SHRM Certification Prep: Core Competencies and Knowledge Domains

Comprehensive practice flashcards covering definitions across SHRM Competencies, Organization, People, and Workplace domains.

Affiliative leadership approach

Leadership approach in which the leader creates strong relationships with and inside the team; team members are motivated by loyalty.

Attribution theory

Motivation theory that states that the way a person interprets the causes for past success or failure is related to the present level of motivation; includes theories of Heider and Weiner.

Authoritative leadership approach

Leadership approach in which the leader proposes a bold vision or solution and invites the team to join this challenge.

Behavioral theories

Category of leadership theories that states that leaders influence group members through certain behaviors; includes Blake-Mouton theory.

Coaching leadership approach

Leadership approach in which the leader focuses on developing team members' skills, believing that success comes from aligning the organization's goals with employees' personal and professional goals.

Coercive power

Power that is created when the leader can punish those who do not follow.

Expectancy theory

Motivation theory that states that effort increases in relation to one's confidence that the behavior will result in a positive outcome and reward; includes Vroom's theory.

Situational theories

Category of leadership theories that states that leaders can flex their behaviors to meet the needs of unique situations, employing both task or directive behaviors and relationship or supportive behaviors; includes Hersey-Blanchard situational leadership, Fiedler's contingency theory, and path-goal theory.

Authenticity

Ability to stay true to values and maintain integrity in both personal and professional lives and, from an organizational perspective, approach to forming and maintaining relationships with colleagues and others in the organization.

Covering

Defensive behavior that occurs when an organization recruits a diverse workforce but, consciously or otherwise, promotes assimilation rather than inclusion.

Cultural intelligence

Capacity to recognize, interpret, and behaviorally adapt to multicultural situations and contexts.

Cultural taxation

Additional workload that is generated for members of an underrepresented group due to their requested participation in I&D efforts.

Emotional intelligence (EI)

Ability to be sensitive to and understand one's own and others' emotions and impulses.

Principled negotiation

Process in which negotiators aim for mutual gain, emphasizing the need to focus on the problem instead of personal differences and on mutually beneficial outcomes.

Framing

Process of constructing a message so that an audience sees communicated facts in a certain way and is persuaded to take a certain action.

Balanced scorecard

Performance management tool that depicts an organization's overall performance, as measured against goals, lagging indicators, and leading indicators.

Force-field analysis

Tool designed to analyze the forces favoring and opposing a particular change; a group identifies and weights factors that could influence an outcome in either a negative or positive manner according to their possible impact and then uses these factors to score different opportunities.

J curve

Visualization of the impact of change on productivity. When change is introduced, there is typically a decrease in productivity and then a gradual return to or, ideally, a surpassing of previous levels of productivity.

Delphi technique

Technique that progressively collects information from a group of anonymous respondents.

Root-cause analysis

Type of analysis that starts with a result and then works backward to identify fundamental cause.

Center of excellence (COE)

An organizational structure that leverages staff expertise in certain areas to improve the entire organization's strategic performance.

Cosourcing

Arrangement in which an enterprise and a vendor share different tasks within a larger complex, often strategic responsibility.

Dedicated HR

HR structural alternative that allows organizations with different strategies in multiple units to apply HR expertise to each unit's specific strategic needs.

Functional HR

HR structural alternative in which headquarters HR specialists craft policies and HR generalists located within divisions or other locales implement the policies, adapt them as needed, and interact with employees.

Shared services HR model

HR structural alternative in which centers with specific areas of expertise develop HR policies in those areas; each unit can then select what it needs from a menu of these services.

Matrix structure

Organizational structure that combines departmentalization by division and function to gain the benefits of both; results in some employees reporting to two managers rather than one, with neither manager assuming a superior role.

Organizational development

Process of enhancing the effectiveness and efficiency of an organization and the well-being of its members through planned interventions.

Co-employment

Situation in which an organization shares responsibility and liability for its alternative workers with an alternative staffing supplier; also known as joint employment.

Judgmental forecasts

Use of information from past and present to predict future conditions.

Succession planning

Process of implementing a talent management strategy for identifying and fostering the development of high-potential employees or other job candidates who, over time, may move into leadership positions of increased responsibility.

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR)

Umbrella term for the various approaches and techniques, other than litigation, that can be used to resolve a dispute.

Constructive discipline

Form of corrective discipline that implements increasingly severe penalties for employees.

Lockout

Action of an employer to shut down operations to prevent employees from working.

Unfair labor practice (ULP)

Violation of employee rights; act prohibited under labor relations statutes.

Work-to-rule

Situation in which workers slow processes by performing tasks exactly to specifications or according to job or task descriptions.

Software as a service (SaaS)

Software that is owned, delivered, and managed remotely and delivered over the Internet to contracted customers on a pay-for-use basis or as a subscription based on use metrics.

Benchmarking

Process by which an organization identifies performance gaps and sets goals for performance improvement by comparing its data, performance levels, and/or processes against those of other organizations.

Environmental scanning

Process that involves a systematic survey and interpretation of relevant data to identify external opportunities and threats and to assess how these factors affect the organization currently and how they are likely to affect the organization in the future.

PESTLE analysis

Scanning process that searches for environmental forces in political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental categories.

SWOT analysis

Method for assessment of an organization's strategic capabilities through use of the environmental scanning process, by which internal and external factors affecting achievement of organizational goals are identified and considered.

Strategic fit

State in which an organization's strategy is consistent with its external opportunities and circumstances and its internal structure, resources, and capabilities.

Employee value proposition (EVP)

Employees' perceived value of the total rewards and tangible and intangible benefits they receive from the organization as part of employment, which drives unique and compelling organizational strategies for talent acquisition, retention, and engagement.

Realistic job preview (RJP)

Tool used to provide a job applicant with honest, complete information about a job and the work environment.

Stay interviews

Structured conversations with employees for the purpose of determining which aspects of a job encourage employee retention or may be improved to do so.

ADDIE model

Instructional systems design framework consisting of five steps that guide the design and development of learning programs.

Successive approximation model (SAM)

Instructional design model that works to gain feedback and build models early in the process; generally has three phases: preparation, iterative design, and iterative development.

Dual career ladders

Career development programs that identify meaningful career paths for professional and technical people outside traditional management roles.

Compa-ratio

Pay rate divided by the midpoint of the pay range: $\text{Compa-ratio} = \frac{\text{Pay Rate}}{\text{Midpoint of Pay Range}}$.

Broadbanding

Combining several salary grades or job classifications with narrow pay ranges into one band with a wider salary spread.

Red-circle rates

Situations in which employees' pay is above the range maximum.

Green-circle rates

Situations in which an employee's pay is below the minimum of the range.

Point-factor system

Job evaluation method that looks at compensable factors (such as skills and working conditions) that reflect how much a job adds value to the organization; points are assigned to each factor and then added to come up with an overall point value for the job.

Global integration (GI)

Globalization strategy that emphasizes consistency of approach, standardization of processes, and a common corporate culture across global operations.

Local responsiveness (LR)

Globalization strategy that emphasizes adapting to the needs of local markets and allows subsidiaries to develop unique products, structures, and systems.

Duty of care

Principle that organizations should take all steps that are reasonably possible to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of employees and protect them from foreseeable injury.

Single loss expectancy (SLE)

Expected monetary loss every time a risk occurs; calculated by multiplying asset value by exposure factor ($\text{SLE} = \text{Asset Value} \times \text{Exposure Factor}$).

Annualized loss expectancy (ALE)

Expected monetary loss for an asset due to a risk over a $1$-year period; calculated by multiplying single loss expectancy by annualized rate of occurrence ($\text{ALE} = \text{SLE} \times \text{ARO}$).

Moral hazard

Situation in which one party engages in risky behavior knowing that it is protected against the risk because another party will incur any resulting loss.

Principal-agent problem

Situation in which an agent (for example, an employee) makes decisions for a principal (for example, an employer) potentially on the basis of personal incentives that may not be aligned with the principal's incentives.

Triple bottom line

Economic, social, and environmental impact metrics used to determine an organization's success.

Disparate impact

Type of discrimination that results when a policy that appears to be neutral has a discriminatory effect; also known as adverse impact.

Disparate treatment

Type of discrimination that occurs when an applicant or employee is treated differently because of his or her membership in a protected class.

Bona fide occupational qualification (BFOQ)

Factor (such as religion, gender, national origin, etc.) that is reasonably necessary, in the normal operations of an organization, to carry out a particular job function.

Burlington Industries, Inc. v. Ellerth

U.S. court ruling that distinguished between supervisor harassment that results in tangible employment action and supervisor harassment that does not.

Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA)

U.S. act that provides individuals and dependents who may lose health-care coverage with opportunity to pay to continue coverage.

Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act

U.S. act that requires some employers to give a minimum of $60\,\text{days}$ notice if a plant is to close or if mass layoffs will occur.

Weingarten rights

Union employees' right in U.S. to have a union representative or coworker present during an investigatory interview.

Workweek

Any fixed, recurring period of $168\,\text{consecutive hours}$ ($7\,\text{days} \times 24\,\text{hours} = 168\,\text{hours}$).