Dans cette leçon d'anglais des affaires, nous continuons notre regard sur le vocabulaire et les collocations pour discussing a budget.
A budget is a plan for spending money. And you’ll often hear the word “budget” used as a noun. But “budget” is also a verb. We can budget carefully or poorly. We can budget not only money but also time. And how we budget can help or harm our business. If we spend too much money, we may decrease profits. But if we don’t spend enough money, the business may not grow or thrive. It’s all about balance.
A typical budget includes a long list of items that we need to spend money on. And in a budget meeting, you’ll hear people talk, or argue, about where to spend more and where to spend less. Donc, how do we do this? bien, in today’s dialog, we’ll learn some of the common expressions we use when we discuss budgets.
Avant d'écouter, parlons un peu de Collocations en anglais. Une collocation est un groupe de mots que les locuteurs natifs utilisent souvent ensemble. Une collocation correcte semble naturelle, alors qu'une colocalisation incorrecte ne semble pas naturelle. Par exemple, in English we say “budget cuts” to talk about lower spending. But we can’t say “budget slices” or “budget chops,” even though “slice” and “chop” mean “cut.” Those simply aren’t natural expressions.
Vous entendrez de nombreuses collocations utiles dans le dialogue d'aujourd'hui. Pendant que vous écoutez, essayez de choisir ces combinaisons naturelles de mots. Ensuite, nous expliquerons ce qu'ils signifient et comment les utiliser dans le débriefing.
Today we’ll rejoin Kate, Harry, and Linda as they discuss the budget for their IT department. Kate and Harry are managers, and Linda is their supervisor. Dernière fois, they talked about the past year’s budget. Aujourd'hui, you’ll hear them making a plan for the upcoming year.
Questions d'écoute
1. What does Kate say the finance department wants to focus on?
2. What is Harry’s concern about replacing the workstations?
3. What does Kate think can be changed to save money?
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