Stage Two

　　The importance of having a good CV

　　Well, in my opinion, you can never underestimate the importance of having a good CV. In the majority of cases, your CV is the employer's first impression of you, your first chance to impress your potential employer, let’s say. It is the essential illustration of your suitability for the job, showing how your skills and experience match your employer's requirements.

　　But more than that, it shows your ability to summarize, prioritize and present information effectively, essential skills in today's job market. It also shows your linguistic and communicative abilities.

　　Even though employers these days use a variety of selection techniques, such as analyzing your handwriting, a good TV is still the single most important part of any application.

　　Stage Three

　　Time Management

　　Your company has found that ineffective time management is one of the major problem areas throughout the workforce. You have been asked to put forward some suggestions for improving the situation. Discuss, and decide together:

　　why poor time management can become a major problem in companies

　　what procedures could be adopted to ensure that time is managed effectively.

　　Zhang: Hi, Ms Wang, you know, our company is sort of out of control these days. Don't you think so?

　　Wang: Yeah. Everything seems to be in disorder here in our company. And that obviously has a lot to do with poor time management.

　　Zhang: You mean poor time management has caused all these problems. Why?

　　Wang: When time is not well planned within a company, they usually do not allocate blocks of time to specified tasks. They do not have a definite idea of when they should complete a certain task. And …

　　Zhang: And I think they often neglect the ordering of priorities. I mean certain tasks need our prior attention. But in our company every task is treated on an equal basis, even if it is a very urgent task.

　　Wang: That's the point. So time should be planned according to the importance of the tasks we need to deal with.

　　Zhang: So what do you think we can do so that time is managed effectively here in our company?

　　Wang: You mean what procedures we can adopt?

　　Zhang: Sure. That's what our boss is asking us to do. Right?

　　Wang: Right. I think we've got a lot to do. First, we should make all the staff members realize how important effective time management is to our company.

　　Zhang: Yes, I think we can give them instruction in time management, especially those in supervisory positions.

　　Wang: Right, perhaps we can run a few training programs for them. If need, we may invite some experts from outside to help us.

　　Zhang: Another thing we can do is to make all the managers, or even every staff member, come up with a job description of their own. In this way, they can be pretty sure about what they are responsible for and what they are not.

　　Wang: Yes, that's a good idea. And I think, the top managers of our company should come up with a set of rules as to what kind of jobs should be given priority to. In this way, we can make sure that important tasks are dealt with first.