and regulations for reporting purposes.

Since regulators require the use of business glossaries to prove compliance to data governance programs, an organization’s need for a business glossary will never go away. With new and updated data privacy and protection regulations surfacing all the time, up-to-date business glossaries — and the comprehensive data governance programs that produce and maintain them — are more critical than ever.

Business Glossary and Data Discovery

Organizations need to leverage an AI-based, ML-driven approach that covers and finds all of their data, everywhere — and then classifies and tags it according to business needs. BigID’s automated discovery , metadata collection and analysis , and machine learning classification can:

classify data and metadata
minimize manual steps
facilitate seamless collaboration between business and technical stakeholders
align business terms with metadata

This integration can help organizations not only bridge business and technical perspectives but also leverage active metadata for a range of data governance activities.

Get a demo to see how BigID’s discovery-in-depth foundation and next-gen classification techniques can help any organization — across any industry — populate a business glossary, minimize manual steps (and potential manual error), centralize business glossary efforts to data professionals, and help build a better data governance program .

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Business Glossary Basics

Enterprises continue to grow and so does data environment complexity, including data terminology both internal and external to a particular enterprise. Consider a firm that builds computer chips for new devices. Each project may have its own Database System and Data Dictionary. Yet engineers, management, accountants, and customers need to speak the same language to […]

The Business Glossary enhances Data Governance, through an organized list of terms, with specific meanings. The Business Glossary has been discussed by many different organizations from a DAMA International Webinar to resources looking to help mitigate Data Governance Problems.

What is a Business Glossary?

A Business Glossary defines terms across a business domain, providing an authoritative source for all business operations, including its Database Systems. Although the term “Business Glossary” and “Data Dictionary” may be used interchangeably, they have different meanings. Take the Linked Data Glossary, created by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). This Business Glossary helps IT managers, Web developers and the everyday visitor understand “publishing structured data using Linked Data Principles.

The National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) have created a Linked Data Data Dictionary towards understanding the health and well-being of people living in HUD-assisted housing, by using data connected by both agencies . Thus, the W3C Linked Data Glossary can be used towards the NCHS-HUD business success integrating housing and health data by its common terminology.

As mentioned in a recent Demystifying Data Dictionary article The International Standards Organization (ISO) proposes a model for the financial industry, in Understanding the Data Dictionary. This model includes a business Metadata layer, as described by Zaino, in Metadata and Data Governance Success: The Three-Level Approach as the “definitions for the physical data that people will access in business terms.” But IT managers and people in finance need to understand this language in a Data Dictionary. The consulting of a Business Glossary, such as the Investor Glossary from the US Securities and Exchange Commission , would help understand and communicate investment terminology comprising the messages and business data elements in different database systems. This Business Glossary, in addition to a Data Dictionary, increases Big Data’s value, reducing miscommunication about what reports, generated from any Database System, related to the business, mean.

Advantages of a Business Glossary

Allows the Business to Own Terms and Meaning: Typically, clients will have a need, such as creating a medical device for patients to communicate vital measurements to clinicians. IT engineers will create an application, including a database or databases to address the desire, which would include a Data Dictionary of the database System. IT may create data elements where a patient can record blood pressure, sending it to the clinician. However, the clinician would probably not be interested in every patient’s blood pressure measurements. How will IT engineers know which values would interest a clinician? Using a Business Glossary, such as the one created by Harvard Medical School , an optimal blood pressure measurement would be defined as 120/80 mm HG or below. IT tailors the application to flag measurements above 120/80 mm HG. By creating a database system in compliance with Business Definitions (e.g. for blood pressure), data becomes more meaningful to business stakeholders not just IT.
Highlights How Vocabulary may Differ across Business Functions: Different business stakeholders define common words differently. For example, take the word “invoice.” An “invoice,” from the perspective of a consumer, may refer to the document sent that requests payment. In the IT engineer’s eyes an invoice may mean the process of creating a bill. In accounting, “invoice” may refer to the document sent to request payment of a customer. Clarification of whether an invoice data element is a physical item or a process becomes necessary when generating invoice reports. The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) defines invoice, in its research business, as a “statement of amount due on the billing terms” . Should IT, at UCSF, need to create a database system that processes payments, the UCSF glossary provides structure in defining an “Invoice Data” element.
Ensures more Trust in Data across the Business: Nothing can be more frustrating than finding out, towards the release of an application, that IT’s conception of the business need does not match what the stakeholders meant. The employees across the business think that Information Technology has not listened to them. IT may think that its clients have not communicated what was needed at the start of the database project. Having a Business Glossary, where the semantic differences in the business have been clarified, provides an excellent tool to keep everyone on the same page, when creating database systems, an application, or in updating a Data Dictionary. As IBM highlights, its Infosphere Business Glossary “improves Data Governance Programs by helping to deliver trusted information.” IBM provides an example of a Business Glossary tool to ensure business alignment across an enterprise.

Alternatives to a Business Glossary

Data or Business Glossaries do have some draw backs. First, a Business Glossary adds unneeded complexity. For example, a start-up organization of fewer 20 people may not need to sit around the table defining Business Glossary terms. So, the two or three IT employees have questions about what the word “invoice” means. Well, they can instant message or arrange a conversation with a manager or the person doubling as an account manager as to what that business term, among others, mean. Second, the process of creating a Business Glossary can lead to quibbling about details on defining a term, taking away time and resources towards being productive in a business. Here are some alternatives to the Data Glossary.

Start with a Data Dictionary: As Nicola Askham suggests in her article , use a Data Dictionary that has already been created and build the Business Glossary from there. In the process of building a Data Dictionary, stakeholders will be identified and business concepts will be hashed out as data elements are defined. Although, be aware that a Business Glossary, built using this approach, ties to a specific business context. As other business stakeholders identify different contexts and database systems the Business Glossary may need to be modified to cover these situations too. Remember a Business Glossary is driven by enterprise terminology not by specific terminologies.
Reference a Business Glossary that has Already Been Created: Why reinvent the wheel? For example, say a business provides health insurance information to individuals or small employers. The U.S. Government has already created a glossary of typical health insurance terms . Want a report on expenditure per patient? Referring to this glossary , suggests differentiating between in-patient and out-patient care. Meet with stakeholders, IT engineers and choose a reliable Business Glossary, from a relatively unbiased source, that is available.

The Business Glossary – A Specific Study

In Data Dictionaries Demystified, Data Dictionaries provided a crucial tool to success of the Human Genome Project, as mentioned by Robert Robins . Towards that end, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) has made a Data Dictionary available through the Genetic Data Commons (GDC). The GDC makes this Data Dictionary available for cancer researchers to share data. Researchers access the Data Dictionary through a Dictionary Viewer . Upon scanning the Data Dictionary Viewer, users can generate data files on “Masked Somatic Mutation” or “Exon Expression.” Unless the person reading the Dictionary Viewer understands how the business of genetics and its terminology works, this information can seem quite meaningless.

Upon consulting a Talking Glossary of Genetic Terms , as made available by the National Human Genome Research Institute, a user can make more sense of the data files generated from the Database System. The person can read about somatic cells and mutations in somatic cells or about “ Exons ” to get a better sense of what the data means in the GDC Data Dictionary.

A different user, new to genetics, who wishes to understand the genetics of Autism Spectrum Disorder may also use a Data Dictionary. The person could consult the NIMH Data Dictionary for Autistic Spectrum Disorder to find out what karyotype means in terms of autism genetic tests . A medical researcher could then look up karyotype in the Talking Glossary of Genetic Terms to get a better handle on karyotypes.

As the Talking Glossary of Genetic Terms demonstrates, understanding genetic terminology, central to its business, becomes essential in understanding the data elements in the Data Dictionary. The Business Glossary makes the technical terms described in a Data Dictionary more relevant to doing any job within that business.

What Is a Business Glossary?

Robert Agar
Updated: May 24, 2024
6 minute read

A business glossary is a collection of business terms and definitions, documented as part of a data governance program. Business glossaries provide a standardized internal vocabulary concerning data resources within an organization. With everybody working from the same definitions and from the same page, organizations can make effective use of enterprise data resources.

On this page:

Business Glossary Objectives

Benefits of creating a business glossary, business glossary vs. data dictionary, building a business glossary, business glossary automation tools.

The objective of a business glossary is to create an authoritative repository of data terms used throughout an enterprise. Business glossaries provide consistency, enabling all parties to use data resources in the same way and avoid misinterpretations resulting from data silos and disparate departments. Organizations that create a reliable business glossary enable effective and efficient use of their information assets.

Creating a business glossary provides a company with multiple benefits that include:

Enhancing data governance by increasing trust in enterprise data and aligning assets with business objectives;
Providing a framework for understanding a company’s terminology and business concepts;
Identifying how elements of the data vocabulary vary across different departments;
Maximizing the ability to use data effectively throughout an enterprise;
Reducing the risk of data that is misused due to inconsistent definitions or misunderstanding of terms;
Enabling everyone in the organization to search for and use data to further business objectives.

With a viable business glossary in place, all departments use the same terms to describe data resources. This can only help coordinate operations and streamline internal communication. Facilitating internal communication often results in smoother operations and enhanced customer satisfaction which contributes to a competitive advantage. Organizations that use their data productively are poised to achieve an advantage over less productive rivals.

The terms business glossary and data dictionary define two different types of documentation serving different purposes for data-driven enterprises.

A business glossary is designed to be used by everyone in an organization, both technical and non-technical individuals. It’s used to define business terms that pertain to a wide audience.

A data dictionary is more concerned with technical terms that may be focused on a specific domain within an organization. It describes and defines data terms and is meant to be used by a more technical audience such as data scientists or the information technology (IT) department.

The following table outlines the differences between these two important tools for organizing data resources.


	Business terms and concepts	Physical data assets
	Defining a common data vocabulary and understanding basic business concepts	Understanding data resources and databases
	A list of business terms and definitions	A list of datasets, tables, fields, and columns
	One business glossary for an organization	A separate data dictionary for each data source
	Data governance	Data modeling, database design
	The business	The business’s IT department

There will only be one business glossary for each organization. The number of data dictionaries is dependent on how many data sources are in scope.

Business glossary management is an important, business-critical task. When building a business glossary, teams need to approach its creation methodically and include the following key steps:

Identify critical data assets to seed the glossary. The number of business terms can be overwhelming and trying to address everything at once can cripple the initiative before it gets rolling.
Identify data owners and connect them to data resources. The individuals or teams that create and use data resources need to be involved in the creation of the glossary.
Build standardized operating procedures around the identified data resources. This is a collaborative exercise that requires the input of data owners and users who understand the intricacies of the assets and can communicate these details to the overall organization.
Promote the use of the glossary throughout the business. A business glossary needs to be used by everyone in the organization for it to be effective and attain its objectives.
Learn More: Top Five Benefits of Business Glossary Management

IDERA’s data modeling solutions provide organizations with the tools necessary to build and manage business glossaries. The ER/Studio family of data modeling applications helps discover data assets and offers the collaborative functionality required to create an effective glossary.

Now, building and managing business glossaries is easier than ever, thanks to purpose-built integration between ER/Studio and Collibra.

By combining the technologies of ER/Studio and Collibra, organizations can automatically exchange and pool the knowledge of data architects and data stewards. This enables data architects and stewards to synchronize business terms from ER/Studio with the business glossary in Collibra.

Synchronizing, rather than manually repopulating information saves organizations time by eliminating tedious manual tasks. But more importantly, it promotes greater accuracy and consistency, ensuring the business has a thorough account of business terms and definitions based on one source of truth.

Through the ER/Studio-Collibra integration …

Data stewards can upload logical and physical models from ER/Studio to Collibra, whereby ER/Studio adds mappings to business terms.
Data architects can send business terms from ER/Studio to Collibra, allowing data stewards to elaborate on and approve these business terms. In turn, data architects can revise the business glossary in ER/Studio with additions, updates, and deletions.
Data stewards can synchronize business terms in Collibra to ER/Studio’s repository with Collibra acting as the master. That allows data architects to use these business terms in ER/Studio to classify logical and physical modeling artifacts.

By integrating ER/Studio with Collibra, organizations can connect data architecture with data governance to form a united data ecosystem across the entire organization.

Learn more about the ER/Studio-Collibra integration.

ER/Studio is also available in the following versions:

ER/Studio Business Architect

Business Architect maps the relationships between the people, processes, and data resources that comprise the raw materials necessary for building a business glossary. Teams can create conceptual data models that capture business objectives important to the organization.

ER/Studio Data Architect

ER/Studio Data Architect is used to create logical and physical data models to be used when creating the policies and procedures necessary in a business glossary. Consistency between data models can be implemented by enforcing naming standards, making it easier to use the models across an enterprise.

Try ER/Studio Data Architect for Free!

ER/Studio Enterprise Edition

ER/Studio Enterprise Edition is a collaborative tool that uses a shared repository to ensure consistency across data models and coordinate updates. Enterprise Edition can be used to build an enterprise-wide business glossary to give organizations a common data vocabulary to further their business objectives.

Request a free demo of ER/Studio Enterprise Edition!

Organizations creating a business glossary need to use proper tools to be successful. ER/Studio furnishes the collaborative functionality teams need to develop an effective business glossary.

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Impromptu Speech

A speech that is given without any preparation, notes, or cards, is called an impromptu speech. It is often delivered at private events (e.g., weddings or birthdays) or for training presentation skills.

Manuscript Speech

For a manuscript speech, the speaker has an entire manuscript to read from. The benefit is that, as every single word is scripted, no important parts will be missed. However, speeches that are fully written down often seem unnatural and may bore the audience.

Declamation Speech

A declamation speech describes the re-giving of an important speech that has been given in the past. It is usually given with a lot of emotion and passion.

Extemporaneous Speech

An extemporaneous speech is a speech that involves little preparation, as the speaker may use notes or cards to give his talk. It is important that speakers will still use their own words and talk naturally. .

Eulogy Speech

A eulogy speech is given at a funeral. It is given by familiy members or friends of the deceased. The aim is to say goodbye and pay tribute to the person who has passed away.

Valedictory Speech

A valedictory speech is given in order to say goodbye, usually at graduation. It should inspire listeners and functions as a send-off into "real life".

.ppt file extension

A .ppt file is a presentation which was made with PowerPoint, that includes different slides with texts, images and transition effects.

.potx file extension

A .potx file is a file which contains, styles, texts, layouts and formatting of a PowerPoint (.ppt) file. It's like a template and useful if you want to have more than one presentation with the same formatting.

.pot file extension

They are used to create more PowerPoint files with the same formatting and later got replaced by .potx files.

.odp file extension

.odp files are similar to .ppt files. It's a presentation which was created with Impress and contains slides with images, texts, effects and media.

.ppsx file extension

A ppsx file is a presentation file. When you open the file the slide show opens and not the editing mode like in ppt files.

.pps file extension

A .pps file is a slide show. They are similiar to .ppt files but they open as a slide show if you double-klick them. They later got replaced by .ppsx files.

.pptm file extension

A .pptm file is a macro-enabled presentation created by MS PowerPoint which contains slides with layout, images, texts and embedded macros.

.potm file extension

A .potm file is a template for macro-enabled presentations. They are used for creating more .pptm files with the same macro settings and the same formatting.

.ppsm file extension

A .ppsm file includes one or more macro-enabled slides. They are used to show presentations with embedded macros, but not for editing them.

Learning on Demand

Learning on Demand means that the content is available extactly when it's needed by the learner

Microlearning

Microlearning means learning in small quantities. It is especially used in E-Learning.

Learning Chunk

Learning Chunk means, like Microlearning, learning in small quantities. The learning content is really small and can be absorbed quickly.

Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) are digital courses (online) with many participants (massive) that are available for free.

Web-Based-Training (WBT)

Web-Based-Training (WBT) is an older term for learnmethods that can be accessed over the internet.

A webinar is a seminar that takes place in a specific digital location at a specific time. It's a seminar that combines live and online formats.

Hybrid Learning

Hybrid learning means that one group of students are in class at school. Another group of students takes part in class from home at the same time. They both get taught at the same time.

Flipped Classroom

Flipped Classroom means that students work out the subject matter themselves at home through tasks such as reading, videos, etc. Interactive learning activities and exercises then take place in class.

Live Online Training (LOT)

In live online training, participants and teachers are not in the same physical room but in the same virtual room. This is usually possible through an online platform or a software system.

Break-out-Room

In live online training, it is sometimes useful to divide the students into small groups for certain exercises, as it would be impossible to have conversations at the same time. Break-out-rooms are used so that people can talk to each other without disturbing the others. When the exercise is over, they are sent back to the main room.

mLearning means mobile learning, which comes from "Mobile Telephone". You can access the learning material over your mobile phone anywhere, which makes learning mobile.

Asynchronous Learning

Asynchronous Learning means that the learning is time-shifted. The communication between student and teacher are time-delayed.

Tutorials are videos with instructions that show how for example a product or a software works.

A podcast is an audio or video contribution that can be listened to or viewed via the Internet. Podcasts can be used for information on specific topics but also for entertainment.

Computer Based Training (CBT)

Computer Based Traing (CBT) means digital learning programs, which work without internet. Exercises can be downloaded over the internet or can be distributed via storage media like a USB stick or a CD.

Virtual Reality

With Virtual Reality people can practice situations and important processes in a virtual room by putting on special digital glasses. They can influence what happens themselves.

Blended Learning

Blended Learning is a teaching / learning method that includes both in-person and online instruction. The technique has gained a lot of popularity, as it combines the benefits of teaching live and online, which makes it very successful, according to several studies.

Game-based Learning

Game-based learning is a popular approach where the instrument for a learning process is a game. Game-based learning scenarios are often found online - they are often favored because they engage learners in a way that few other learning methods do.

WWTBAM is an acronym for "Who wants to be a Millionaire", which is a famous quiz show that airs in several countries.

An e-lecture is a lecture that is held online. Many schools and universities offer e-lectures as technical opportunities improve.

Open Educational Resources (OER)

Open Educational Resources are free learning and teaching materials provided on the web. They have an open license (e.g., Creative Commons), which allows anyone to use and benefit from these resources.

Learning Management System (LMS)

Learning Management Systems (LMS) are online platforms that provide learning resources and support the organisation of learning processes.

Student Response System (SRS)

With Student Response Systems (SRS) it is possible to get live student feedback in the classroom. Questions and answers can usually be asked and given anonymously, which increases participation and engagement. An SRS may be used for any grade, including university.

Classroom Communication System (CCS)

A Classroom Communication System allows students and teachers to communicate efficently online. It improves students' engagement as they are animated to ask questions, give feedback and take notes. There are various companies that offer CCS solutions.

Personal Response System (PRS)

A Personal Response System (PRS) provides lecturers, presenters or teachers with the opportunity to ask a group of students or their audience questions. The questions are usually in a multiple choice format. PRS increase student engagement and provide an opportunity to receive instant feeback.

Informative Presentations

An information presentation is created when no solution is currently available. Facts, data and figures or study results are presented and current processes are described.

Instructive Presentations

Instructive Presentations are similar to informative presentations, but it's more than just giving informations. People attend instructive presentations to learn something new and to understand the topic of the presentation better.

Persuasive Presentations

A persuasive presentation is made, for example, to introduce an amendment. There are usually several options to choose from. It is particularly important to provide good arguments and reasons.

Solution Presentation

A solution has already been found during a solution presentation. The only thing that remains is to find a solution on how to realize the decision.

Concept Presentation

In a concept presentation, you have to give general information as well as try to convince the audience with good arguments and deliver a solution concept.

Motivational Presentation

A motivational presentation is meant to inspire people. In a company, for example, you could tell the company's story in a motivational presentation.

Screen presentation

A screen presentation is a graphic support and accompaniment to a spoken presentation. A popular programme for creating screen presentations is PowerPoint.

TOK Presentation

The Theory of knowledge (TOK) presentation is an essential part of the International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IB). The TOK presentation assesses a student's ability to apply theoretical thinking to real-life situations.

A pitch is a short presentation that is given with the intention of persuading someone (a person or company) to buy or invest. There are various forms of pitches, depending on the goal and intended outcome.

Audience Demographics

Audience Demographics are the characteristics of listeners like age, gender, cultural backgrounds, group affiliations and educational level. The speaker has to consider all these characteristics when adapting to an audience.

Audience Dynamics

Audience Dynamics means the motivations, attitudes, beliefs and values, which influence the listener's behaviour.

Internal Summary

Internal summary means to remind listeners about the major points which were already presented in a speech before coming to new ideas.

Internal Preview

An Internal Preview is a statement, which is made in the body of the speech, so that the audience knows what the speaker is going to discuss next.

Multimedia Presentation

A multmedia presentation is a speech in which several types of visual and audio aids are combined in the same speech with the help of computer software. .

Hybrid Audience

A mix between in-person and virtual participants for an event or a lecture is called a hybrid audience. Working with a hybrid audience may be challenging, as it requires the presenter to find ways to engage both the live and the virtual audience.

Distributed Audience

A Distributed Audience means that the audience you are trying to reach is spread over long distances.

Virtual Audience

A virtual audience consist of people who join an event / a meeting / a presentation via an electronic device (computer or smartphone) over the Internet. Each member may be located in a different place while an event takes place. Virtual audiences are becoming increasingly important as the amount of events held online is rising.

Co-located Audience

Co-located Audience means that the speaker talks to the audience in person. It is used verbal and non-verbal methods to communicate a message. The speaker makes gestures with their hands, changes their face expression and shows images.

Audience Response System (ARS)

Audience Response Systems (ARS) are technical solutions that are used in presentations in order to increase the interaction between the presenter and the audience. There are various forms of ARS that offer different features.

Glossophobia

Glossophobia means the strong fear of public speaking.

Slide Master

To create your own Template in PowerPoint it is best to use the Slide Master. After updating the Slide Master with your design, all slides (fonts, colours, images, …) adapt to those of the Slide Master.

PowerPoint Online

PowerPoint Online is the web version of PowerPoint. You can present and edit your PowerPoint presentation with it, without having PowerPoint installed on your computer. It's only necessary to have a Microsoft - or a Microsoft 365 account.

Normal view (slide view)

The normal view or slide view is the main working window in your PowerPoint presentation. You can see the slides at their full size on screen.

Outline view

The outline view in PowerPoint shows a list with the whole text of all slides on the left of the screen. There are no images and graphics displayed in this view. It's useful for editing the presentation and can also be saved as a Word document.

Slide Sorter view

The Slide Sorter view in PowerPoint shows thumbnails of all your slides in horizontal rows.The view is useful for applying global changes to several slides at once. Also it's useful for deleting and rearranging slides.

Notes Page view

The Notes Page view in PowerPoint shows a smaller version of the slide with a small area for notes underneath. In the presentation every slide has it's own space for notes. During the presentation the notes do not appear on screen. They are just visible in the presentation mode.

Master view

In the master view in PowerPoint you can edit the Slide Master.

Slide Layouts

PowerPoint has different types of Slide Layouts. Depending on which type of presentation you make, you will use more or less different slide layouts. Some Slide Types are: title slides, section heading slides, picture with caption slides, blank slides.

Slide transitions

Slide transitions are visual effects which appear in PowerPoint when one slide moves to the next. There are many different transitions, like for example fade and dissolve.

Animations in PowerPoint

Animations in PowerPoint are visual effects that are applied to different items like graphics, title or bullet points, instead of the slides. There are many different animations like: Appear, Fade, Fly in.

Effect Options

In the effect options in PowerPoint, further details can be specified for the selected effect.

Display duration

Under display duration in PowerPoint, the start of the animation, the duration, repetition and delay can be controlled.

Keynote is a programme which, like PowerPoint, is used to create digital screen presentations. It is mainly used by Apple users.

SmartArts are diagrams that convey processes, connections or hierarchies. They can also be edited individually and easily be added to your presentations.

Animated GIF

An animated GIF enables images to be played in a specific order. It is created when several individual images are saved in a GIF file.

Title Slide

The title slide is the first slide of a presentation. It usually contains a title and a subtitle.

Verbal Communication

Communication is verbal if it includes talking with other people. This can be face-to-face but also over the telephone or via Skype

Nonverbal Communication

Nonverbal communication means that the communication is based on someone's voice and body instead on the use of words.

Panel Discussion

A panel discussion is a structured conversation in front of an audience on a given topic between several people.

Vocalized pause

A vocalized pause means the pause when the silence between words is filled by the speaker with vocalizations like "um", "uh" and "er".

Vocal distractions

In vocal distractions filler words like um, er, and you know are used during a pause.

Body language

Body language is communication through movements, hand gestures and body posture.

To interview somebody means to ask a person different questions. An interview is often done by journalists.

Face-to-face

If you are talking to someone face-to-face you are directly facing each other.

Interpersonal communication

Interpersonal communication is face-to-face communication. It means that people exchange information and feelings through verbal and non-verbal messages.

Written Communication

The goal of written communication is to spread messages clear and explicit. Written Communication can be: emails, a contract, a memo, a text message or a Facebook Post.

Visual Communication

If there are used images or videos for communication, it is visual communication. Visual Communication is almost used everywhere like on television, posts on social media (Instagram, Facebook), advertisement.

Listening is a very important part of communication. To be good in communication you need to be a good listener. That doesn't mean just hearing what the other person is saying. But you need to listen active, engage your mind and intently focus on what your talking partner is saying.

Formal Communication

formal communication should be used for speeches or at work

Informal Communication

informal communication can be used when talking to your friends or your family

Online Communication

Online communication is communication over the internet. Online communication is often anonymous and over social media platforms you can communicate with people around the world.

Vertical Communication

Vertical communication means that information is passed from one person to the next according to a linear system based on their titles. This type of communication is used when a company follows a hierarchical structure or for important, sensitive information.

Horizontal Communication

Horizontal communication is the exchange of information between people, departments or units within the same level of an organisational hierarchy of a company.

Diagonal Communication

Diagonal communication means that the employees of a company communicate with each other regardless of their function and their level in the organisational hierarchy and regardless of their department within the company.

Internal Communication

Internal communication is particularly important for corporate communication. It communicates important information from leadership to staff so that they can do their jobs in the best possible way and work processes run well.

External Communication

External communication is the exchange of information between two organisations. For example, it can be an exchange with customers, clients or traders. Feedback from a customer also counts as external communication.

Closed Questions

Closed questions are followed by a short, clear answer. There are several answer options from which you can choose one or more.

Open Questions

In contrast to closed questions, the answer to open questions can be more detailed and creative. You can convey more information.

Leading Questions

Leading questions subconsciously make the respondent think in a certain direction.

Recall Questions

With recall questions, you have to remember something or something has to be recalled. Example: A teacher asks his students a question so that they remember the material from the last lesson.

Process Questions

Process questions are similar to recall questions but they need some deeper thoughts and maybe also analysis.

Hybrid Event

When an event consist of both virtual and in-person parts, this is called a hybrid event. This type of event is popular as it combines the benefits of both online and live events.

Virtual Event

Virtual events take place entirely online. They are very convenient as anyone may join from wherever they are via a smartphone or computer.

Corporate Events

A corporate event is an event organised by a company and intended for employees, stakeholders, customers, a charity event or public. The audience depends on the goal of the event.

Social Events

Social events in companys can be to celebrate an anniversary or to bond better as a team. They should address the personal interests of employees and revolve around things like entertainment and food.

Fundraising Events

The aim of fundraising events is to raise funds for a specific organisation. They are often organised by charities and non-profit organisations.

Community Events

Community events are about bringing people together, creating positive change and making new friends.

Pop-up Events

Pop-up events only last for a short period of time, such as only for one night or one month. An example: Another location of a shop is opened for only one month to extend the reach.

B2B means Business to Business. B2B events are between at least two companys. They help to build interpersonal relationships, which are important for a successful company.

B2C means Business to Customer. A B2C event is hosted by a company for its customers. It's important for gaining new customers and for satisfieing regular clients.

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What is a Presentation? Definition and examples

A presentation involves talking in front of a group of people to explain an idea, system, process, recent performance, forecast, or other topic. The person who does the explaining is the presenter and may use visual aids to help convey his or her message more effectively.

What is a presentation image for article b440o

Moscow State Technical University has the following definition of the term:

“A presentation is a formal talk to one or more persons that “presents” ideas or information in a clear, structured way. All presentations have a common objective: they are given in order to inform, train, persuade or sell”

An event with prizes or awards

The term may also refer to an event in which qualifications, prizes, or awards are formally given to people who have achieved or won them. Somebody in an office might say, for example: “Harold is retiring next week. There will be a small presentation tomorrow.”

This means that Harold’s colleagues and bosses will be there to celebrate his retirement, thank him for his good work, and possibly give him a goodbye present. Typically, in this kind of event, there are drinks and food.

Presentation of a product

In the retail business , the term refers to how a product is presented to customers, consumers, and prospects. A prospect is somebody who might well turn into a paying customer.

For example, in supermarkets, donuts and croissants are typically presented in attractive boxes to make them more desirable and enticing. Marketing and merchandising professionals often say : “When selling something, presentation is everything.”

If you are selling your home, you need to make it as attractive as possible for possible buyers. Perhaps you will paint the walls, get a gardener, and maybe redecorate the hall. A good presentation can help speed up the sale.

This article focuses on the meaning of the term when it refers to presenting information to an audience.

An effective presentation

To be effective, presenters must make the best use of their relationship with their audience. It is crucial to know the audience members well, including their needs, if you want to capture their interest and develop their understanding and cooperation.

The University of Leicester says the following about effective presenters:

“An effective presentation makes the best use of the relationship between the presenter and the audience . It takes full consideration of the audience’s needs in order to capture their interest, develop their understanding, inspire their confidence and achieve the presenter’s objectives.”

Body language in a presentation matter image 49394959

The technical term for body language is kinesic communication . Remember that your face and the rest of your body are communication with the audience as well as your words.

Here are some suggestions that will help you deliver effective presentations:

If you are passionate about your topic, your audience will notice and are much more likely to feel a connection with you.

The world’s best presenters all say that it is crucial to connect with members of the audience. The best way to do this is with passion.

What are their needs?

People have come to watch and listen to you to satisfy their needs, rather than to find out how much you know. Before you even start preparing your presentation, you must find out what their needs are.

SKILLSYOUNEED says the following regarding what you know and your audience’s needs :

“As you prepare the presentation, you always need to bear in mind what the audience needs and wants to know, not what you can tell them.”

Preparation

The best presenters in the world make sure they have prepared thoroughly for each event. Just like a good play requires rehearsals, so does presenting information or ideas to a group of people.

If you can, practice on somebody or a small group of people. Perhaps the only volunteers you can find are members of your household. That’s fine; practice on them and ask for feedback.

If you talk too fast or keep scratching your head, you will probably not be aware, but other people will. It is best to find that out beforehand.

There are literally dozens of other components of a good presentation, such as:

Having a strong opening.
Editing your script ruthlessly.
Using visual aids appropriately.
Being yourself.
Creating a structure that is easy to follow.
Making eye contact.
Distributing your eye contact equally.
Keeping it simple.
Projecting your voice effectively.
Body language.
Breathing properly.

Above all, make sure you enjoy it. If you don’t, your audience will soon realize, which is the kiss of death as far as presentations are concerned.

If you are ambitious regarding your career, eventually you will have to present to audiences. C-level executives, for example, have to do it all the time . A C-level executive is a top corporate officer in a business, such as a CEO, CIO, CFO, i.e., an executive whose job title begins with the letter ‘C’.