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Glossary

Term Definition
Accountability Active acceptance of the responsibility for the diverse roles, obligations, actions, including self-regulation, and other behaviors that positively influence patient and client outcomes, the profession, and the health needs of society.
Active listening Active listening requires you to listen attentively to a speaker, understand what they’re saying, respond and reflect on what’s being said, and retain the information for later. This keeps both listener and speaker actively engaged in the conversation.
Adaptability Adaptability in the workplace means being flexible and able to change in order to become successful
Altruism Overt behavior reflects concern for the welfare and well-being of others and assumes the responsibility of placing the needs of the patients or client ahead of the professionals’ interest.
Ambition Having ambition at work means having the desire to improve in the workplace. This may mean not conforming to the way things have always been done. Ambitious people orient their efforts on goals and ways to achieve them, regardless of what others do.
Analytical skills Analytical skills are a wide-ranging set of professional qualities that include the ability to think critically, analyze data, make difficult decisions, and solve complex problems. These important skill sets all involve taking in new information and mentally processing it in a productive manner.
Business writing Business writing is a type of writing that is used in a professional setting. It is a purposeful piece of writing that conveys relevant information to the reader in a clear, concise, and effective manner. It includes client proposals, reports, memos, emails, and notices. Proficiency in business writing is a critical aspect of effective communication in the workplace.
Care/Caring Behavior that reflects concern, empathy, and consideration for the needs and values of others and a level of responsibility for someone’s well-being.
Clarity Organizational clarity is a two-way street; everyone has to participate equally. The most important thing is to make the effort. If you manage to foster a culture of clarity inside of your organization, you’ll see fewer problems, better execution, and happier, more productive teams.
Coaching Coaching refers to a method of training, counselling or instructing an individual or a group how to develop skills to enhance their productivity or overcome a performance problem. The supervisor is called a coach while the learner is called the coachee.
Collaboration The act of working together cooperatively, especially in the case management of a patient or client; including sharing responsibilities for solving problems and making decisions to formulate and carry out plans for patient care.
Collaborative Practice in health care occurs when multiple health workers from different professional backgrounds provide comprehensive services by working together synergistically along with patients, their families, caregivers, and communities to deliver the highest quality of care across settings.
Confidence The quality of being certain of your abilities or of having trust in people, plans, or the future:
Conflict resolution Conflict resolution is a way for two or more parties to find a peaceful solution to a disagreement among them.
Conscientiousness Conscientiousness is a trait that is commonly associated with awareness. Typically, conscientious people are well organized, demonstrate self-control, and can plan their time very well. They are known as great team players and diligent workers.
Cooperation Cooperation is the process of groups of organisms working or acting together for common, mutual, or some underlying benefit, as opposed to working in competition for selfish benefit.
Creativity Creativity is defined as the tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives, or possibilities that may be useful in solving problems, communicating with others, and entertaining ourselves and others.
Critical thinking Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action.
Decision-making Decision-making is the process of making choices by identifying a decision, gathering information, and assessing alternative resolutions. Using a step-by-step decision-making process can help you make more deliberate, thoughtful decisions by organizing relevant information and defining alternatives.
Determination The determination provides guidance and motivation. Determined employees are actively engaged and want the best for themselves, their team, and the company. Their determination gives them the drive to push ahead and do better.
Empathy Empathy is the ability to emotionally understand what other people feel, see things from their point of view, and imagine yourself in their place.
Etiquette The set of rules or customs that control accepted behaviour in particular social groups or social situations.
Excellence Behavior that adheres to, exceeds, or adapts best practices to provide the highest quality care; including engagement in continuous professional development.
Facilitation In business, employers use facilitation to build teams and shape leaders. The main role of a facilitator is to add value to a group planning session or meeting by keeping a group on task and making progress, which saves the employer valuable time and money. Facilitators can also help resolve conflict and manage employee concerns.

Facilitation can be done in individual sessions, or a facilitator may participate in a group event or meeting.
Friendliness Friendliness is an important communication skill and helps others receive your message more readily. An example of practicing friendliness in the workplace is including personalized messages, such as wishing someone a good evening, when communicating.
Goal setting Goal setting is a process that starts with careful consideration of what you want to achieve, and ends with a lot of hard work to actually do it. In between, there are some very well-defined steps that transcend the specifics of each goal. Knowing these steps will allow you to formulate goals that you can accomplish.
Independence Working independently is the ability to work self-sufficiently on assigned tasks. You might receive direction on projects from a supervisor or manager, but they can then trust you to accomplish tasks with little to no supervision.
Initiative Taking initiative means thinking proactively about tasks— not just to check them off a list, but to get them done well. It’s about going the extra mile on the basic tasks you’re assigned, thinking through complications, and taking on work before someone asks you to
Innovation Being innovative at work means that you contribute ideas and solutions to workplace challenges or problems. Innovators recognize when there’s a need for improvement, and they use logic, reason and creativity to come up with ways to meet those needs.
Inquisitiveness The quality of wanting to discover as much as you can about things, sometimes in a way that annoys people.
Inspirational abilities The Inspirational Leadership competency is the ability to inspire, to guide people to get the job done, to bring out their best. With inspiration, you can articulate a shared mission in a way that motivates, and offer a sense of common purpose beyond people’s day-to-day tasks.
Introspection The ability to evaluate your thoughts and emotions.
Mentorship A mentor may share with a mentee (or protege) information about his or her own career path, as well as provide guidance, motivation, emotional support, and role modeling. A mentor may help with exploring careers, setting goals, developing contacts, and identifying resources.
Motivational skills Every organization needs motivated people. They need to have the right kind of motivator for every situation. Motivation in the workplace is important for a variety of reasons.
Networking Networking usually involves meeting new people, who share a profession, industry, or interests. Networking involves exchanging ideas and information between these individuals. Unrelated to computer networking, professional networking often takes place in informal settings.
Open-mindedness Open-minded team members learn things they wouldn’t on their own and participate in greater solutions than they could come up with alone. Being open-minded helps you work through interpersonal or intra-team conflicts that arise when people work in close quarters.
Optimism Optimism is formally defined as an individual’s expectancy of positive outcomes. The importance of optimism in the workplace is having the mindset of seeing the glass as half full — and it’s one of the keys to boosting well-being and engagement.
People management People management is defined as a set of practices that encompass the end-to-end processes of talent acquisition, talent optimization, and talent retention while providing continued support for the business and guidance for the employees of an organization.
Positive thinking Positive thinking helps with stress management and can even improve your performance at work.
Prioritization Prioritization is the activity that arranges items or activities in order of importance relative to each other. In the context of medical evaluation it is the establishment of the importance or the urgency of actions that are necessary to preserve the welfare of client or patient.
Proactiveness Proactive Attitude (PA) is a personality characteristic which has implications for motivation and action. It is a belief in the rich potential of changes that can be made to improve oneself and one’s environment.
Project management Project management is the application of processes, methods, skills, knowledge and experience to achieve specific project objectives according to the project acceptance criteria within agreed parameters. Project management has final deliverables that are constrained to a finite timescale and budget.
Reliability Reliability is defined as the probability that a product, system, or service will perform its intended function adequately for a specified period of time, or will operate in a defined environment without failure.
Resilience Resilience is associated with greater job satisfaction, work happiness, organizational commitment and employee engagement. Raising resilience contributes to improved self-esteem, sense of control over life events, sense of purpose in life and improved employee interpersonal relationships.
Respect Behavior that shows regard for another person with esteem, deference, and dignity. It is a personal commitment to honor other peoples’ choices and rights regarding themselves and includes sensitivity and responsiveness to a person’s culture, gender, age, and disabilities.
Respectfulness Respect is defined as to feel or show esteem or honor for someone or something.
Risk Management Risk management is the process of identifying, assessing and controlling threats to an organization’s capital and earnings. These risks stem from a variety of sources including financial uncertainties, legal liabilities, technology issues, strategic management errors, accidents and natural disasters.
Self-awareness Self-awareness is the ability to focus on yourself and how your actions, thoughts, or emotions do or don’t align with your internal standards.
Self-regulation Self-regulation is the ability to understand and manage your own behaviour and reactions. Self-regulation helps children and teenagers learn, behave well, get along with others and become independent.
Self-starter A person who begins work or undertakes a project on his or her own initiative, without needing to be told or encouraged to do so.
Stress management Stress management offers a range of strategies to help you better deal with stress and difficulty (adversity) in your life. Managing stress can help you lead a more balanced, healthier life. Stress is an automatic physical, mental and emotional response to a challenging event.
Sympathy Sympathy is feeling bad for someone else because of something that has happened to them.
Teamwork Cooperative effort by the members of a group to achieve a common goal.
Tolerance The capacity to endure continued subjection to something such as a drug or environmental conditions without adverse reaction.