Test 1: Listening Comprehension – Questions 1 – 15 (30 points)

1.1. Questions 1 – 8 (16 points)

You will hear a man called Tim Simmons talking about giving and receiving feedback in
a work environment. For each question, mark one letter for the correct answer. Only
one option is correct. You will hear the recording twice.

1. Why does Tim Simmons talk about your mind racing and your heart beating faster?
a. to show how people usually respond when they will be given feedback
b. to highlight the importance of constructive feedback
c. to describe the feelings of a person who is about to give feedback

2. Tim says that receiving feedback constructively starts with thinking about feedback
a. critically.
b. positively.
c. specifically.

3. According to Tim, what is a sign of good communication and a positive work environment
in a company?
a. no direct feedback
b. no delayed feedback
c. no negative feedback

4. In order to stop taking feedback personally an employee should

a. realise what the purpose of the feedback is.
b. start producing better results.
c. improve the relationship with the person giving feedback.

5. Why does Tim advise against starting every response to feedback with the word “but”?
a. It signals your unwillingness to improve your work performance.
b. It shows you protect yourself from what you see as criticism.
c. It provides an unhealthy atmosphere during feedback meetings.

6. Tim Simmons recommends that when receiving critical feedback from a manager, you
should
a. just listen carefully and ask yourself why he is telling you this.
b. defend yourself making sure you speak in a neutral tone.
c. be direct and ask for suggestions on how to make improvements.

7. What does Tim imply about positive feedback?

a. It is less motivating than negative feedback.
b. It can help you to get rid of your weaknesses.
 c. Many people don’t notice it when they receive it.

8. Tim Simmons recommends employees to

a. learn from colleagues how to respond to feedback.
b. initiate positive feedback by themselves.
c. remain passive listeners at feedback meetings.

1.2. Questions 9 – 15 (14 points)

You will hear part of a podcast, where Jackie and Richard discuss how automation
might affect businesses and jobs in the future. For each question, decide which of the
following statements are TRUE (A) or FALSE (B). You will hear the recording twice.

9. According to Richard, the future rise in automation will have less impact on the service
industry than it did on manufacturing. True/ False
10. Richard gives an example of Australian mine sites, where only a limited number of
operations have been automated. True/ False
11. Richards suggests that US employees spend 13% of their work time collecting and
processing data. True/ False
12. Many jobs in the insurance and finance sectors could be replaced by computers in the
future. True/ False
13. According to Jackie, office occupations are less affected by automation than manual
labour jobs. True/ False
14. The speakers agree that the only jobs that won’t be at risk are psychologists and those in
healthcare industry. True/ False
15. Richard suggests that those in danger of losing their jobs because of automation should
develop and master new job skills. True/ False

Test 2: Reading Comprehension – Questions 16 – 30 (30 points)

Questions 16 – 22 (14 points)

Read the text below and answer questions by choosing the right option. Only one of
four options is correct in each question. Mark your answers on answer sheet 1. Some of
the questions refer to words underlined in the text.
The rise of remote work has helped grow tech centers outside major coastal cities like San
Francisco and New York. In today’s newsletter, we look at how it can also be a double-edged
sword — giving tech companies across the country access to a larger number of talented people,
while also making hiring more competitive.
Companies that hired remote workers during the pandemic say going back to the office isn’t an
option. Remote work made more normal by the pandemic has altered how companies operate,
especially when it comes to hiring. Tech companies outside Silicon Valley have been able to
grow because their talent pool has expanded.

Take, for instance, Craig Fuller, the founder of a logistics data analytics company in
Chattanooga, Tenn., who is used to recruiting software engineers and data experts who live
outside the area. In the past, that meant making a case for why they should move to the midsize
Southern city. He would emphasize the low costs of living and outdoor community: “We look
for people who have families,” he said. But during the past two years, these sorts of
conversations have been unnecessary. Mr. Fuller’s company, FreightWaves, has doubled the
size of its staff by expanding remote work. And of its 120 new hires, about 60 percent live
outside Chattanooga. “All of a sudden, the rules and restrictions of where we can hire no longer
became an issue for us,” Mr. Fuller said.

For some start-ups outside Silicon Valley and other major metropolitan tech hubs, remote work
has been crucial to unlocking rapid growth. Companies can recruit talent from anywhere
without asking candidates to relocate.

But even as remote work has broadened the pool from which start-ups outside Silicon Valley
can recruit, it hasn’t necessarily made hiring easier. That’s because it works both ways: Just as
a start-up in Chattanooga can hire a software engineer in San Francisco, deep-pocketed start-
ups and big tech companies in San Francisco can hire software engineers who live in
Chattanooga.

Mr. Fuller pointed out remote work broke the “protective moat” around his business. “All of a
sudden, we’re now competing against companies in the Valley, in New York, for staff
equivalent to our existing staff, so they are starting to pick off our teams,” he said. For Olive,
an automation company competing on a national scale has meant the company has had to adjust
its pay scale, Mr. Rutkowski, the company’s chief people officer, said. “We’ve had to get
creative with compensation in this model,” he said. Olive employees who live in places with
higher cost of living make more, and the company has applied additional inflation adjustments
on top of its salary ranges.

Hiring remote workers during pandemic lockdowns has also made it more difficult for
companies to require a return to the office. Those that require office hours would have to return
to a more limited local talent pool — but one that is now more competitive than it was before
the pandemic. “I don’t think that you can put the genie back in the bottle,” said Scott Siegert,
the chief operating officer at Buildertrend, a company in Omaha that makes software for
residential contractors. “I don’t think that that’s what workers expect, and I don’t think that’s
best for the company.”

Mr. Fuller said he wasn’t disappointed that completely returning FreightWaves to the office
seemed implausible. His business improved when the company shifted to a virtual office, he
said, and he hasn’t had trouble filling jobs, even if it has meant paying higher salaries and hiring
a recruiter for the first time. “Every metric that you would care about actually increased,” he
said. “Sales increased, momentum increased.” Most of his employees continue to work from
home, even if they’re based in Chattanooga.

Robert Hatta, a partner at the venture capital firm Drive Capital, which is in Columbus, Ohio,
and invests in companies outside coastal cities, said that before the pandemic, about 20 percent
of the firm’s about 70 portfolio companies allowed remote work. Now, about 90 percent have
added some form of logging in virtually to their permanent office plans. But he’s not convinced
that remote work will remain the default. “I think most people would agree, all things
considered equal, the co-located team beats the distributed team, even in tech, and this continues
to be sort of the default belief in the start-up world,” he said. Mr. Hatta said it was too early to
say which model would become the new normal. “Right now, we’ve got over 60 companies,
each running 60 different versions of an experiment on what will work from a work force
perspective.”
(Adapted from: “Remote access” by Sarah Kessler, Senior Staff Editor, DealBook)

16. For tech companies, the growing popularity of remote work

a. has twice as many advantages as disadvantages.
b. can be rather disadvantageous.
c. has both advantages and disadvantages.
d. makes their products more competitive.

17. Before the pandemic, companies based in smaller towns

a. tried to lower the costs of living for their employees.
b. didn’t want to recruit people who lived locally.
c. encouraged whole families to work for them.
d. went to great lengths to persuade people into moving.

18. One of the reasons why companies want to continue working online is that it
a. allows for monitoring company’s growth.
b. allows relocating employees without their consent.
c. enables them to omit some restrictive labour laws.
d. enables access to unlimited human resources.

19. Among the consequences of hiring employees for the remote work system, the author
mentions
a. growing labour costs.
b. growing inflation.
c. the need to cut salaries.
d. shortage of talented engineers.

20. Scott Siegert, COO for Buildertrend, claims that

a. convincing employees back into the office would be difficult.
b. it would be best for the companies if employees returned to offices.
c. going back to offices is what employees want.
d. only the most talented employees should return to offices.

21. According to the author, in spite of the obvious advantages of remote work,
a. it will never become the new standard.
b. start-up workers favour working close to their colleagues
c. most businesses do not want to have to pay their recruiters.
d. companies have not seen substantial benefits.

22. Which aspect of remote work is NOT presented in the article?

a. Access to increased number of potential employees
b. Growing creativity of the recruiters
c. Returning to the pre-pandemic model of work
d. Effects of remote work on employees’ health

2.2. Read carefully the text below. Some of the phrases have been removed from the text.
Choose from the options provided below the text, which phrase fits each gap. For
questions 23 – 26 choose from the first set of options, while for questions 27 – 30 choose
from the second set of options. In each set there is one extra option that you will not
need to use. The text should be cohesive. Mark your answers on the answer sheet 1
(16 points).
This year’s Laureates of the Nobel Prize for Economic Sciences – David Card, Joshua Angrist
and Guido Imbens – have provided us with new insights about the labour market and shown
what conclusions about cause and effect can be drawn from natural experiments. (23)
________ and revolutionised empirical research.

Many of the big questions in the social sciences deal with cause and effect. How does
immigration affect pay and employment levels? How does a longer education affect
someone’s future income? (24) ________ because we have nothing to use as a comparison.
We do not know what would have happened if there had been less immigration or if that
person had not continued studying.

However, this year’s Laureates have shown that it is possible to answer these and similar
questions using natural experiments. (25) ________ in which chance events or policy changes
result in groups of people being treated differently, in a way that resembles clinical trials in
medicine.

Using natural experiments, David Card has analysed the labour market effects of minimum
wages, immigration and education. His studies from the early 1990s challenged conventional
wisdom, leading to new analyses and additional insights. (26) ________, among other things,
that increasing the minimum wage does not necessarily lead to fewer jobs.
We now know that the incomes of people who were born in a country can benefit from new
immigration, while people who immigrated at an earlier time (27) ________ . We have also
realised that resources in schools are far more important for students’ future labour market
success (28) ________.

Data from a natural experiment are difficult to interpret, however. For example, extending
compulsory education by a year for one group of students (but not another) will not affect
everyone in that group in the same way. Some students would have kept studying anyway
and, for them, the value of education is often not representative of the entire group. So, is it
even possible to draw any conclusions about the effect of an extra year in school? In the mid-
1990s, Joshua Angrist and Guido Imbens solved this methodological problem, demonstrating
how precise conclusions about cause and effect (29) ________.

“Card’s studies of core questions for society and Angrist and Imbens’ methodological
contributions have shown that natural experiments are a rich source of knowledge. Their
research has substantially improved our ability to answer key causal questions, (30)
________.

(adapted from
https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2021/press-release/ )

For questions 23 – 26 choose from the list below. There is one extra phrase you will not
need to use.

A. The key is to use situations

B. The results showed
C. These questions are difficult to answer
D. The findings of the research will be applied
E. Their approach has spread to other fields
For questions 27-30 choose from the list below. There is one extra phrase you will not
need to use.

A. than was previously thought

B. can be drawn from natural experiments
C. risk being negatively affected
D. looking at average treatment effect
E. which has been of great benefit to society,” says chair of the Prize Committee

Test 3: Use of English questions 31 – 70 (40 points)

3.1. Questions 31 -50 (20 points)

Read the text below and decide which option (A, B, C or D) best fits each space. Mark
your answers on the answer sheet 1.

Online start-ups are rallying citizens to revamp their neighbourhoods

Names, wedding dates and declarations of love cover a new pedestrian walkway in central
Rotterdam, a Dutch city. Asked by a website to help (31) ____ the project, locals paid €25 each
for the right to etch a message there. The walkway’s length depended on the (32) ____ of
donations. Within three months do-gooders had (33) ____ a third of the cash needed to build
its full 350-metre span. A government award has since (34) ____ that up.

Civic-minded citizens have long (35) ____ ventures that authorities desire but cannot afford.

Now, as cash-strapped councils (36) ____ their budgets, locals are relying on private gifts to
improve parks and playgrounds. Spacehive, a British site for urban projects is one of (37) ____
of crowdfunding sites. Visitors (38) ____ the site have paid part of the cash to bring wireless
internet to the centre of Mansfield, in England.

Donors are (39) ____ only when the project reaches its funding (40) ____. Spacehive then takes
a small (41) ____ from the sum of money. Most patrons receive no return (42) ____ their
investment. Ventures need careful examination. If neighbours or officials (43) ____ of a plan,
it will be delayed. Project leaders are asked to seek (44) ____ from a charity or trade association
to verify that their venture is beneficial and (45) ____. Their assistance earns them a (46) ____
if the project goes through.
Critics of crowdfunding point out that it is attractive installations that (47) ____ crowd’s
attention. Boring functional infrastructure that could (48) ____ improve an area, such as roads
and parking places, will be a harder sell. A deeper worry is that (49) ____ crowdfunding
councils cut spending on public spaces. That hurts poor neighbourhoods, (50) ____ mostly lack
the spare cash, know-how or time to get involved.

A B C D

31 bill remunerate fund pay

32 figure volume range bulk

33 risen build covered raised

34 topped done made put

35 supported strengthened opted relied

36 draw slash meet sever

37 busiest frequent the busiest the usual

38 into for from to

39 claimed charged forced made

40 target peak final solution

41 piece fragment cut dose

42 after in over on

43 disapprove approve fear postpone

44 power backing empowerment proof

45 achievable invaluable valueless notable

46 pension fame recognition fee

47 pay meet draw bring

48 the most most better little

 49 as long as resulting due to consequently

50 which who what those

3.2. Questions 51 – 70 (20 points)

Read the text below and complete the gaps. Use only one word in each gap. Write your
word on answer sheet 2. Remember to check the spelling of each word you use.

This week China promised a crackdown on social media influencers, who are paid (51) ______
brands to promote products online, but do not pay tax owed to the state. They have been accused
of tax (52) ______. One of the big stars, Viya, a 30-something fashionista known as the live-
streaming queen, has already been (53) ______ $210m for not declaring her income. The size
of that levy shows the scale of the industry, which (54) ______ for 12% of online sales in China.

Harnessing existing celebrity power to promote your product is known as product (55) ______.
Elizabeth Taylor touted Colgate-Palmolive’s shampoo in the 1950s, and Michael Jordan’ s deal
in 1984 with Nike revolutionised both basketball and branding. Influencers turn the logic on its
(56) ______: selling things helps make them more famous. Through curated feeds of clipped
videos and filtered photos they offer recommendations to consumers, mingled with glimpses
into their daily lives. Hardly ever (57) ______ they disclose how they are paid. And, with the
growing popularity among the followers, the sky’s the (58) ______ to what they can earn.

Influencers’ networks (59) ______ out for new audiences, particularly younger shoppers. And
influencers, being technologically proficient, have the upper (60) ______ over old-style brand
ambassadors. They are quick to adapt to newer platforms such as TikTok and to the ever-
changing algorithms of older ones (61) ______ Instagram.

Yet one-third of brands do not use influencers. They (62) ______ about tarnishing their
reputation. Having a swarm of freelance advocates is risky. (63) ______ this, ignoring
influencers is a mistake. Their (64) ______ of digital advertising market is still low at perhaps
3%, but it is (65) ______ fast. The boundary between entertainment and e-commerce is blurring.
And the most popular marketing strategy of the 2010s – ads targeted through Google and
Facebook – is (66) ______ threat as new privacy standards, including on Apple’s iPhone, make
it harder to spy on potential customers.
To (67) ______ on doing business with influencers, brands should (68) ______ a clear strategy.
They should expect more regulation on consumer protection. The guiding (69) ______ should
be to use only influencers who disclose to their audiences that their posts are paid. And, above
all, they should conduct market (70) ______ to understand what customers expect and to keep
improving their experience.

Adapted from The Economist

Test 4: Writing (40 points)

Write a short composition (200-250 words) on ONE of the following topics:
1) Working remotely will change more than work. Express your opinion.

OR

2) Business leaders look to crowdfunding as a potential source of capital. What are the
costs and benefits of this type of investment?
Write your answer on answer sheet 3.

THIS IS THE END OF THE TEST

 Key

1.1 1.2

1. a 9. b
2. b 10. b
3. b 11. b
4. a 12. a
5. b 13. b
6. c 14. b
7. c 15. a
8. b

2.1 2.2

16. c
17. d 23 - E 27 - C
18. d 24 - C 28 - A
19. a 25 - A 29 - B
20. a 26 - B 30 - E
21. b D- not used D- not used
22. d

31. c 51. by
32. b 52. evasion
33. d 53. fined
34. a 54. accounts
35. a 55. endorsement
36. b 56. head
37. c 57. do
38. d 58. limit
39. b 59. reach, look
40. a 60. hand
41. c 61. like
42. d 62. worry
43. a 63. despite
44. b 64. share
45. a 65. rising, growing
46. d 66. under
47. c 67. carry
48. b 68. set, have
49. c 69. principle
50. a 70. research
Transcripts
1.1.
Giving and receiving feedback.
How do you feel when you hear something like this from your manager: “Listen, I really need
to talk to you about the work you’ve been doing on that big project…”. If you’re like most
people, your heart starts beating a little faster and your mind starts racing. In fact, this is a
common reaction to the idea that we’re about to receive feedback. We naturally don’t like it.
But it’s important, so we need to learn how to receive feedback constructively. Receiving
feedback properly begins with thinking about feedback positively.
First of all, if someone is giving you direct and immediate feedback, it’s a sign of good
communication and a healthy work environment. The alternative is not getting feedback, or
getting feedback too late to use it constructively. That’s not a good situation. How would you
feel if, six months after finishing a project, a colleague told you that your boss wasn’t really
happy with your work? Next, when you get feedback, understand that it’s not personal, but
about producing better results. Humans have a natural tendency to take feedback personally,
but that will only hinder your performance. Focus on the ideas in the feedback, rather than the
way the feedback is given or your relationship with the person giving it. Don’t think “why is he
really telling me this?” or “why does he have to say it with that tone?” Instead, think “what
exactly is he saying and how can I use that to improve my work.” Not taking things personally
also means resisting the urge to become defensive. Just listen carefully and ask for clarification
if you don’t understand. Try not to start every response with “but…” That’s a sign of
defensiveness. Now, sometimes it’s true that feedback is not delivered effectively. If this
happens, be upfront about it. If a manager is constantly criticizing what you, tell him that you
need the feedback differently. Good feedback is specific, so ask for specifics if you don’t get
any. Good feedback is also actionable, so if it’s not obvious how you can use the feedback, then
ask how. So if someone says “That report really needs some work,” you can say something like
“is there any specific section that you think could be improved.
Now, we’ve been focusing on negative feedback, or feedback about what you need to do better
or differently. And people naturally focus on this kind of feedback. But you shouldn’t forget to
recognize positive feedback when you get it. Let the praise inspire and motivate you. Build on
that positive feedback and learn to apply your strengths in different areas. And if you really feel
you don’t receive much positive feedback, then ask for it, like this: “Could you tell me what
you thought worked really well in the report?” So, stay positive and open-minded when you
receive feedback, keep lines of communication clear, and you’ll be able to use the feedback
constructively. And finally, pay attention to how people are giving you feedback. Whether you
think they’re doing it well or not, you can learn how to provide better feedback to others. That’s
all for today.
(Source: http://www.mybeonline.com/business-english-skills-360-giving-and-receiving-
feedback-2/)
1.2.

Jackie: …,and now we want to have a little look at the future and ho businesses
and jobs are going to be affected.

Richard: The big change, in the past, machines did jobs in the manufacturing sector.
It looks now as if the future, it will be the service sector jobs that are going
to be lost.

Jackie: Can you give an example?

Richard: Well, driverless taxi cabs. They’re going to have taxis with no drivers going
round the cities and this is actually happening now. For instance in
Australia, they’ve got huge mines and they have the robots doing all the
drilling, they’ve got driverless trucks and driverless trains so there’s hardly
anyone in the mine at all.

Jackie: So in the near future um... more regular driving jobs could be lost.

Richard: Yes. But also more interestingly, is that even today, 30% of time spent in
the workplace in the United States is spent collecting and processing data
and so therefore a lot of jobs in the insurance industry, the finance
industry they could be in jeopardy.

Jackie: Okay, I can understand that because they receive lots of data, I mean not
unlike playing chess or something, and then they have to decide what’s the
best thing to do but robots can do that.

Richard: Exactly. The computers can do the number crunching and come out with
the answers.

Jackie: Right

Richard: Yes, so that means that we have computers now in insurance industries
calculating credit scores and even managing stock portfolio.
Jackie: So when we have the situation of blue collar jobs disappearing, we’ve now
got, you know, the future is almost like, white collar jobs are disappearing.

Richard: It’s often a lot of the highly paid jobs are just as much at risk as the low
paid jobs.

Jackie: Can you give an example, though Richard, of jobs that won’t be
affected by automation?

Richard: Yes, the things that machines can’t do very well require a high degree of
flexibility and physical adaptability and human interaction.

Jackie: And creativity.

Richard: Exactly, so the jobs that shouldn’t be at risk are in healthcare:
dentists, doctors, surgeons...

Jackie: Teachers?

Richard: ...and also in the education industry, teachers, social workers,

psychologists, those sorts of things.

Jackie: Right, okay. Good news for us then.

Richard: Yes, yes, so that the nature of work is changing, isn’t it? A lot of jobs are
disappearing so it’s very important for people therefore, possibly to be
retrained.

Jackie: So, so what about you, the listener are you worried about losing your job
because of automation? Are you thinking about retraining?

Richard: Or perhaps even you are doing a job caused by automation?

Jackie: We’d love to hear from you.

Adapted from podcastsinenglish.com