Glossary
The HR and finance agent glossary
The Meridian glossary is 34 plain definitions of the terms behind governed AI agents in HR and finance, from agent system of record to zero-copy data sharing. Each entry opens with one citable sentence, then explains the term, how it applies, and which agents use it.
A
7 terms
- Agent gateway
- An agent gateway is the control point through which AI agents reach tools, data, and other agents, enforcing identity, policy, and logging on every call.
- Agent registry
- An agent registry is a catalog of the AI agents an organization operates, used to discover, permission, monitor, and retire them from one place.
- Agent system of record
- An agent system of record is the authoritative registry of every AI agent in an organization, recording owner, permissions, data access, and compliance status.
- Apache Iceberg
- Apache Iceberg is an open table format for large analytic datasets that gives data lake files schema evolution, time travel, and ACID transactions.
- ASC 606
- ASC 606 is the US GAAP revenue recognition standard: recognize revenue when control of goods or services transfers to the customer, under a five-step model.
- ATS (Applicant Tracking System)
- An ATS is the system that manages job requisitions, postings, applications, candidate stages, interviews, and offers through the hiring process.
- Audit evidence
- Audit evidence is the documentation and data an auditor obtains to support conclusions about financial statements or controls, such as invoices and approvals.
B
1 term
- BAA (Business Associate Agreement)
- A BAA is a contract HIPAA requires between a covered entity and a vendor that handles protected health information, defining permitted uses and safeguards.
C
2 terms
- Case deflection
- Case deflection is the share of support requests resolved by self-service or automation without a human handling a case, as a percentage of total demand.
- Consumption pricing (credits)
- Consumption pricing charges for software by the work it performs, measured in units such as credits, rather than by the number of users who have access.
D
3 terms
- Data residency
- Data residency is the requirement that data be stored and processed within a specific geographic region to satisfy privacy law, regulation, or contract.
- DPA (Data Processing Agreement)
- A DPA is a contract between a data controller and a data processor that sets out how personal data will be processed, protected, and deleted under GDPR.
- Duplicate payment detection
- Duplicate payment detection identifies supplier invoices paid or about to be paid more than once, including near-duplicates that exact-match checks miss.
E
1 term
- ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning)
- An ERP is the integrated system of record for a company's financial and operational transactions: general ledger, subledgers, procurement, and inventory.
G
2 terms
- Governed agent
- A governed agent is an AI agent confined to one workflow, permitted data, and logged actions, with human approval required for consequential decisions.
- Guardrails
- Guardrails are the enforced constraints on what an AI agent may read, do, and decide, including data scopes, approval requirements, and cost limits.
H
2 terms
- HRIS (Human Resources Information System)
- An HRIS is the system of record for employee data: jobs, managers, locations, compensation, time off, and employment status, from hire to exit.
- Human-in-the-loop
- Human-in-the-loop is a design pattern in which an automated system pauses at defined points for a person to review, approve, edit, or reject before it proceeds.
I
1 term
- ISO 27001
- ISO 27001 is the international standard for an information security management system, certifying that an organization systematically manages security risks.
J
1 term
- Job architecture
- Job architecture is the structured framework of job families, levels, titles, and pay bands an organization uses to define, compare, and pay roles consistently.
M
3 terms
- Model Context Protocol (MCP)
- The Model Context Protocol is an open standard that lets AI models and agents discover and call external tools and data sources through a common interface.
- Model-agnostic
- A model-agnostic platform runs on foundation models from multiple providers and lets the customer choose or change the model without rebuilding anything.
- Month-end close
- Month-end close is the accounting process of finalizing a period's transactions, reconciliations, accruals, and reviews so financial statements can be produced.
O
1 term
- OpenTelemetry
- OpenTelemetry is an open standard and toolkit for generating, collecting, and exporting traces, metrics, and logs to any compatible observability backend.
P
1 term
- Pay band
- A pay band is the range of base salary an organization will pay for roles at a given level and location, usually defined by a minimum, midpoint, and maximum.
R
2 terms
- Resolution time
- Resolution time is the elapsed time from when a request is opened to when it is resolved, usually reported as a median or percentile per case type.
- Revenue recognition
- Revenue recognition is the accounting principle that determines when and in what amount revenue is recorded, based on when performance obligations are met.
S
4 terms
- SCIM
- SCIM is an open standard for automatically provisioning, updating, and deprovisioning user accounts across applications from an identity provider.
- Shift coverage
- Shift coverage is the practice of keeping every scheduled shift staffed with enough qualified people, including gaps left by absences and call-outs.
- SOC 2 Type II
- SOC 2 Type II is an independent auditor's report on how effectively a service organization's security and availability controls operated over a period.
- SOX controls
- SOX controls are the internal controls over financial reporting that US public companies must design, operate, and test under Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404.
T
1 term
- Three-way match
- A three-way match is an accounts payable control that verifies a supplier invoice against the purchase order and the goods receipt before payment is approved.
V
1 term
- Variance analysis
- Variance analysis quantifies and explains the differences between planned and actual financial results by driver such as price, volume, mix, and timing.
Z
1 term
- Zero-copy data sharing
- Zero-copy data sharing lets a consumer query data in a provider's warehouse in place, with no extract or copy, so the provider's security policies still apply.
Get started
See the terms in practice.
Every definition above is something a Meridian agent does, logs, or is measured by. Book a working session and watch one run on your data.