BPO is short for business process outsourcing. It is the practice of asking people outside a company — often another firm, sometimes in another country — to take charge of running a whole slice of the company's day-to-day work. That slice is usually a process: answering phones, keeping the accounts, handling staff paperwork, or running a computer help desk. The company still owns the business; it just does not do that part itself. You will hear BPO in business talk and in news about jobs. It is a dry, formal abbreviation, not a word for home conversation.