Biometrics
Verifying an individual's identity through unique physical characteristics (fingerprints, iris/retina/voice patterns, facial/hand contour and so on). Accenture Technology Labs leads in the development of commercial solutions using biometric technology.

Best People
An Accenture core value that is based on the following:

• Seek opportunities to develop leading-edge skills on your team.
• Recognize and value diversity; build teams that offer diverse perspectives to our clients.
• Provide honest and timely feedback—formal and informal—to your team.
• Take time to integrate new hires to the organization and new team members to your projects.
• Take responsibility for your career development.
  

Board of Directors
The Board of Directors manages the business affairs of Accenture, which includes approving and overseeing our overall business strategy and appointing management to carry out that strategy.

Bold Growth
See Strategic imperatives.

BRIC
Refers to the economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China, economies which are leading the emergence of what Accenture calls the multi-polar world.

Building Blocks of High Performance
As identified by the Accenture High Performance Business initiative, the three building blocks of high performance are market focus and position, which is about exploiting growth opportunities; distinctive capabilities, which is about creating differentiation; and performance anatomy, which is about out-executing the competition. Find out more.

Bundled Outsourcing
See outsourcing.

Business Areas
Accenture’s principal areas of business are consulting, technology and outsourcing; this is reflected in the strategy line on all branded materials.

Buddy
New Accenture employees are assigned a buddy as an informal mentor. Buddies are generally people who have been with the company a year or two, and thus know exactly what kind of information a new employee needs—and the new hire need have no embarrassment about asking “silly” questions. The system is designed to facilitate integration. See also analyst training program, career counselor and start group.

Business Architecture and Operations
This organization has primary responsibility for coordinating activities to achieve the initiatives under Accenture's operational excellence imperative.

Business Consulting
See Management Consulting.

Business intelligence (BI)
Business intelligence solutions help companies aggregate data derived from their day-to-day operations and from external sources (e.g., economic forecasts, geo-political analysis, weather patterns) and then turn it into information that users can customize easily to meet their specific business needs.

Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Growth Platform
In September 2009, Accenture announced the creation of a new Business Process Outsourcing growth platform. It brings together all our cross-industry and industry-specific BPO services, including the 20,000+ people from the Delivery Center Network (DCN) for BPO. As one fully integrated BPO team we are much better positioned to help serve our clients and respond to their changing needs with more differentiated capabilities and offerings.

Business Systems and Integration
Consultants in Business Systems and Integration Consulting are responsible for large-scale, complex programs that marry processes with technology. They specialize in the design, development, integration and delivery of functional and industry solutions and processes for clients based on existing packages such as SAP, PeopleSoft, Retek or custom-built systems. See also Consulting, Business Consulting.