The boss of the company had _________ his friend’s good advice, which led to the failure of his business.

A. considered                        B. suffered                       C. ignored                           D. discussed

 

Most people in business have a strong sense that meetings are demanding more and more of their time. Fifty years ago meetings were barely necessary – the boss decided what was going to happen and told employees in a brief office memo.

Now everything in business is discussed extensively in large meetings attended by anybody who has the remotest interest in the subject. The gradual erosion of formal systems of authority has increased the appetite for face-to-face meetings. Consultation and discussion has taken the place of direct instruction.

The amount of travel to get to these meetings is increasing. More than nine million people passed through Heathrow(希思罗机场) in 2005 on the way to internal company events. As a consequence, corporate travel is a growing part of UK carbon emissions(排放). It would be easy to say we must reverse the trend towards more meetings to reduce the climate-change impact of modern business. Unfortunately, it is not going to be easy. Some interesting recent research shows that most of the attendees at corporate meetings do complain about the waste of time involved. But when they were questioned in private, the picture changes. Only 15 per cent of people rated their most recent meeting adversely. Though most attendees saw room for improvement, meetings were valuable both in helping build plans for action and in making employees feel part of the organization.

But do these meetings have to be face-to-face? British Telecom recently presented some data on the success of its internal voice conferencing. In the most recent year, more than two million telephone conferences took place in the company. BT estimates a saving of over ??200m from the use of this technology and a cut of almost 100,000 tonnes of CO2. Of course BT has a clear interest in telling us that phone meetings are a good substitute for wasteful corporate get-togethers. So far, such conferencing has struggled to take off as people have tended to prefer to travel. It is, after all, rather more difficult to understand the boss's body language over the phone. Nevertheless, BT's research on the considerable benefits of conferencing is reasonable. Rather than try to get rid of apparently unproductive meetings, we need to find ways to make telephone and video conferences ever better substitutes for those traditional meetings.

Why are there more and more meetings according to the passage?

A. Because the formal systems of authority has been established.

B. Because people prefer to solve problems through discussion.

C. Because the organizations are getting more and more complex.

D. Because modern transportation has been developing rapidly.

The word “ adversely” in the third paragraph is closest in meaning to ______.

A. approvingly       B. enthusiastically         C. feasibly             D. unfavourably

British Telecom presented the figures to prove that voice conferencing _______.

A. stimulates the development of technology       B. plays a vital role in large organizations

C. may well replace conventional ones         D. brings large profit to the company

What can we learn from the passage?

       A. Traditional face-to-face meetings bring more benefits than harm.

       B. Corporate travel contributes a lot to environmental problems.

       C. The idea of telephone conference is well accepted by employees.

       D. Meetings should be abandoned because they are a waste of time.

阅读下列各小题，根据每句后的汉语提示，用句末括号内的英语单词完成句子，并将答案写在答题卡上的相应题号后。

1．Only after they had discussed the matter for several hours ______ a decision, （reach）

       只有在讨论这个问题几个小时后他们才做出一个决定。

2．Although he has got a doctor's degree, ______ whether he is equal to the job．（remain）

       尽管他获得了博士学位，但他是否胜任这个工作还有待去看。

3．It was______ this morning that made the boss so angry, （come）

       是因为他今天早上来晚了才使老板如此生气。

4．Alex was listening attentively to the lecture by professor Smith, all his attention ______．（fix）

       亚历克斯在专心致志听史密斯教授的演讲，他所有的注意力都集中在上面。

5．The products produced by Apple, especially iphone 4, ______ in the US and have a good market internationally, （sell）

       苹果公司生产的产品尤其是iphone 4在美国很畅销，在国际上有良好的市场。

6．_______ is that China is playing more and more important role in the world, （know）

       众所周知，中国在世界上正扮演着越来越重要的角色。

7．Had it not been for the fact ______, I wouldn't have won the first prize in the English Writing Competition, （help）

       要不是我的老师帮我，我就不会再在英语作文竞赛中获一等奖。

8．The 30th Olympic Games will be held in London, from July 27 to August 12,2012, ______all athletes will compete for medals, （during）

       第三十届奥运会将于2012年7月27日至8月12日在伦敦举行，在此期间所有的运动员将为奖牌而战。

9．Frank insisted that ______ although I had great difficulty in waking him up．（fall）

       尽管我很费力才把他弄醒，弗兰克坚持说没睡着。

10．More and more highways have been built, ______ for people to travel from one place to another, （make）

       越来越多的高速公路已经建成，使得人们从一地去另一地更加容易。

The boss of the company had _________ his friend’s good advice, which led to the failure of his business.

A. considered  B. suffered     C. ignored             D. discussed

 The boss of the company had _____ his friend’s advice, which led to the failure of his business.

A. ignored       B. considered       C. suffered           D. discussed