A list of business acronyms that every consultant should know
Finance – Investments
| CAPM | Capital Asset Pricing Model |
| DCF | Discounted Cash Flow |
| FCF | Free Cash Flow |
| IRR | Internal Rate of Return |
| NPV | Net Present Value |
| ROI | Return On Investment |
| WACC | Weighted Average Cost of Capital |
Finance – Deals
| IPO | Initial Placement Offer |
| LBO | Leveraged Buy-Out |
| MBO | Management Buy-Out |
| M&A | Mergers and Acquisitions |
| NDA | Non-Disclosure Agreement |
| PER | Price/Earnings Ratio |
Finance – Profitability
| EBIT | Earnings Before Interest and Tax |
| EBITDA | Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortisation |
| EPS | Earnings Per Share |
| GM% | Gross Margin % |
| NOPLAT | Net Operating Profit Less Adjusted Taxes |
| ROA | Return on Assets |
| ROCE | Return on Capital Employed |
| TSR | Total Shareholder Return |
Finance – Accounting
| ABC | Activity Based Costing |
| COGS | Cost Of Goods Sold |
| GAAP | Generally Accepted Accounting Principles |
Operations
| JIT | Just In Time |
| QC | Quality Control |
| SCM | Supply Chain Management |
| TQM | Total Quality Management |
| WIP | Work In Progress |
Economics
| BRICs | Brazil, Russia, India and China |
| FDI | Foreign Direct Investment |
| GDP | Gross Domestic Product |
| PPP | Purchasing Power Parity |
Marketing
| CPC | Cost Per Click |
| CPM | Cost Per Mille (1000 views) |
| WOM | Word of Mouth |
| ECR | Efficient Consumer Response |
| RTM | Route-To-Market |
| USP | Unique Selling Proposition |
Statistical
| APR | Annual Percentage Return |
| CAGR | Composite Annual Growth Rate |
| YOY | Year On Year |
Strategic
| BHAG | Big Hairy Audacious Goal |
| B2B | Business-to-Business |
| B2C | Business-to-Consumer |
| BSC | Balanced ScoreCard |
| CSR | Corporate Social Responsibility |
| KPI | Key Performance Indicator |
| KSF | Key Success Factor |
| MNC | Multi-National Corporation |
| OEM | Original Equipment Manufacturer |
| PEST | Political, Economic, Social, Technological |
| SME | Small/Medium Enterprises |
| SWOT | Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunity, Threats |
IT
| API | Application Programming Interface |
| BPO | Business Process Outsourcing |
| BPR | Business Process Re-engineering |
| CRM | Customer Relationship Management |
| ERP | Enterprise Resource Planning |
| P2P | Peer-to-Peer |
| SAAS | Software-As-A-Service |
| SDK | Software Development Kit |
Consulting Toolkit 