单选题When a firm lowers its price and total revenue increases, it tells us that ______ A．the demand for the product is price-inelastic. B．a penetration pricing strategy is being followed. C．consumers are not very responsive to price changes. D．the demand for the product is price-elastic. E．the term is using a price-skimming strategy.

单选题What might be the first significant move in negotiating process?

单选题A Quality support need be a top priority for any serious Web hosting provider. Customers, especially individuals and small businesses expect timely and informative customer support. Noting that the majority of a reseller''s clients come from this constituency, support must be a central tenant of a vendor''s offerings. Unfortunately, because most hosting resale operations are small, often resellers cannot effectively deal with incoming support requests. The result is usually an unsatisfied client base that does not obtain timely responses to their support; inquiries. B When customers cannot obtain a desired level of technical support they obviously get furious and look for change. It is thus incumbent upon the reseller to establish effective and efficient means of providing technical support to their clients in order to satisfy customer expectations. Resellers can obtain higher levels of technical support if they outsource their own support infrastructure. By outsourcing technical support functions, a reseller can actually reduce customer costs while improving customer satisfaction. C Outsourcing customer support services allows a reseller to provide technical support without the headaches or capital expense of developing, staffing and maintaining an internal help desk. At fast growing Web host reseller businesses, over 50 per cent of all incoming inquiries can be support requests. At the smallest of these Web host operations, these inquiries can detract from other essential areas of business, such as sales and marketing. By outsourcing technical support, a reseller can increase the amount of time that they dedicate to the revenue-generating components of their business. D Great deal of technical support providers now offer expert support solutions that can actually expand the complexity and breadth of support operations. Any basic provider should offer toll-free telephone support and 24-hour e-mail support inquiries at a minimum. Their inquiry supports are the most commonplace in the Web hosting industry. An excellent hosting provider however should have the capacity to offer help desk support via fax and by instant messaging. All this support should be "private labeled" as well, so that assistance provided to your customers is transparent. In other words, your technical support operator should pick up the phone as you. E Outsourcing service providers should also be able to provide customized activity reporting and bill the reseller on a per support request basis. Only on a "per-instance" basis will outsourcing customer support be an affordable proposition to a smaller Web host vendor. For this reason, resellers must ensure that they enter into an arrangement with a customer support outsourcer that is negotiable, short-term and is pro-rated based upon call volume. Outsourced technical support must be specifically tailored to your service offerings. Your customers will not be impressed with your technical support simply because it is responsive. Customers must obtain relevant assistance when they call. This can only be achieved if the technical support outsourcer has an in-depth understanding of your business operations. 0. If the customers cannot get the satisfactory technical support, they tend to be very angry. (B)

单选题Corporate social responsibility and sustainability are ethical choices that companies make about how they do business. Current thinking indicates that, as a society, we are beginning to appreciate more fully that there must be limits to our consumption of natural resources, and that business activities must take greater account of this impact on society and economies, as well as the environment in which we live. It is well documented that the corporate sector is in a position of unparalleled dominance and that the global resources of a rising number of multinational companies dwarf many of the national economies in which they operate. Market liberalisation and privatisation have created new global markets, and extended the role of the private sector in public services and civil infrastructure projects. As a result, businesses are now heavily involved in public policy issues throughout the world. For these reasons, businesses must be accountable - not just to shareholders but to consumers, employees and other stakeholders. This means that as corporations continue to grow in power, their responsibility grows too, increasing the number of ethical considerations they must face. Companies who ignore this development will increasingly find themselves challenged by different groups of stakeholders questioning the values and practices of businesses. These issues present major challenges for the role of marketing, and an opportunity for a timely response for individual marketers to consider what this means in their day-to-day work. Marketing is the guardian of the brand, so a company's marketing team must be able to take account of how social and cultural changes impact on the health of the brand. How is this to be addressed by marketers? How widely does marketing engage with the company's stakeholders? A more holistic, inclusive approach across the business is required to safeguard the brand's intangible assets of trust, goodwill and long-term value to the business. Marketers may aim to establish whether they can connect with customers in a way that extends the marketer's role beyond merely communicating the offer to prospective buyers. Marketing's role could well come to be seen more broadly in terms of connecting with stakeholders not only in terms of value, but values. In a world where intangible assets and corporate reputation are critical components of corporate success, it is inevitable that these newer approaches to marketing are becoming involved with ethics and sustainability issues. It means that marketers can enjoy new opportunities to add value to brands. There are tangible benefits to be gained in product development, innovation and competitive advantage when broader sustainability and ethical considerations are taken into account. But if marketing is about selling more and sustainability is about consuming fewer resources and producing less pollution, how on earth are marketers supposed to pursue both goals at the same time? Perhaps it's easy to overestimate the depth and scale of the opposition between these goals - and to underestimate the degree to which marketers can align traditional corporate objectives with those of ethics and sustainability. Marketing's core role is to align what the business produces to what the market wants - the route to increased sales. It all means that the firm must invest money, people and resources only in the things that add value for customers. It requires the business not to waste any effort, money or resources doing things that don't add value for users. Responsible marketing, in other words, is actually all about helping business avoid and eliminate waste, as well as continuing to manage natural or manmade resources. It is an important role for marketers and one that has not been fully recognised or appreciated in terms of potential to create innovative solutions.

单选题Build Your Team in Negotiation You are leading a negotiating team for your company, facing off with a major client to work out a price increase. You think you"re on solid footing you"ve done your homework, and you know the terms you"re looking for. But after some opening niceties, one of your team members blurts out: "Just tell us what do we need to do to get more of your business?" And at that moment, you know you"ve lost the upper hand. Gaffes like this are more common than most businesspeople would care to admit. Team members, often unwittingly, routinely undermine one another and thus their team"s across-the-table strategies. We studied 45 negotiating teams from a wide array or organisations, including ones in the finance, health care, publishing, manufacturing, telecom, and nonprofit sectors. And they told us their biggest challenges came from their own side of the table. Drawing on the lessons learned from the experiences of these teams, we offer advice on how to manage the two major obstacles to a negotiating team"s success: aligning the conflicting interests held by members of your own team and implementing a disciplined strategy at the bargaining table. Align Your Own Team"s Interests It"s not surprising that negotiating teams wrestle with internal conflicts. After all, companies send teams to the negotiating table only when issues are political or complex and require input from various technical experts, functional groups, or geographic regions. Even though team members are all technically on the same side, they often have different priorities and imagine different ideal outcomes: Business development just wants to close the deal. Finance is most concerned about costs. The legal department focuses on patents and intellectual property. Teams that ignore or fail to resolve their differences over negotiation targets, tradeoffs, concessions, and tactics will not come to the table with a coherent negotiation strategy. They risk ending up with an agreement that"s good for one part of the company but bad for another. On the basis of our research, we recommend four techniques for managing conflicts of interest within the team, internal tradeoffs they must make before they can coalesce around the highestmargin proposal. Work with constituents Underlying many conflicts of interest is the simple fact that members represent different constituencies within the organisation. People don"t want to let their departments down, so they dig in on an issue important to their constituents that might not be in the best interest of the whole company. If constituents are presented with all the facts, however, they might be willing to concede more ground because they"ll also see the bigger picture. To help get everyone on board with a single negotiation strategy, some leaders deliberately assemble teams that contain only individuals good at forming relationships across constituencies. Managers who don"t have the luxury ot choosing their team members, though, might have to go an extra mile to engage those constituencies themselves. One way is to invite important opinion leaders or decision makers to attend team planning sessions. Alternatively, team managers might have to embark on multiple rounds of bargaining with constituent departments. One manager described many times he went back and forth between the customer service department, the programme managers, and the engineers. He"d say: "OK, we need you to move a little bit more and get your number down a little bit more. We are close—just come this little extra bit."

单选题· Read the following article about negotiating and the questions on the opposite page.· For each question 15-20, mark one letter (A, B, C or D) on your Answer Sheet for the answer you choose. The ability to negotiate successfully, to reach agreements with other people or parties, is a key skill in any business. This negotiation could be with a buyer or seller and it almost always involves an element of compromise. But, when entering negotiations, you should always keep in mind that it is almost impossible to negotiate and make agreements successfully if you think you can't afford to 'lose' or walk away from what is on offer. This will result in your avoiding asking for anything more than what you think the other side will give without a dispute. You become a passive observer, with the other side dictating the terms.In most negotiations one side has more to offer than the other and proper planning can help minimise the effects of this imbalance. Decide on set limits for what you can offer before negotiations begin. There are always advantages you can offer the other side, and you clearly have benefits they want or need or they would not be negotiating with you. In fact, the buyer or seller often wants you more than you think, so it is to your advantage to try and see things from their point of view. The better you know their real needs or wants - not just the ones they have told you - the more successful you will be, and the less likely you are to fall into the trap of giving them more than you really need to.But it is also true that a concession they really need or will value from you won't cost you as much as it benefits them, and yet may still leave you with everything you want. If you know the other side must reach agreement on a deal by a certain date for financial reasons, your willingness to comply with that date could be worth a great deal of money to them, without costing you much, if anything at all. It is up to you to find out what the other side really needs.Untrained negotiators often allow their feelings to become too involved and they may take each rejection of a proposal as personal rejection. So they become angry with the other person, or blame them for failing to reach an agreement. While it is important to be yourself and, on occasion, not be afraid to express how you honestly feel, it is important to judge carefully when to do this. It is particularly important to maintain a polite and friendly personal relationship when you are facing a difficult negotiation, but keeping negative personal feelings out of negotiation doesn't mean hiding your personality.Think carefully about your negotiation schedule. Take breaks, particularly during times when you cannot agree over a particular point. But if you have to continue the negotiation on another day, make it soon, and keep the momentum of the negotiations. As long as you are still talking and meeting, you build rapport with the other party; learn more about what they need and ensure that your company is the one most likely to make the deal. This may require both patience and perseverance - but patience pays!To 'win' a negotiation then, means that neither side should feel that they have 'lost'. You should know what you can offer the other side and know exactly what they want. If you have done everything you can and the deal remains outside the limits you have defined for yourself beforehand, then walk away from it. Either way, you're a winner!

单选题A. If liability exceeds assets, negative equity exists. In an accounting context, shareholders' equity (or stockholders' equity, shareholders' funds, shareholders' capital or similar terms) re presents the remaining interest in assets of a company, spread among individual shareholders of common or preferred stock. B. Therefore, a shareholder receives a dividend in proportion to their shareholding. For the joint stock company, paying dividends is not an expense; rather, it is the division of after tax profits among shareholders. Retained earnings (profits that have not been distributed as dividends) are shown in the shareholder equity section in the company's balance sheet-the same as its issued share capital. C. At first, all the secured creditors are paid against proceeds from assets. Afterward, a series of creditors, ranked in priority sequence, have the next claim/right on the residual proceeds. Ownership equity is the last or residual claim against assets, paid only after all other creditors are paid. In such cases where even creditors could not get enough money to pay their bills, nothing is left over to reimburse owners' equity. D. Preferred stock usually carries no voting rights, but may carry a dividend and may have priority over common stock in the payment of dividends and upon liquidation. Preferred stock may have a convertibility feature into common stock. Terms of the preferred stock are stated in a "Certificate of Designation". E. At the start of a business, owners put some funding into the business to finance operations. This creates a liability on the business in the shape of capital as the business is a separate entity from its owners. Businesses can be considered, for accounting purposes, sums of liabilities and assets; this is the accounting equation.

单选题Every year British universities turn out 15,000 graduates in business studies. Many dream that they will one day be running a major business, wielding power and influencing markets. But only a very few will climb to the top and realise their fantasies. For the rest, compromise, disappointment, mediocrity and an alternative career away from the mainstream action will be their let. Peter Blackburn is chairman and chief executive of Nestle UK, which employs more than 12,000 people and has a turnover of ￡ 1.8 billion. His advice to those who wish to move ahead of the pack is as straightforward as the man. "Take all your qualifications seriously. Although many top executives do not have first-class honours and it is often a disadvantage to be an intellectual, qualifications are increasingly important, as is the quest for improvement. " "1 do feel that an international dimension helps every career. It says something about the person and if they have worked in another language, it gives a manager the important dimension of realising that each market is part of something bigger. Also it is always important in any career to keep your options open as events can take an unexpected turn. When they did for me, I acted accordingly. I still have to pinch myself to remind myself what I am doing. Even 10 years ago I didn't think this is what I would end up having achieved." "In the end, those that get right to the top retain their "people touch", which can be very difficult as one gets swept up on the fast track of corporate life. But those who never forget where they have come from and keep their feet on the ground have a real advantage. The important thing is that you should never ask someone else to do something you couldn't do yourself. I am always looking for those who have the determination, the steel to see through our corporate objectives. I also want managers who can be role models for the next generation, people who will be an inspiration." Blackburn started out working for a small confectionery company and was responsible for clearing up a major financial scandal when it was taken over by a larger company, Rowntrees. This was a project which marked him out and gave him visibility in Rowntrees. While many successful careers can easily be seen as an almost predictable procession, there are always one or two moments when success in a project promotes the executive, bringing star quality and something of an aura. However, if at the decisive moment a mistake is made, then the executive, instead of moving sharply forward, disappears into the pack and others are given their chance. When Rowntrees was later taken over by Nestle, Peter Blackburn went on television and argued against the takeover. When the dust settled, the winners rewarded their spirited adversary. "I have always believed in doing the best that I can in any situation. Sometimes you have to make difficult decisions and then it's important to meet them square on. I have been fortunate in that the evolving company that I am now involved with has always believed in strong social values and has behaved as humanely as possible when it has been forced to close or to sell one of its businesses." Peter Blackburn's career has been marked by two company takeovers. Many successful takeovers have been characterised by the new owners looking at the second layers of management and giving them a free rein. Mr. Blackburn has benefited from this process twice and says: "In both the takeovers I have been involved with, success has been achieved because the new owners have not gone in for wholesale clearouts. They have realised that it is the existing people who understand the business and they must be the platform for any growth./

单选题After three years of sluggish or no growth, Mexico's economy is set to expand by 3% to 3.5% in 2004. The US turnaround will be (21) to Mexico's outlook, since the US buys almost 88% of Mexican export.Progress can be seen in Mexico's industrial (22) Production began growing again in October and is now showing its best performance in nearly four years. A 20% depreciation of the peso against the US dollar over the past two years has helped exporters' competitiveness. The economy has also (23) from lower interest rates, a byproduct of the drop in inflation, which (24) just 3.98% in 2003.Falling rates have bolstered consumer borrowing. While hank lending to companies has (25) , consumer credit has grown some 30% in the past two to three years, and nonbank mortgage lending has also expanded significantly. Easy credit has (26) retail, auto, and home sales, though unemployment is at its highest rate since 1997.The 2004 (27) will come none too soon for President Vicente Fox, who took office in 2000 promising that Mexico would enjoy 7% annual growth by the end of his six-year term. But he still faces obstacles to reach that long-term goal. First, the Mexican congress has failed to (28) badly needed fiscal, labor, and energy reforms. That has left the federal government with a tight budget and few resources to generate more (29) growth.Second, while a limited package of energy reforms may win approval this year, more significant structural overhauls, which could add some stimulus, are unlikely. The sticking point is 11 key gubernatorial elections set for this year. Campaign rhetoric, not serious reform, will (30) Mexico's agenda this year.

单选题In the world of big business, James Linton is precocious in the extreme. Just two years into the job of reviving one of the most illustrious names in retail finance, RoCom, he has found himself a key player in one of the richest and certainly most audacious deals in the industry: PTL's takeover of RoCom. PI'L is paying 25 a share for RoCom - approximately 40 percent more than the market value of the shares - and its offer document boasted that 'PTL attaches great importance to key employees having appropriate, performance-related remuneration'. Initially wary about the takeover, Linton has now negotiated a hands-off agreement with PTL, which confirms its intention to leave him very much to his own devices to continue building the business. All this and he will not turn 38 for another fortnight! Although Linton is credited with turning RoCom around, this is more a matter of work in progress than actual achievement. Yet he does seem to have instituted the biggest top-level shake-up in its near 70-year history, promoted some big-hitters amongst key staff and transformed RoCom's way of doing business. Linton has, however, warned that the takeover is by no means a guarantee of future success; indeed, deteriorating market conditions suggest that the way forward will be anything but smooth. Linton recently ventured the hypothesis that being shareholder-owned had, in recent years, helped the business focus and argued that the sector's experience of rival takeovers was not encouraging. Indeed, the recently reported performance of rival organizations such as Maften Limited has not promoted the notion that big corporations are happy homes for experienced staff and managers such as Linton It may have been his ideas about independence that made Linton address RoCom's 900 staff on the day the takeover was announced, rather than doing high-profile media interviews on what was immediately seen as a fantastic deal for share-holders. He is acutely aware of the business is to succeed, something which is not lost on them. This is not a management-school dictum. It is a genuine belief that every member of staff has contributed to the firm and enabled it to net 1.9 billion from PTL. Other CEOs say he is arrogant, but this probably reflects the fact that Linton may find talking to them difficult. He is also ferociously intelligent, and, while in others this could appear intimidating, in Linton it awakes further admiration amongst loyal employees. They clearly do not feel they have to grovel in front of this mastermind, and claim that although he's incredibly dedicated to his work, he has an affable manner. Linton boasts that staff turnover rates at RoCom have remained low for the industry, at about 12 percent since he took over as CEO two years ago. 'People have a real affection for RoCom, and that runs right through the office here. They all want us to be number one,' he says. He is aware of the possibility that the collegiate ethos he has worked so hard to create, the meritocracy on which he thinks much of RoCom's success depends, could be destroyed if PTL is too heavy-handed. He will need all his skills to keep RoCom on course, particularly when attention has immediately focused on the possibility that Susan Marshall, its respected investment chief, might be the first casualty of the takeover. Whatever the future holds for RoCom, we are certain to go on hearing a lot more of James Linton.

单选题If one party makes a strong plausible opening in the right way, that opening can often

单选题 · You will hear part of a conversation between a management consultant and a Training Manager of Anderson，a chain supermarket，who are talking about the importance of case studies for staff train-ing． · For each question 23-30，mark one letter A，B or C for the correct answer. · You will hear the recording twice．

单选题The Internet can make the news more democratic, giving the public a chance to ask questions and seek out facts behind stories and candidates, according to the head of the largest U.S. online services. "But the greatest (21) for public participation is still in the future, " Steven Case, Chairman of American Online, told a recent meeting on Journalism and. the Internet sponsored by the Freedom Forum. (22) , some other experts often say the new technology of computers is changing the face of journalism, giving reporters (23) to more information and their readers a chance to ask questions and turn to (24) sources. "You don't have to buy a newspaper and be confined to the four corners of that paper any more, " Sam Meddis, online technology editor at USA Today, (25) about the variety of information available to computer users. But the experts noted the easy access to the Internet also (26) anyone can post information for others to see. "Anyone can say anything they want, (27) it's right or wrong, " said Case. Readers have to determine for themselves whom to trust. "ln a world of almost infinite voices, respected journalists and respected brand names will probably become more important, not (28) , " Case said. The Internet today is about (29) radio was 80 years ago, or television 50 years ago, or cable 25 years ago, he said. But it is (30) rapidly because it provides people fast access to news and a chance to comment on it.

单选题______ can reduce boredom and prepare employees for other jobs if their primary job is eliminated.

单选题If an employee receives a poor performance appraisal, the first action that should be taken is ______

单选题 · Choose the best words or phrases to fill each gap from A, B, C, or D on the opposite page. · For each question (21-30), mark one letter (A, B, C, or D) on your Answer Sheet. · There is an example at the beginning. Matching Prices to Demand—in Real Time Can an ice cream shop charge more for a cone on a hot day? Should a parking space get {{U}} {{U}} 1 {{/U}} {{/U}}as the garage fills up? Boston Consulting Group senior adviser George Stalk believes business can—and should—charge according to {{U}} {{U}} 2 {{/U}} {{/U}}. The idea builds on a longtime strategy most {{U}} {{U}} 3 {{/U}} {{/U}}the airline industry, called yield management, in which carriers {{U}} {{U}} 4 {{/U}} {{/U}}prices as planes fill up. The consultant, who in the late 1980s coined the term "time-based competition", the notion that {{U}} {{U}} 5 {{/U}} {{/U}}is a strategic weapon, thinks far more companies could take similar steps to match prices to real-time customer demand. Such moves are especially {{U}} {{U}} 6 {{/U}} {{/U}}following a year when oil and commodities prices swung wildly, he notes, "companies couldn't change prices as fast as they needed to." Stalk says existing technologies such as radio-frequency identification, GPS, and wireless networks could someday make what he calls dynamic pricing a reality. He points to Ohio auto insurer Progressive, which is expanding its MyRate program that offers discounts in return {{U}} {{U}} 7 {{/U}} {{/U}}demonstrably safe driving habits. Customers who {{U}} {{U}} 8 {{/U}} {{/U}}to the program can plug a device into their cars' diagnostic ports, often situated beneath the steering wheel. The devices then wirelessly {{U}} {{U}} 9 {{/U}} {{/U}}data to Progressive on how many miles customers travel, how fast they drive, and other factors. Progressive uses the information to offer policyholders discounts every six months for safe behaviour and, in states where it's allowed by laws, to tack {{U}} {{U}} 10 {{/U}} {{/U}}surcharges for risky driving.

单选题A. Human resource managers seek to achieve this by successfully matching the supply of skilled and qualified individuals and the capabilities of the current workforce, with the organization's ongoing and future business plans and requirements to maximize return on investment and secure future survival and success. B. These include issues such as economic climate and current and future labor market trends. On the other hand, internal influences are broadly controlled by the organization to predict, determine, and monitor—for example—the organizational culture, underpinned by management style, environmental climate, and the approach to ethical and corporate social responsibilities. C. Human Resources Development is a combination of training and education, in a broad context of adequate health and employment policies, which ensures the continual improvement and growth of the individual, the organization, and the national human resourcefulness. D. In organizations, it is important to determine both current and future organizational requirements for both core employees and the contingent workforce in terms of their skills/technical abilities, competencies, flexibility etc. E. In the corporate vision, the Human Resources Development framework views employees as an asset to the enterprise, whose value is enhanced by development, "Its primary focus is on growth and employee development... it emphasizes developing individual potential and skills" Human Resources Development in this treatment can be in-room group training, tertiary or vocational courses or mentoring and coaching by senior employees with the aim for a desired out come that develops the individual's performance.

单选题Prices firms pay for supplies or materials directly influence their ______ A．operating expenses. B．operating revenues. C．dividends. D．stockholders' equity. E．economic assets