单选题In open-book management, the compensation of employees is typically aligned with their contribution to the firm"s ______
单选题______ represents the collective consumer demand that businesses satisfy their needs. A.Conservationism. B.Consumerism. C.Social responsibility. D.Business ethics. E.Recycling.
单选题· Road the article about the European Monetary Union and the questions
below.· For each question 15—20, mark one letter (A, B, C or D) for the
answer you choose.
With euro bills and coins now
circulating across much of Europe, the European Monetary Union is fully in
place. The post-World War Ⅱ European leaders' dream of an economically and
politically unified continent is one large step closer to realization, and
membership in the monetary union could easily grow to 20 or more countries from
the current 12 as the large European Union expands to the east. A fully
operational European Monetary Union does not come, however, with a guarantee of
success. There is one enormous problem: This union creates a single monetary
policy for group of quite different national economies that often experience
divergent business-cycle patterns. As long as business-cycle
conditions differ significantly among European Monetary Union countries, there
is no way for the central bank's policies to avoid creating serious problems for
some members. The patterns of economic ups and downs remain far more diverse in
the European Monetary Union countries, and it is not clear that this will change
soon. The designers of the monetary union thought that the demand of a single
monetary policy, combined with free trade a mong the members, would cause
cyclical conditions to converge quickly, producing a unified group of
economies. A 1997 agreement also limits the power of the
individual nations in the European Monetary Union to use government spending or
tax cuts to ease national downturns. They can be fined if they run budget
deficits of more than 3 percent of their gross domestic products. No fines have
been levied yet, but the threat is there. Even if the economies
of the original European Monetary Union members become more similar in their
cyclical behavior, it will take far longer for the convergence to include the
new member nations expected to come in within the next 10 or 15 years. The
chances for consensus on the Governing Council, however thin now, will become
far more distant with more members representing divergent national economies.
And the larger nations, like Germany, France and Italy, might well resent the
power of representatives from much smaller nations to outvote them on monetary
policy. All of this does not mean that the European Monetary
Union is likely to fail. But clearly the arrival of the euro as the standard
currency does net guarantee the union's success.
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单选题Chadwick's, the struggling high street food retailer, has been having a horrible time. Not only did its recent takeover of cash-and-carry chain DeeDee create more problems than it solved, but its risky move into organic-only, own-label frozen vegetables nudged prices up and alienated traditional customers. Sales fell sharply, with dire effects on suppliers who had geared up to meet Chadwick's much larger orders – not to mention the group's profits. As a result investors lost their initial confidence in the plan and the share price tumbled. The architect of this policy, the former Chief Executive, abruptly departed last January, and Carl Hammond was brought in to pick up the pieces. Mr Hammond sees the corporate culture as a major barrier to a revival in the group's fortunes, and is making strenuous efforts to change it. Today's event is one part of the process: the delegates - over a thousand of them - are all managers, whose attitude to company policy is crucial to its implementation. By setting out his recovery strategy face to face, he hopes to get the managers on board, and equip them to carry the right messages back to the group's 20,000 employees. He believes this is essential if the group is to turn around its declining sales. The format he has chosen is one that Mr Hammond has no experience of. 'Normally I use traditional conference-style presentations with speeches, or television studio arrangements with well-known TV journalists to tease out the issues, ' he says. These are quite easy to organise but they are net participatory. Today's event is much less predictable, but ironically it's been a nightmare to choreograph everything in such a way as to encourage spontaneity.' First, delegates are sent to booths around the hall to learn from senior managers about the effects of the takeover on each part of the business, and why some functions, such as finance and logistics, are being integrated at group level. The senior managers then fire questions at the delegates to reinforce the learning process. Done at breakneck speed, it keeps everyone on their toes, and there's a definite buzz in the hall. Several other activities follow, and after lunch comes the main event, a 2g-minute session in which Mr Hammond answers questions from delegates, covering pay scales, investors' attitudes, to the recovery strategy, possible job losses, and so on. The reaction of one store manager, Carol Brinkley, sums it up: 'It was quite demanding, with lots of people eager to ask questions, so he didn't always go into as much depth as perhaps he should have done. But at least everything that I was hoping to find out was touched on, and he came across as being quite approachable and willing to accept criticism.' Mr Hammond believes the event was effective in getting important messages across to a large number of people, and in raising their morale, which had been appallingly low. The questions that he was asked confirmed his belief that many managers were unhappy with what had been going on in the group and were optimistic about the new strategy - though few of the suggestions which they made took the broader picture into account. He admits that the novel format pushed him outside his comfort zone. 'I'm a control freak, like most chief executives,' he says. 'But now I realise that the group depends on the managers to keep it going: my role is to provide them with the tools.' For a control freak it is a remarkably 'hands-off' message.
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单选题In addition to linking compensation with performance, some firms grant employees ______ for good performance.
单选题Monopolv is one points the peculiar (21) .which can affect the sale and purchase of certain commodities.In some markets,there may be only one seller or a (22) .of sellers working very closely together to control prices.The result of such monopolistic activitv is to fix prices at a level (23) to the seller,a level which may bring him artificially high profits.Many governments dislike this procedure and have taken legal actions to (24) .or halt such business activities.In the U.S.anti-trust laws operate to limit cartels and mergers. (25) in Britain the Monopolies Commission examines all special arrangements and mergers referred to them by the Board of Trade. This type of monopoly is not the only (26) ,however.There are three other forms:state,legal and natural.State monopolies are quite common nowadays,where the (27) in a particular country control industries like steel and transport or important and prestigious revises like national airlines.Legal monopolies are rather different,because the law permits certain individuals to (28) solely from their special inventions,discoveries or processes.Ne other person may infringe their rights in respect to (29) monopolies. Finally,natural monopoly (30) where a nation or individual possesses most of a particular mineral for reasons of geography and geology.
单选题Not long ago innovation was The Big Idea in marketing circles. Now, however, it's hard to see the benefits of this rush to innovate. Indeed if anything, companies seem to be drawing back from innovation, not charging ahead. But just a few years ago many companies were combining a commitment to create entirely new product categories through innovative technologies - working to hugely ambitious growth targets -with a root-and-branch organisational overhaul designed to free up creativity and speed new product roll-outs. The result was that as resources were shifted away from core businesses, sales and profits faltered, share prices slumped and CEOs were ousted. Now the mantra is a more conservative focus on the top brands, the top retail customers and the top markets. It's being rewarded in many cases by healthier share prices. This sustained effort to cut long tails of smaller brands and focus marketing resource on existing leaders seems to be paying off. So were we wrong to pinpoint innovation as key to tong-term market success? Surely not. But we might have underestimated the enormous complexity of this beast. The term 'innovation' may be simple enough but it spans a vast landscape, including the type and degree of innovation, marketing purpose, management process and market circumstance - not all of which are well understood. Take 'type' of innovation. Are we talking about new products only? Or new processes, new channels, underlying technologies, organisational structures and business models? When should the innovation involve a new brand? Or take 'degree'. Are we aiming for blue-sky inventions that will transform markets and create new categories? Or marginal tweaks in, say, formulation or packaging that give us an excuse to advertise something 'New! Improved!'? Likewise, is the marketing purpose of the project to steal a march on competitors and drive incremental growth, or to update an obsolete product line and play catch-up to competitors? As one business news editorial complained, 'innovation' is often just 'simple proliferation of similar products'. Then there's process. What is the best way to manage this particular innovation? Is it to employ creative revolutionaries and set them free, or is disciplined risk management, requiring the careful testing and sifting of options to pick winners, a better approach? In larger organisations, has, senior management really made time spent in cross4unctional teams a recognised element of successful career paths? What time frames (eg payback periods) and degrees of risk is senior management comfortable with? And does the organisation have a culture that fits the chosen approach? Does it 'celebrate failure', for example, or is it actually a risk-averse blame culture (despite what the CEO says in the annual report)? Successful innovation requires clearing two hurdles. First, it needs the right project with the right degree of innovation to fit with the right marketing purpose, the right innovation process, corporate culture and market circumstance. Second, it needs senior managers that understand the interplay between these different factors, so that rather than coming together simply by chance, they are deliberately brought together in different ways to meet different circumstances. Clearing Hurdle Two can happen 'by accident'. Clearing Hurdle One requires real skill We can all point to admirable, inspiring innovations. But how many companies can we point to and say, 'these people have mastered the art of innovation'? Brilliant innovations are a wonderful thing, Expert innovation management is even better and much rarer.
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{{B}}Task Two-Sources of
Funding{{/B}} ·For questions 18-22, match the extracts with the
sources of funding, listed A-H. ·For each extract, choose the
source of funding described. ·Write one letter (A-H) next to the
number of the extract. A a student's parent's
money B the sale of the owner's property C
money from friends and a loan from a bank D money from his
parents E his own money and money borrowed from
relatives F money from the government G
no financial investment H the deposit from the bank
only
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单选题 · Choose the correct word 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. Today the need to 'go global' and to cut
outgoings is demanding that companies combine protecting international interests
whilst keeping down staff {{U}} {{U}} 1 {{/U}} {{/U}}The
solution in most cases has been the forming of intercultural teams.
Undoubtedly, the intercultural dimension of today's teams brings about
new challenges. Successful team building not only {{U}} {{U}} 2
{{/U}} {{/U}}the traditional needs to harmonise personalities but also
languages, cultures, ways of thinking, behaviours and motivations.
The key to successful intercultural team building lies {{U}}
{{U}} 3 {{/U}} {{/U}}intercultural training. It is one method of
helping to blend a team together. Through analysis of the cultures involved in a
team, their particular approaches to communication and business and how the team
interacts, intercultural team builders are able to find, suggest and use common
ground to {{U}} {{U}} 4 {{/U}} {{/U}}team members in building
harmonious relationships. It helps a team to realise their differences and
{{U}} {{U}} 5 {{/U}} {{/U}}in areas such as status, hierarchy,
decision making, conflict resolution, showing emotion and relationship building
in order to create mutually agreed upon structures of communication and
interaction. From this {{U}} {{U}} 6 {{/U}} {{/U}} teams
are then tutored how to recognise future communication difficulties and their
cultural roots, empowering the team to become more self-reliant. The end result
is a more cohesive and productive team. In conclusion, for
intercultural teams to succeed, it is important to stay {{U}} {{U}}
7 {{/U}} {{/U}}to the need for intercultural training to help cultivate
{{U}} {{U}} 8 {{/U}} {{/U}}relationships. Companies must be
supportive, proactive and innovative. This goes {{U}} {{U}} 9
{{/U}} {{/U}}financing and creating technological links to bring together
intercultural teams at surface level and going back to basics by {{U}}
{{U}} 10 {{/U}} {{/U}}better interpersonal communication. If
international businesses are to grow and prosper in this ever contracting world,
intercultural synergy must be a priority.
单选题 How do you teach managers to manage? Henry Mintzberg, a
professor of management at McGill University in Montreal, has long held a
contrary view to that proposed by most business schools. In this constantly
stimulating book he divides his answer into two parts: first, he argues that the
traditional qualification, the Masters of Business Administration (MBA), is the
wrong way-he says it "prepares people to manage nothing". Then he expounds what
he believes is the right way: an imprecise mix of personal reflection and the
sharing of experience.Mr Mintzberg finds fault with the emphasis that
many MBA programs place on frenetic case studies which encourage students to
come up with rapid answers based on meagre data. But more than that, he
criticizes them for their concentration on dry analysis. Such courses, he says,
enable their graduates to "speak convincingly in a group of 40 to 90 people",
and make them believe they can leapfrog over experience. That, though, is not
the sum total of what is required to manage a complex commercial
organization.Synthesis, not analysis, argues Mr Mintzberg, "is the very
essence of management". On several occasions he cites Robert McNamara, once
president of the Ford Motor Company and a United States secretary of defense in
the 1960s, as the archetypal MBA, a man who thought that even in Vietnam
"generic analysis could substitute for situational knowledge". More recently,
the qualification has been thrown into deeper disrepute by the heavy dependence
of companies such as Enron on MBA recruits. Its former chief executive Jeffrey
Skilling, currently awaiting trial on 36 charges of fraud and insider trading,
liked to boast that he came in the top 5% of his MBA class at the Harvard
Business School.And yet, if the MBA is so bad at teaching management,
how come America has far more successful businesses than Europe and Japan, areas
of the world that are significantly less enthusiastic about such methods of
learning? Leaving aside the unprovable rejoinder that American firms would have
done even better without the MBA, Mr Mintzberg argues that any list of America's
most admired corporate leaders is heavily loaded with people who don't have the
qualification: Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Jack Welch, Michael Dell and Andy
Grove, to name but a few. The fact that some 40% of the bosses of America's
biggest companies today have an MBA is, he claims, largely due to the fact that
the system is self-perpetuating. "Enabling Harvard to place so many people at
the top is the fact that Harvard already has so many people at the
top."Mr Mintzberg is not alone these days in questioning the value of
the traditional MBA. Leading consultants such as McKinsey and Mercer are
spreading their recruitment net much more widely. Mercer's London office says
that one year's in-house training enables young graduates to "run circles round
newly minted MBAs". In its February issue, the Harvard Business Review (no less)
said that "an arts degree is now perhaps the hottest credential in the world of
business", with corporate recruiters trawling places such as the Rhode Island
School of Design."Managers not MBAs" throws a stone into the often
complacent world of management education. It should be required reading for
anyone who has the qualification, wants one, or just wonders what all the fuss
is about.
单选题{{B}}How to approach Reading Test Part Three{{/B}}· in this part of the
Reading Test you read a longer text and answer six questions.· First read
the questions. Try to get an idea of what the text will be about. Then read the
text for general understanding.· Then read the text and questions more
carefully, choosing the best answer to each question. Do not choose an answer
just because you can see the same words in the text.· Read the article on
the opposite page about interim managers who work for companies on short
assignments and the questions below.· For each question 15 - 20, mark one
letter (A, B, C or D) on your Answer Sheet for the answer you choose.
John Tiernan has spent five years
trouble-shooting as an interim manager, hired on short-term assignments by a
variety of companies to sort out their problems. He has no desire to return to
the certainties of a permanent position, because now, whichever company he is
working for, he is perpetually involved in a meaningful task that's critical to
the business at that time. Though he admits that sorting out the aftermath of
other people's misjudgments can be frustrating. At first he found the gaps
between jobs traumatic, but now he has got used to them, so when a job ends he
simply books a holiday. Mr Tiernan is part of a relatively small
pool of managers used by agency BIE. Whereas most suppliers of interim
managers have large databases, which they tap into in order to match a manager's
qualifications and experience with a client company's requirements, BIE tries to
develop a good understanding of its managers' personalities and of hew they are
likely to fit into a company through interviews and from feedback on their
previous assignments. He is very happy with the way the agency treats him,
though he admits that he has no idea how this compares with other agencies. One
advantage he finds of being one of a small number of managers is that they can
get to know each other well, through the agency's social and professional
development activities. Interim jobs are frequently highly
pressured and can be uncomfortable. John Tiernan was recently brought in to
improve customer service at a division of Jarvis Porter Group, a printing and
packaging company. Initial resistance from staff fairly soon melted away, but
then Mr Tiernan realised that the division's trading position was unsustainable,
and it soon became clear that what was needed was a shutdown, not a rescue. Mr
Tiernan managed the closure, in which about 250 jobs were lost.
The secret is always to keep channels of communication open. Making
oneself known to the whole range of employees is useful, although it may net be
enough to prove one's value to the company. Keeping the company's Chief
Executive informed is essential for the interim manager's actions to be
understood and accepted. Agencies, too, often like to keep track of what their
managers are doing for their clients, though few have gone as far as W&S.
This Dutch agency arranges .for its interims to be assisted by expert 'shadow
managers' back at base, who act as a sounding board for their ideas and
actions. Client companies hire interim managers to deal with
temporary situations, such as mergers or delays in filling senior posts.
Although interim managers don't come cheap, inaction may be even more costly,
and if the company has established a good relationship with an agency, it can
trust in the latter's ability to supply someone suitable. The interim manager
arrives without corporate baggage or vested interests, which may be an advantage
in the effect they have on staff, but the potential downside, which deters some
companies from using them, is a fear that having only a short-term commitment to
the company, they might net have its long-term interests at heart.
Interim management providers' defence is that the success of the system is
precisely due to the reputation of managers such as Mr Tiernan. But there are
fears that the growing demand for interim managers is encouraging too many new
agencies to be set up, and the absence of uniform practices is endangering
quality and leading to an overall fall in standards. Whatever happens, though,
it looks as though interim managers are here to
stay.
单选题· Read the article below about market research.· Choose the best word 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.
{{B}}
Market research{{/B}}Market research has become
more and more important in recent years. In some organisations, in fact,
managers will not initiate any activity without market research to back. them
up.The first thing to be said about market research is that it is not
an{{U}} (21) {{/U}}to management decision-making. No form of market
research, no matter how deep, complicated and detailed, can ever be seen as a
substitute for creative decision-making by professional managers{{U}} (22)
{{/U}}its very best, all it can do is{{U}} (23) {{/U}}some doubt and
clarify the nature of the problem. It may even be seen as a tool which can
improve the{{U}} (24) {{/U}}of decisions but it is not in itself a
decision-making mechanism.Market research, in{{U}} (25)
{{/U}}with a number of other approaches in marketing, suffers from the
frequent complaint that it is not really accurate. Market research results can
never be completely accurate because they{{U}} (26) {{/U}}with a
dynamic, ever-changing marketplace. It is vital that this is understood by
everyone with an interest in the results. There is, therefore, an ongoing need
for creativity and imagination when{{U}} (27) {{/U}}market
research results and when making any{{U}} (28)
{{/U}}to apply them in the marketplace.Lastly, it should always be
remembered that market research is not an end in itself but simply a{{U}}
(29) {{/U}}by which some degree of risk can be removed from
marketplace activity. If no activity{{U}} (30) {{/U}}from the research,
then the entire exercise has been completely
pointless.
单选题Which of the following belongs to traditional investment?
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