CAT 2002 — VARC Question 38
Fill the gaps in the passage below with the most appropriate word from the options given for each gap. The right words are the ones used by the author. Be guided by the author's overall style and meaning when you choose the answers.
In a large company, ______1______ people is about as common as using a gun or a switch-blade to ______2_______ an argument. As a result, most managers have little or no experience of firing people, and they find it emotionally automatic, as result, they often delay the act interminably, much as an unhappy spouse will prolong a bad marriage. And when the firing is done, it's often done clumsily, with far worse side effects than are necessary.
Do the world-class software organizations have a different way of firing people? No. But they do the deed swiftly, humanely, and professionally.
The key point here is to view the fired employee as a "failed product" and to ask how the process ______3_______ such a phenomenon in the first place.
The sentences given in each question, when properly sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentences is labelled with a letter. Choose the most logical order of sentences from among the four given choices to construct a coherent paragraph.
- As officials, their vision of a country shouldn't run too far beyond that of the local people with whom they have to deal.
- Ambassadors have to choose their words.
- To say what they feel they have to say, they appear to be denying or ignoring part of what they know.
- So, with ambassadors as with other expatriates in black Africa, there appears at a first meeting a kind of ambivalence.
- They do a specialized job and it is necessary for them to live ceremonial lives.
Answer & solution
- A
BCEDA
- B
BEDAC
BEADC
- D
BCDEA
Sentence B begins the paragraph. That is evident from the options. It is also evident because the sentence introduces the topic ‘ambassadors’. At first glance, BC seems a likely pair. But, it is not so. DC is a mandatory pair. ‘Ambivalence’ mentioned in sentence D is exemplified in sentence C (to say what they feel… they appear to be denying…) that helps us to rule out all other options that is, 1, 2 and 4. BEA talk about what ambassadors have to be like. Sentence D introduces another idea and as discussed earlier is followed by C.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.