EPISODE 114
LEVEL A2
READING COMPREHENSION
Women at the top: Andrea Jung
In 2011, Andrea Jung celebrated 12 years as Chief Executive of Avon Products. It is a big job. Avon sells cosmetics door to door in more than 120 countries. It has 6.2 million sales representatives and a billion customers. It sells four lipsticks and 190 mascaras every second. Jung was born in Toronto to Chinese immigrant parents. Her parents moved to the US when she was two, to get a better education for their children. She grew up in Massachusetts and graduated from Princeton. She speaks fluent English and Mandarin. Jung joined Avon in 1994. Four years later, she became Avon’s first female CEO. At the time, the company had revenues of $4bn. Today, its revenues are more than $10bn. Avon is known as “the company for women”. Most of Avon’s representatives are women.
About half the managers and four out of the nine members of Avon’s board are women. Jung says there are good business reasons for management teams with a mix of men and women. “In mixed teams, communication and decision-making are better”. Famous for her long black hair, pearls and her passion for Avon, Jung is one of the world’s top business leaders. She is also on the board of GE and Apple.
Exercise 1
Find the words or expressions in the text which mean the following:
1) the main director of a company: __________
2) a person who directly sells the products of a company: __________
3) somebody who buys products or services: __________
4) to change you place of living: __________
5) to finish your studies: __________
6) the money that a company earned: __________
7) the controlling body of a company: __________
8) somebody who is at the top of an organisation: __________
Exercise 2
Match the expressions from the two columns into logical collocations:
1) business door to door
2) management education
3) sales leader
4) to get representative
5) to sell team
Exercise 3
Provide English equivalents of these expressions:
1) świętować, obchodzić
2) przedstawiciel handlowy
3) klient
4) przeprowadzić się
5) zostac absolwentem uniw.
6) Dołączyć
7) przychód
8) członek
9) zarząd
10) mieszany
11) podejmowanie decyzji
12) znany z (czegoś)
Cultural note
In the Anglo-Saxon culture there is one body (organ) controlling the functioning of a company: the Board of Directors (Rada Dyrektorów), often called just board. It has the same powers as two Polish bodies: the Management Board (Zarząd) and the Supervisory Board (Rada Nadzorcza).
Grammar corner…
“It has 6.2 million sales representatives and a billion customers.”
In English words describing big numbers are used in the same singular form.
So we should say:
300 – three hundred
5 000 – five thousands
7 000 000 – seven million
9 000 000 000 – nine billion, which is the equivalent of Polish miliard!
Exercise 4
Say these numbers:
1) 200 000
2) 6 800 000 0000
3) 4 300
4) 9 700 000
5) 75 000
GLOSSARY
to celebrate – obchodzić
to sell door to door – prowadzić akwizycję
a sales representative – przedstawiciel handlowy
a customer – klient
to move – przeprowadzić się
to graduate from – ukończyć studia, zostać absolwentem
to join – dołączyć
CEO – dyrektor generalny
a revenue – przychód
the board – zarząd (patrz: Cultural note)
mixed – mieszany
decision-making – podejmowanie decyzji
a leader – lider
>>Answers
ANSWER KEY:
Ex. 1
1) Chief Executive (Officer) – CEO
2) sales representative
3) customer
4) to move
5) to graduate
6) revenue
7) board
8) leader
Ex. 2
1) business leader
2) management team
3) sales representative
4) to get education
5) to sell door to door
Ex. 3
1) to celebrate
2) sales representative
3) customer
4) to move
5) to graduate from
6) to join
7) revenue
8) member
9) board
10) mixed
11) decision-making
12) famous for
Ex. 4
1) two hundred thousand
2) six billion eight hundred million
3) four thousand three hundred
4) nine million seven hundred thousand
5) seventy-five thousand
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