15. Meetings and presentations CHECK YOUR ENGLISH VOCABULARY FOR BUSINESS AND ADMINISTRATION

CHECK YOUR ENGLISH VOCABULARY FOR BUSINESS AND ADMINISTRATION

15. Meetings and presentations

Look at this rather long-winded opening address from a company's Annual General Meeting (AGM) and fill in the gaps with words from the box. The first letter of each word is already in the text. I'd like to 1. o ____________ this meeting by 2. w ____________you all. It's good to see so many 3. p ____________here today - in fact, this is probably the best 4. a ____________we've had at a meeting for a long time - and I'd like to thank you all in advance for 5. s ____________me. Well, we've got a lot on the 6. a ____________ and I want to make as much 7. p ____________ as possible in the next two hours or so. If we stick to the main 8. s ____________, we should 9. G ____________ everything and 10. a ____________ all of our 11. g ____________ and 12. o ____________. I will 13. c ____________ the meeting, as usual, but I really hope that you will all have something to 14. c____________ , and if anything needs 15. c ____________, please don't hesitate to 16. i ____________ me (although not too often, I hope: the more 17. i ____________ we can 18. a ____________ today the better). I'll be 19. b____________  several important 20. m ____________ during the meeting, beginning with those that I feel should take 21. p ____________, before 22. s ____________ the main 23. p ____________ and making 24. r ____________. This will be followed by an 25. o ____________ session where you can give me your 26. o ____________. And I'm sure you will all be delighted to hear that after the meeting 27. c ____________, there will be drinks and snacks for everyone. Mr Barker will be taking 28. n ____________ and keeping the 29. m ____________ of the meeting, and I will be using these to write my 30. R ____________ afterwards, so if anyone has any 31. c ____________, I suggest you talk to him and not to me! Now, before I get going, are there any 32. q ____________ from the 33. f____________ ? No? Good. Right, well I'll begin. The first point I want to 34. d ____________ is next month's 35. c ____________. As you know, the 36. v ____________ we have chosen is the Royal Eynsham Hotel in Oxfordshire. We've invited several 37. s ____________ to make 38. p ____________ on various aspects of the trade, and we're expecting over 200 39. d ____________ from our offices around Europe. Now, of course, there's always the possibility that some major players* won't be able to make it, so we need to make a 40. c ____________ plan that we can 41. i ____________ if things go pear-shaped**... (*major players: important people. **Pear shaped: if something goes pear-shaped, it goes wrong. This is an informal expression)

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