TEST I ENGLESKIMerima Salcin created the doc: "proslogodisnji test eng. grupa 2 "N.B. Correct answers are boldedVOCABULARY AND LANGUAGEChoose the correct definition of the following words and expressions:1. full-blowna. potentially problematic       b. most complete                   c. explaining too much 2. recoup the investmenta. ask for money back                 b. provide finance for     c. get returns on the money invested 3. fleet

1. group of cars owned by a company2. able to run quickly

3. people or organizations affected by company’s activities

 4. headcount

1. group of cars owned by a company2. the number of people

3. people or organizations affected by company’s activities

 5. something that provokes a negative reaction

1. turn-off                     b. work out                             c. cut-off

 Complete the sentences with the correct word or expression:6. We are depending _ the government to improve local transport services.

1. of2. on

3. from

 7. Sandra will ____ with an overview, and I’ll continue with a sales figures analysis.

1. kick around2. kick off

3. bounce off

 8. He screamed at the manager. ____, he was fired.

1. However2. Because

3. Consequently

 9. When my _____ was up, I negotiated a reduction in hours.

1. bargaining power2. maternity leave

3. redundancy package

 10. The company’s policy is not to _____ difficult issues.

1. shy away from2. follow suit

3. set out

  TOEFL PRACTICE Choose the correction for the underlined words: 1. Acts of vandalism are frequently blamed on low employed rates among youth.

1. employee2. employing

3. employment

 2. The introduction of new various of apples has increased yields on many farms.

1. vary2. varying

3. varieties

 3. Unfortunately, enough many mail deliverers are still bitten by dogs.

1. too2. far

3. both

 4. George Cadbury provided a pleasant housing estate for his chocolate factory workers,   much of whom had previously lived in appalling conditions.

1. who many2. many of whom

3. much of them

 Choose the correct way to complete the sentences:5. Today _____ the single largest organized industry in India.

1. the cotton textile industry2. there is the cotton textile industry

3. the cotton textile industry is

4. it is the cotton textile industry.

 6. _____ toward animated cartoons with war-related topics has come under criticism from such groups as the National Coalition against Television Violence.

1. It is the trend2. That the trend

3. The trend

4. Trends

 7. ____ will the personal assistant go home before the boss leaves the office.

1. Not once2. Not until 

3. No sooner than

  8. At each end of the tube _ , one which gathers light and one which magnifies the image.

1. two lenses are there2. are two lenses

3. are there two lenses

 9. The problem facing most tourists is ______ among so many possibilities.

1. what they should see2. what should they see 

3. should they see what

4. they should see what

 10. _______ patients should try to reduce needless office visits for colds and minor respiratory ilnesses.

1. Doctors that agree2. Doctors agree that

3. That doctors agree

4. Doctors agreeing that

 READING COMPREHENSIONTake another quick look at the article about call centers in India and choose the correct option to complete the sentences. INDIA: Call centres ring the changeIndia's call centres have a lot to answer for, according to the traditionalists. Not only has the booming sector helped spawn a brash new generation of profligate consumers, they say, but its revolving-door work culture is also undermining virtues such as loyalty, hierarchy, patience and discipline. Such anxieties might appear futile in view of the fact that the sector has almost quadrupled its headcount in the past three years to more than 350,000 employees and looks set to continue expanding at 50 per cent a year.Such concerns are also becoming the chief headache of Indian call-centre managers. Attrition rates, particularly in the larger hubs of Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai, have jumped to more than 50 per cent a year in the past 18 months. This is still comfortably below the worst rates in western centres, where it could exceed 100 per cent. It is now posing serious challenges to India's increasingly stretched human resource managers. 'Until very recently, India had a culture where you took a job for life and never dreamed of leaving it unless you had a firm counter-offer,' says Noni Chawla, a management consultant and head-hunter in Delhi. 'But these young call-centre workers think nothing of taking a job, doing four weeks of training and leaving without anything else in the bag.'There is an economic logic to such restlessness, however. In spite of India's unmatchable supply of English-speaking graduates - roughly 2.5m a year graduate in India, most of them with some level of English - the industry's rate of expansion has meant that demand has often outstripped supply. This is particularly true of the more established centres. ‘I would advise companies that are setting up in India to avoid Bangalore in particular,' says Paul Davies, managing director of Onshore Offshore, a UK-based consultancy. 'There is a circuit where new companies come in and poach employees at higher salaries.'One solution has been for companies to choose more isolated locations - as HSBC has recently done, when it opened a call centre on the coast of Andhra Pradesh. India has more than 50 towns with a population of 500,000 or more. Nevertheless, the strategy has its risks. One multinational that recently opened a centre in the Rajasthan capital of Jaipur has found it hard to boost its employee count at the pace it would wish. 'India has a lot of English speakers, but investors should not overestimate the number that are ready to work,' said Raju Bhatnagar, president of ICICI OneSource, an Indian third-party call centre, with 4,200 employees in Bangalore and Mumbai. It is probably better to face problems of attrition than of shortage of supply.'Another remedy, which has taken on increasingly bizarre forms, is to make the workplace more attractive. Some companies have introduced salsa classes. Others have moved to multi-cuisine canteens. Almost all have on-site recreational facilities, such as football tables and cafes, albeit with limited success. 'You can only really attract people with such gimmicks,' says Mr Chawla. 'Retaining them is a different matter.'More seriously, companies are also becoming more alert to dealing with employee trauma, particularly for those who work on the telephone, for example abusive calls. 'Ali calls are recorded, so we sit everyone around and replay it and ask everybody to suggest where it could have been better handled,' says Mr Bhatna-gar. 'It helps the employee realise that it was nothing personal. In fact, only about 1 per cent of calls are abusive and training can do much to help.' 'The typical Indian response to anger is to fall silent, which only makes the Western customer worse,' says Mr Davies. 'But they learn very quickly.'Another solution - still in its infancy - is to hire part-time older employees, including housewives, and to allow them to telecommute from home. About 80 per cent of India's call-centre employees are aged between 20 and 25 and do not consider the industry to be a long-term career.Another option, which one company is considering, is to open a call centre on campus and allow students to drop in and out and work part-time. 'The more flexible we can be, the more likely the employees are to stick around,' said a human-resources manager in Delhi.Ultimately, though, there is not much companies can do to surmount the two core problems; that very few people like to sleep during the day and work at night (the permanent 'jet-lag syndrome') and that, in spite of some of the more glamorous-sounding outgrowths, most work in call centres is repetitive and is likely to remain so.At the same time, there is little to suggest the problem of an inherently footloose workforce will pose a mortal threat to India's continued expansion. 'Call-centre attrition is a universal problem,' says Mr Bhatnagar. 'It has got worse in India, but not nearly to the extent you would see in the West.’ 

Now choose the correct option to complete the sentences:1. Despite significant growth in the sector, a high turnover of staff in India’s call centers has led to

1. loss of contracts.2. criticism of its work culture.

3. closure of many call centers.

 2. Young workers recruited by a call center in India

1. often leave the job to work in another center that pays better.2. often leave, even if they don’t have another job to go to.

3. Both (a) and (b).

 3. As a result of some unfair tactics by competitive call centers, some multinationals are now

1. increasing employee count at a faster rate.2. opening call centers in more remote locations.

3. retaining workers with attractive work facilities.

 4. Allowing more mature employees to work from home or part-time is another way of

1. telecommuting from home.2. attracting more experienced employees.

3. dealing with the problem of staff turnover.

 5. Despite high attrition rates, call centers in India are expected to

1. continue to grow.2. do worse than those in the West.

3. close for good.

TEST 2

Merima Salcin created the doc: "proslogodisnji test :) eng grupa 1"N.B. Correct answers are boldedVOCABULARY AND LANGUAGE Choose the correct meaning of the following words and expressions:1. tap intoa. make possible         b. make as much use as possible     c. follow and understand 2. accountabilitya. responsibility         b. financing                c. profession of keeping financial accounts 3. rev upa. become more active                      b. produce       c. depend on 4. attritiona. chronic diseases                  b. lay-offs       c. natural decrease in numbers

 5. stakeholders

1. group of cars owned by a company2. able to run quickly

3. people or organizations affected by company’s activities

 Complete the sentences with the correct word:6. Our new employment policy resulted ____ a better bottom line.

1. in2. with

3. to

 7. Why don’t we _____ a few ideas?

1. kick off2. keep track of

3. kick around

 8. He screamed at the manager. _____, he was not fired.

1. Because2. However

3. Consequently

 9. Allowing more mature workers to work from home is another way of _____ the problem of staff turnover.

1. dealing with2. attract

3. telecommuting

 10. We hope this initiative will motivate others in the industry to _____ .

1. shy away2. hold us to account

3. follow suit

 TOEFL PRACTICE Choose the correction for the underlined words: 1. Our new collection features many rare and unknown works of historically interest.

1. history2. historical

3. historic

 2. Lack of transportation is a major impede to development in remote areas.

1. impediment2. impedance

3. impeding

 3. Like automobiles, which use a four-stroke engine, motorcycles use a two-stroke one.

1. Alike2. Unlike

3. Liking

 4. So Einstein suggested eighty years ago, space can vibrate.

1. Since2. Both

3. As

  Choose the correct word or expression to complete the sentences: 5. _____ are phosphorescent in the dark intrigues many people.

1. Certain species of centipedes2. That certain species of centipedes

3. There are certain species of centipedes

4. It is certain species of centipedes

 6. _____ in the frozen wastes of Antarctica takes special equipment.

1. To survive2. That survival

3. It is survival

4. Survive

 7. _____ after years of planning do large-scale civil engineering projects get underway.

1. Only2. Seldom

3. Under no circumstances

     8. _____ should a young child be allowed to play with fireworks without adult supervision.

1. Only2. Seldom

3. Under no circumstances

 9. Differences among environmental groups illustrate ______ a broad range of philosophies and tactics.

1. that is there2. that is

3. that there is

4. that there

 10. Science has not yet made a machine that can learn _______ a young child can learn in a few days - how to tie a pair of shoes.

1. what2. when

3. where

4. which

 

READING COMPREHENSIONTake another quick look at the article about PPPs and match the two parts of the sentence summaries. Infrastructure:  Experience of the 1999s has put people offThe failure of inefficient and under-funded governments to provide citizens in the developing world with essential services such as water, power and sanitation provides a compelling argument for private sector involvement in these activities. However, it is difficult to persuade companies to participate when pricing remains too low to repay investments, and when lenders are reluctant to back projects in places where political risk is high.Private money flooded into infrastructure projects in the 1990s, particularly power projects in Asia and Latin America, which was a target for multinationals that invested widely as former state monopolies were privatised. But as problems emerged - both in the region and in companies' home markets - many withdrew, and today Latin American countries are embracing the privatisation of energy resources with less enthusiasm. Even if investors could be tempted back into power or water distribution projects in emerging markets, the higher tariffs associated with private systems are often politically unacceptable.'The private sector not only has to improve operations and collection, but also has to increase the level of investment and correct for historical underinvestment,' says Francisco Toureilles, director for infrastructure at the International Finance Corporation (IFC).In the case of water, passions run high, with many arguing that access to water is an essential human right that should not have to be paid for. However, Michael Klein, vice-president for private sector development at the World Bank and IFC, points out that many are paying for it already. Those without access to water, he says, are often forced to buy from vendors, paying ten times or more than people connected to modern water systems. 'The idea that you can't raise prices because it's not affordable is, in many cases, just plain wrong,' he says.But even if the argument for a private-sector role in infrastructure development has been won, the question is how to persuade business to participate, particularly since the experience of the 1990s has made companies and lenders more risk averse. 'Companies got badly burned in Latin America,' says Dan Bond, who co-chairs the Experts Group on Developing Country Infrastructure Finance. 'They invested heavily before the regulatory regimes were worked out, so they were building the foundations on shifting sand.'Another difficulty is that infrastructure projects generate local currency revenue, while the long-term financing is in dollars or euros. A sudden devaluation, such as the 1999 Brazilian currency crisis, means that what seemed a promising enterprise can no longer service its debt.  'We're trying to figure out how to get projects' sponsors interested again, and one of the key things we see is some type of risk sharing between the public and private sector,' says Mr. Bond. 'Because the private sector is certainly not going to step back in and take the kind of risks it did in the 1990s.'Besides financing difficulties, recouping investments remains a challenge. The World Bank estimates that power prices cover an average of about 60 per cent of the costs, while water prices cover just 30 per cent. 'So whether it's public or private, if nobody pays for this stuff, it doesn't get built,' says Mr Klein. 'The private sector can't recoup the investment, and the public systems don't get expanded and become decrepit.'The participation of multilateral institutions is seen as one answer. The IFC hopes to foster public-private partnerships by providing upfront financing, advising governments on how to structure contracts and establishing transparent processes, thus creating conditions it believes can attract investors.     Now match the two parts of the sentences summaries.1.Governments in developing countries have failed toe. provide basic services such as water, power and sanitation. 2. Private companies are now more wary of investing inc. infrastructure projects in Latin America than in the 1990s.

 3. The IFC is trying to a.. increase the participation of institutions and attract investors. 4. Michael Klein would disagree that b. charging higher prices for essential services is politically unacceptable. 5. Developing countries tend not to d. use the same currencies for financing projects and generating revenue.