Key term | Definition |
Adding value | The process of producing a particular good or service that is worth more than the cost of the resources used to produce it. |
Business | A decision-making organization established to produce goods and/or provide services. |
Consumers | The individuals or organizations that actually use a product. |
Customers | The individuals or organizations that purchase a product. |
Entrepreneurs | The individuals who take risks in overseeing a business organization or business venture, usually in pursuit of profit. |
Entrepreneurship | The knowledge, skills and experiences of individuals who have the capability to manage the overall production process. |
Factors of production | The collective term for the resources used in the production process, i.e. land, labour, capital and entrepreneurship. |
Finance and accounts | Function of an organization responsible for ensuring that the business has sufficient funds in order to conduct its daily operations. |
Goods | These are physical (tangible) products, such as cars, clothes, flowers, food, furniture, smartphones, and toys. |
Human resources (HR) | The business function that handles all aspects relate to the workforce, involving all aspects of a firm's operations related to staff (personnel) within an organization. |
Marketing | Business function of identifying the needs and wants of customers so that the organization can provide goods and services to meet these requirements and desires, usually in a profitable way. |
Needs | The basic necessities that an individual must have in order to survive, such as food, water, and shelter. |
Operations (or operations management) | The business function referring to the process of making goods and providing services from the available resources of a business to meet the needs and wants of its customers. |
Primary sector | Business activity involved with the extraction of natural resources, e.g. fishing, mining and agriculture. |
Production | The process of creating goods and/or services using the factors of production available to the business. |
Quaternary sector | Business activity involving the creation or sharing of knowledge and information. |
Secondary sector | Business activity involved with the manufacturing or construction of finished products. |
Services | Intangible products, such as haircuts, tourism, public transport, banking, insurance education, and healthcare. |
Tertiary sector | Business activity that involves providing services to customers, i.e. consumers and business clients. |
Value added | The numerical difference between the cost of factor inputs in the production process and the price that the final output is sold for. |
Wants | These are the desires of individual customers, i.e., the goods and services that they would like to have (rather than things they need to survive), such as a new smartphone, a family holiday in an overseas location, fresh flowers, or jewellery. |