In questa lezione di Business English Pod, continuiamo il nostro sguardo al vocabolario e alle collocazioni per 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. Così, how do we do this? BENE, in today’s dialog, we’ll learn some of the common expressions we use when we discuss budgets.
Prima di ascoltare, parliamo un po' di Collocazioni inglesi. Una collocazione è un gruppo di parole che i madrelingua usano spesso insieme. Una collocazione corretta suona naturale, mentre una collocazione errata suona innaturale. Per esempio, 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.
Ascolterai molte collocazioni utili nel dialogo di oggi. Mentre ascolti, prova a scegliere queste combinazioni naturali di parole. Poi spiegheremo cosa significano e come usarli nel debriefing.
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. Ultima volta, they talked about the past year’s budget. Oggi, you’ll hear them making a plan for the upcoming year.
Domande sull'ascolto
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?
Download: Podcast MP3
