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English Test 87

Directions for Questions from 1 to 5:

Today’s growth product is tomorrow’s buggy whip – and often management does not seem to realize it. A company must learn to think of itself not
as producing goods and services but as buying, creating and satisfying customers. This approach should permeate every book and cranny of the
organization; if it doesn’t, no amount of efficiency in operations can compensate for the lack. Marketing myopia is not easy to overcome, but unless
it is, an organization cannot achieve greatness. This is the lesson learned by many companies in many industries, including the most glamorous
“growth” industries.

Every major industry was once a growth industry. But some that are now riding a wave of growth enthusiasm are very much in the shadow of
decline. Others which are thought of as seasoned growth industries have actually stopped growing. In every case the reason growth is threatened,
slowed, or stopped is not because the market is saturated. It is because there has been a failure of management. The failure is at the top. The
executives responsible for it, in the last analysis, are those who deal with broad aims and policies.

The railroads did not stop growing because the need for passenger and freight transportation declined. That grew. The railroads are in trouble
today not because the need was filled by others (cars, trucks, airplanes, even telephones), but because it was not filled by the railroads
themselves. They let others take customers away from them because they assumed themselves to be in the railroad business rather than in the
transportation business. The reason they defined their industry wrong was because they were railroad-oriented instead of transportation-oriented,
they were product-oriented instead of customer-oriented.
Generally, all the established film companies went through drastic reorganizations. Some simply disappeared.

All of them got into trouble not because of TV’s inroads but because of their own myopia. As with the
railroads, Hollywood defined its business incorrectly. It thought it was in the movie business when it was actually in the entertainment business.
“Movies” implied a specific, limited product. This produced a fatuous contentment which from the beginning led producers to view TV as a threat.
Hollywood scorned and rejected TV when it should have welcomed it as an opportunity – an opportunity to expand the entertainment business.

Today TV is a bigger business than the old narrowly defined movie business ever was. Had Hollywood been customer-oriented (providing
entertainment), rather than product-oriented (making movies), would it have gone through the fiscal purgatory that it did/ I doubt it. What
ultimately saved Hollywood and accounted for its recent resurgence was the wave of new young writers, producer, and directors whose previous
successes in television had decimated the old movie companies and toppled the big movie moguls.

There are other less obvious examples of industries that have been and are now endangering their futures by improperly defining their purposes. I
shall discuss some in detail later and analyze the kind of policies that lead to trouble. Right now it may help to show what a thoroughly customer
oriented management can do to keep a growth industry growing, even after the obvious opportunities have been exhausted; and here there are
two examples that have been around for a long time. They are nylon and glass – specifically, E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Company and Corning
Glass Works:

Both companies have great technical competence. Their product orientation is unquestioned. But this alone does not explain their success. After all,
who was more pridefully product-oriented and product-conscious than the erstwhile New England textile companies that have been so thoroughly
massacred. The Du Ponts and the Cornings have succeeded not primarily because of their product or research orientation but because they have
been thoroughly customer-oriented also. It is constant watchfulness for opportunities to apply their technical know-how to the creation of
customer-satisfying uses which accounts for their prodigious output of successful new products. Without a very sophisticated eye on the customer,
most of their new products might have been wrong, their sales methods useless.

1. What does the phrase “fatuous contentment’ as used in the fourth paragraph connote?

j A state of déjà vu
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j A state of delirium
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j A state of false satisfaction
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j A state of equanimity
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j A state of deeper contentment
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2. The rhetoric “Today’s growth product is tomorrow’s buggy whip” is substantiated and exemplified by
the mention of which of the glamorous “growth” industries”?

j TV companies, E.I.Du pont de Nemours & Company and Corning glass Works
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j The railroad companies, Hollywood and the erstwhile New England Textile companies.
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j The railroad companies and Hollywood.
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j The Du ponts, the Cornings, the railroad companies and Hollywood.
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j Both 1 & 2
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3. Which of the following inferences drawn from the passage can serve as statements/ arguments to define and strengthen the case of a customer-
oriented approach, except for-?

j A customer-oriented approach exacts a focused concern about the customers’ expectations.

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j A prior research and analysis of customers’ profile and behavior must be done before development of new products and sales methods.
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j Lack of customer orientation leads to marketing myopia which no amount of efficiency in operations can ever compensate.
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j A company that only thinks itself as buying, creating, and satisfying customers and not as producing goods and services is eventually going to
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receive the fate of the erstwhile New England textile company.
j Customer orientation demands looking at the business processes primarily from the perspective of the end-user and not that of the producer
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alone.
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4. Study the following statement carefully and draw another example from the passage that is semantically
and structurally parallel to it. “The reason they defined their industry wrong was because they were railroad –oriented instead of transportation –
oriented”

j Hollywood scorned and rejected TV when it should have welcomed it as an opportunity- an opportunity to expand the entertainment business.
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j After all, who was more pridefully product-oriented and product-conscious than the erstwhile New England textile companies that have been
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so thoroughly massacred?
j The Du Ponts and the Cornings have succeeded not primarily because of their product or research orientation but because they have been
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thoroughly customer-oriented also.
j As with the railroads, Hollywood defined its business incorrectly. It thought it was in the movie business when it was actually in entertainment
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business.
j Had Hollywood been customer-oriented, rather than product-oriented, would it have gone through the financial purgatory that it did?
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5. In the statement “This is the lesson learned by many companies in many industries, including the most
glamorous “growth” industries.” What ‘lesson’ does the author refer to?

j That today’s new economies are tomorrow’s old economies.

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j That a company must have great technical competence.
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j That marketing myopia is not easy to overcome.
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j That companies should simply be product oriented backed up by great technological and financial abilities.
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j That companies in order to achieve greatness must learn how to satisfy their customers.
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Directions for Questions from 6 to 8:

Arrange the sentences A, B, C and D to form a logical sequence between sentences 1 and 6.

6. 1. Climate change will trigger a chain of events that is likely to prompt an increase in HIV rates worldwide, an expert has warned.
A. Daniel Tarantola of the University of New South Wales (UNSW) said the disadvantage in developing countries must be addressed if the world is
to prevent a dramatic escalation of the HIV epidemic as well as other health problems.
B. "It was clear soon after the emergence of the HIV epidemic that discrimination, gender inequality and lack of access to essential services have
made some populations more vulnerable than others," Tarantola said on Wednesday.
C. "Today, additional threats are lurking on the horizon as the global economic situation deteriorates, food scarcity worsens and climate change
begins to affect those who were already dependent on survival economies," Tarantola said.
D. David Cooper, also of UNSW, said: “Science has achieved great strides towards shaping a more
effective response to HIV.
6. Yet research has not succeeded in producing the hoped-for 'magic bullets' of either a cure or a vaccine.”

j BACD
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j DCBA
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j CDBA
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j ABCD
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j ADCB
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7. 1. Even though dance starts a bit later than school does during the week, Saturday morning is still
pretty chaotic around here.
A. More so if John is leaving for an auction that day, because it means I have to truck Kristen and Alex
with me and get them ready too.
 B. This is one of those mornings where John was rushing to leave too.
C. There are buns to be done, bodysuits to find, tights to mend (because they’re always ripped
somewhere) and a good breakfast to be had.
D. His work van has been giving him some problems, so he was nervous about travelling with it (not
to mention what it’s costing us to fix it).
6. He couldn’t find his cell and even though he had woken up in a general good mood, I could see it
going downhill from there.

j ACBD
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j ABCD
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j ADCB
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j BCDA
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j BDCA
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8. 1. Meeting people after nine to ten years, almost to the day, is a very weird experience.
A. It genuinely felt awkward to meet people, some married and some with children, others married but who forgot to send out 200 cards to school
friends, others, divorced.
B. I did find out that the marriage was unhappy for all the wrong reasons, none because of the obnoxious twit that he is.
C. I actually felt sorry for one of those guys, because, and if you knew equation with him in the school
bus where we almost killed each other a few times, I would not have wished a divorce on him -
though, I would not have wished any woman on him either.
D. I am in close touch with a couple of school friends - Doc, for example is an ass I can still call my
best friend after twenty years - but my god, did he (or rather his overheating BMW) push my
patience on Saturday night.
6. Everybody was fatter/ balder and in some cases both.

j DCBA
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j CBDA
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j DACB
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j BCDA
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j ABCD
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Directions for Questions from 9 to 10:

Each of the following questions has a paragraph with one italicized word that does not make sense. Choose the most appropriate replacement for
that word from the options given below the paragraph.

9. Lenin was the initiator of the central drama - the tragedy - of our era, the rise of totalitarian states.
A hhixcd man with a scholar’s habits and a general’s tactical instincts, Lenin introduced to the 20th
century the practice of taking an all-embracing ideology and imposing it on an entire society rapidly
and mercilessly.

j hawkish
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j boorish
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j rakish
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j bookish
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j fiendish
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10. Most countries rely upon the police to enforce the law. Police officers most often must be professionally
trained in law enforcement before they are permitted to act under the ‘migith of law’, to issue legal
warnings and citations, execute search or other legal warrants and to make arrests.

j label
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j flush
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j colour
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j grade
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j tenet
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