Unit 4 Reading Activities Plus Questions

USA Speaker One:
UK Speaker Two:
Dialog at a project meeting:

Tim: Ok guys, so following on from last week's brainstorming sessions, I just wanted to say that management are seriously thinking about a lot of the ideas you mentioned.

Pete: Great. Now what about the timeframe? Have they agreed to extend it by the extra month?

Tim: Yes, so our new deadline is the end of January next year. This should give us plenty of time to do everything.

Mark: But the milestones are still at the same time, yes?

Tim: Well the first two are still at the same times but the third will now be the 2nd week of January instead of the 3rd week of December with the final launch happening on the 31st January.

Pete: Ok, so lets look at the changes to the schedule, shall we?

Tim: The initial phase is exactly the same as we discussed before, but in the second phase we will need to adjust the times. I don’t think we need to worry about that today though. Our priority today should be to confirm everything for next weeks presentation.

Mark: Well all of the materials have been prepared and we know what we are doing. I am still looking for a volunteer to take part in the demonstration though.

Pete: Actually, my plans changed and I can do that now.

Mark: Great, so that's settled.

Tim: Mark, did you update the presentation with the changes I emailed to you?

Mark: Yes, I have done that already.

Tim: Great. We need to get this presentation perfect. We will be presenting to over 30 delegates from potential clients.

Pete: Wow, the last time I checked it was only 15 confirmed delegates.

Tim: Yes, the number of confirmations has gone up a lot in the last couple of days.

Mark: That means we will have to prepare a lot more information packs. Will the budget allow us to still give away free samples to all delegates?

Tim: I am speaking with management about that at the moment. We should work on the idea that this will still happen.

Pete: It has to. The free samples are a key part of the presentation and its attractiveness.

Tim: I know and I am sure management will agree to raise the budget for this, it just takes time.

Mark: Ok, I know we have very limited resources for this presentation but I was wondering if we could get a speaker to talk about the benefits for logistics.

Tim: You have mentioned this before Mark and it just isn’t possible this time. We can come back to this before the next presentation and assess it again then.

Pete: Tim, can we talk about the ongoing work for a moment?

Tim: Of course, is there anything wrong?

Pete: Well, I have been looking at the design for the printed materials and I am not sure it is what we want.

Tim: Why? I thought we were all happy with the design.

Pete: I was, but I started thinking that I am not sure if it really works with our objective. Our goal was to prepare informational, training seminars on the product, but the posters and leaflets seem to be more sales orientated (or sales-oriented in USA).

Mark: Well, we do want to sell them!

Pete: I know. But that isn’t really our job and I am worried it will affect the quality of the presentations if people think that we are just trying to sell to them.

Tim: That is a good point. I will speak with management about this and see what they think, although I don’t think we will have time to redesign them now.

Discussion Questions
  • What are the advantages and disadvantages of brainstorming?
  • Have you ever volunteered for anything? What was it?
  • What resources does your company have?

Quiz: Reading Questions

1. Deadlines and milestones are part of the timeframe.
2. Brainstorming is great to assess main objectives.
3. The initial launch never happens according to schedule.
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