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  3. How to approach Reading Test Part Three • In this part of the Reading Test you read a longer text and answer six questions. • Fi

How to approach Reading Test Part Three • In this part of the Reading Test you read a longer text and answer six questions. • Fi

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问题 How to approach Reading Test Part Three
• 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 a food group’s event for its managers and the following questions,
•   Each question has four suggested answers or ways of finishing the sentence (A - D).
•   Mark one letter (A, B, C or D) on your Answer Sheet for the answer you choose.
      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.
Why were there troubles with the policy mentioned in the first paragraph?
选项 A、Profit margins were set at too low a level.
B、There were difficulties with getting enough supplies.
C、Investors doubted whether it would lead to long-term success.
D、The group misjudged the attitude of its customers.
答案D
解析
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