Text 3

Reading 1 hour

 

 

PART ONE

Questions 1 – 8

 

l         Look at the statements below and at the five extracts on the opposite page from an article giving advice to self-employed consultants about negotiating fees for their services.

l         Which book (A, B, C,D or E) dose each statement 1 –8 refer to ?

l          For each statement ! – 8, make one letter (A, B, C,D or E) on your Answer Sheet .

l          You will need to use some of these letters more than once .

 

Example : 0           Lack of self-confidence will put you at a disadvantage in a negotiation .   0 A   B   C   D   E

 

1  Trying to negotiate is only worthwhile if there is the prospect of success.

 

2  The best result of negotiation is when both parties have a sense of satisfaction.

 

3         Accepting a lower fee might have benefits in the future.

 

4         It is important to know how much other people are charging for similar work.

 

5         You should ask for a fee in excess of what you expect to get.

 

6         Offer the other party incentives to agree to your fee.

 

7         Other people’s reactions to you are influenced by your body language.

 

8         It may become obvious that you have come to regret a deal you have made.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A                                         

You’re in danger of selling yourself short if you don’t know where the goalposts are, especially when you’re negotiating with a new client. Research the market and find out the going rate. You can do this by networking contacts or talking to small business advisers. Alternatively, ask the competition. Of course  your rivals may not tell you, but there’s no harm in asking. Another prerequisite is learning to recognize when there’s scope for negotiation, because without it, you can waste a great deal of time and energy.

 

B 

Know the amount you would really like, slightly above what you think they will offer and above what you’d be happy to settle for. Also, know your trade-offs. Create a wish list of all the things you’d like to receive if you lived in a perfect world. That way, if the other side want you to move from your preferred or opening position on an issue to a position nearer the bottom line, you can move in exchange for something from your wish list.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

C

People who are nervous about negotiating over money often let fear tell them they’re no good at these discussions and not worth the fee. You literally can’t afford the luxury of a single negotiating thought. Stand up when making negotiating phone calls: it will make you fell more powerful. If you’re face to face, make steady eye contact, keep your head up and your hands still – these all suggest assertiveness, rather than aggressiveness or passivity, and you’ll be surprised at how much this affects the way that you come across in the negotiation.

D

You have to know the price below which it would be uneconomical for you to do a job. This could vary from job to job - you may be prepared to do some cheaper in the hope that they’ll lead to better things. But don’t be talked below your bottom line and end up working for nothing. After all, in the long term, there’s little point in agreeing to something that you’re not happy with: you’re likely to feel resentful, and this might even come across in your behaviour.

 

E

When negotiating money, there may be non-financial factors you can throw into the mix. For example, why not say, ‘If you pay me such and such, I’ll include a report on the company for you’. Plan these extras beforehand. Make sure that they won’t take forever to do, but are things of value to the other side. This way, you can achieve the ideal outcome: you appear to accept compromise when in fact you’ve got everything you wanted, and they’ll think they got the better of the deal.

PART TWO

Questions9– 14

l         Read the text about training progammes.

l         Choose the best sentence from the opposite page to fill each of the gaps .

l         For each gap 9– 14, mark one letter (A-H) on your Answer Sheet .

l         Do not use any letter more than once .

l         There is an example at the beginning .(0)

 

 

REAL TRAINING FOR ALL-ACTION MANAGERS

Learning by doing is familiar to every manager sent on a training course. Invariably this involves role-play based on studies of long-ago triumphs and disasters from a relevant industry or organization. (0)_H_ The problem is, any experience of decision-making gained from role-play has one obvious shortcoming: it is not real life.

 To tackle this dilemma, some of the best-known companies have set up the International Management Development Consortium, which provides a range of executive development programmes for staff members. (9)____ What this means is that they involve ‘action learning’ through real-life situations, and participants work as problem-solving consultants on projects within companies engaged in day-to-day business.

  (10)____ Within this they also take training and refresher courses in traditional business skills such as finance, marketing, staff management and strategic planning. These disciplines are taught by a mix of academics, business people and senior managers from Consortium companies who also monitor the consultancy work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 More than 100 of these consultancy projects have been undertaken so far, and many more are to come. (11)____ Generally, those who choose to attend the course come from various countries, reflecting the multi-national nature of companies within the Consortium. (12)____ As a result of this cross-cultural exchange, the people on the course learn a great deal from each other- and often keep in contact on a professional level long after the end of their course.

  The Consortium says language difficulties are not a problem when consultancies are undertaken for foreign companies on site. A translator is on hand to deal with difficulties which arise from technical terms or jargon.

(13)____ This is because they are not charged consultancy fees, although a nominal sum is payable for administration. The funding for the scheme is provided by each Consortium member who contributes to the cost of running the training courses, and the amount involved is considerably less than fees charged by leading business schools. (14)____ ‘it is,’ says the Chairman, ‘a real learning experience with techniques that can easily be used back at work..’

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Example :

0	A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H

 

A  They are being offered by companies who are aware of the benefits of the range of knowledge offered by the people on the course.

 

B  As well as the savings, there are also the dividends it pays in the form of improved staff performance.

 

C  The difference between these programmes and the average executive course, however, is that these courses are based on the concept of ‘live’ consultancy.

 

D  In this way, participants can also benchmark themselves against the best members from a range of Consortium companies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

E  This means that within every training group there will be a wide variety of experience, which is discussed and explored by the group.

 

F  Typically, groups of up to six course members undertake projects as part of this development programme.

 

G  Another major advantage is that these companies usually get their problems solved very cheaply.

 

H  Managers are typically cast as key figures in these dramas, the comparisons are made later between how they dealt with the fictional situation and the actual event.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PART THREE

Questions 15– 20

 

 

 

 

l         Read the following article about business schools and the questions on the opposite page .

l          For each question 15 – 20 , mark one letter (A, B, C or D ) on your Answer Sheet for the answer you choose. 

 

In terms of pure quantity of research and debate, business schools have performed amazingly in promoting management as a distinctive activity. No other discipline has produced as much in such a short period. It is unclear yet how much of it will stand the test of time, but for sheer industry, the business school deserve credit. Not a day goes by without another wave of research papers, books, articles, and journals.

 

In these terms, schools have produced a generally accepted theoretical basis for management. When it comes to knowledge creation, however, they find themselves in difficulties. They are caught between the need for academic rigour and for real-world business relevance, which tend to pull in opposite directions. The desire to establish management as a credible discipline leads to research that panders to traditional academic criteria. The problem for business school researchers is that they seek the approval of their academic peers rather than the business community. In the United States this has led to the sort of grand ‘paper clip counting’ exercises that meet demands for academic rigour but fail to add one iota to the real sum of human knowledge.

 

Business schools have too often allowed the constraints of the academic world to cloud their view of the real world. Business school researchers seek provable theories – rather than helpful theories. They have championed a prescriptive approach to management based on analysis and, more recently, on fashionable ideas that soon disappear into the ether. The ‘one best way’ approach encourages researchers to mould the idiosyncrasies of managerial reality into their tightly defined models of behaviour. Figures and statistics are fitted into linear equations and tidy models. Economists and other social scientists label this cure smoothing. Meanwhile, reality continually refuses to co-operate.

 

Central to this is the tension between relevance and rigour. In a perfect world, there would be no need to choose between the two. But in the business school world, the need to satisfy academic criteria and be published in journals often tilts the balance away from relevance. In other words, it is often easier to pursue quantifiable objectives than it is to add anything useful to the debate about management. To a large extent, the entire business school system works against useful, knowledge-creating research. Academics have five years in which to prove themselves if they are to make the academic grade. It seems long enough. But it can take two or even three years to get into a suitable journal. They therefore have around three years, probably less, to come up with an area of interest and carry out meaningful and original research. This is a demanding timescale. The temptation must be to slice up old data in new ways rather than pursue genuinely groundbreaking, innovative research.

 

It is a criticism also made by some business school insiders. “Academic journals tend to find more and more techniques for testing more and more obscure theories. They are asking trivial questions and answering them exactly. There has to be a backlash,” says Julian Birkinshaw of London Business School. In large part, the problem goes back to a time when business schools were trying to establish themselves. Up until the 1960s, American business schools were dismissed as pseudo-academic institutions, including the universities of which they often formed a part, regarded them as a little more than vocational colleges. Since then, most of the leading schools have undergone major reassessments and introduced sweeping changes. However, it is questionable whether those changes have gone far enough.

 

15   What does the first paragraph suggest about the research generated by business schools?

          

A  Its quality is variable.

B  Its lasting value is uncertain.

C  It has always been produced too quickly.

D  It has had no influence on management.

 

16           In paragraph two, the writer argues that business school research

       

        A  takes a negative view of the business community.

        B  has failed to give credibility to management as a discipline.

        C  is directed at the wrong audience.

        D  does not stand up to academic scrutiny.

 

17   In the third paragraph, the writer criticizes the theories of management produced by business schools for being

 

            A  incomprehensible.

            B  contradictory.

            C  vague.

            D  inflexible.

 

18       In the fourth paragraph, the writer says that the business school system causes     academics to         

       

  A  be satisfied with reinterpreting previous research.

  B  avoid complicated business issues.

  C  concentrate on very narrow fields of study.

  D  focus on topics no longer  relevant to business needs.

   

19       What do we learn about business schools in the last paragraph?

       

A  They are reluctant to admit to failings.

B  They resent criticism of their academic journal.

C  They used to be looked down on by other institutions.

D  They are comfortable with the current situation.

 

 

 

20      What is the writer’s purpose in this text?

       

        A  to express regret at the growth of business schools

        B  to point out a weakness in the approach of business schools

        C  to criticize business school for producing bad academics

        D  to forecast the eventual collapse of business schools

 

 

     

PART FOUR

Questions 21 -30

 

l         Read the article below about expanding a retail business.

l         Choose the correct word to fill each gap from  (A, B, C or D) on the opposite page.

l          For each question 21-30,mark one letter (A, B, C or D) on your Answer Sheet.

l         There is an example at the beginning, (0)

 

 

Should you open a second branch?

 

Choosing to expand your business by opening a second location can be one of the best decisions you’ll ever (0)____, or one of the worst. Before you (21)____ at a decision, there are several things you should check to see if you are ready to take this big step towards expansion.

  Firstly – your cash flow. Like starting up any business, a second location (22)____ a large initial investment and usually takes a long time to turn a profit. Look at your firm’s accounts carefully. If these (23)____ that you cannot afford a long-term drain on your financial resources, then it is probably better to wait.

  Secondly – your personnel and systems. If you don’t have a management team (24)____ place already, you should probably think about establishing one before opening a second branch. The same (25)____ in the case of operating systems and controls. The better organized your business now, the better organized your second location will be, too.

  Also, you need to think about your market. Is your current site doing as much business as it can (26)____, or are there ways you could grow without opening a second branch? Try expanding internally first. Similarly, don’t (27)____ that just because your business is successful in one town, it will immediately succeed in a (28)____ community. Research your potential markets before setting up shop, and (29)____ your new branch to answer the specific needs of these markets.

  Finally, be realistic about the time you need to invest to make a second location work. You don’t want to take (30)____ so much work that you can’t honour your commitments.

 

 

 

 

Example : A  have        B  decide      C  do         D  make   0 A  B  C  D

 

 

21        A  arrive         B  come         C  reach         D  approach

 

22        A  contains       B  includes       C  involves       D  consists

 

23        A  tell            B  present        C  show         D  exhibit

 

24        A  at             B  in             C  by            D  to

 

25        A  applies         B  refers         C  concerns       D  relates

 

26        A  deal            B  hold          C  handle         D  cope

 

27        A  assume         B  trust           C  rely           D  count

 

28        A  connecting      B  neighbouring    C  surrounding    D  matching

 

29        A  invent          B  amend          C  design         D  innovate

 

30        A  through         B  up             C  down          D  on

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PART FIVE

Questions31-40

 

l         Read the article below about a successful airline .

l         For each question 31-40, write one word in CAPITAL LETTERS on your Answer Sheet .

l         There is an example at the beginning, (0) .

 

 

0

Example :   

 

 

A SUCCESSFUL AIRLINE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Executives at Fastline, now (0)____ of the country’s largest airlines, were in optimistic mood at the press conference they held yesterday afternoon. They announced that they were (31)____ a position to revise the company’s full-year profits forecast sharply upward (32)____ a result of an exceptionally strong performance over the last nine months. Profits during this period rose by very (33)____ 50 per cent compared with the same period last year. The company feels confident that this performance will continue throughout the remainder of the year. It is expected (34)_____will be a 40 per cent increase in profits for the full year compared with the 15 per cent that had been indicated (35)____ the half-year stage.

 

During the year, (36)____than raise its fares as most other airlines did in response to higher fuel costs,  Fastline stuck to its decision to keep fares at the same level as last year. This must account to (37)_____ extent for the significant rise (38)____ only in the number of passengers booked on flights, but also in the amount of freight carried.

 

The airline has also confirmed that it is in negotiations with another airline to sell the whole of (39)____ 20 per cent holding in Border Air. However, executives are refusing to reveal the name of the interested party until a definite agreement (40)____ reached.