Section A: Banked Cloze
Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.
Trust is fundamental to life. If you can't trust anything, life becomes intolerable. You can't have relationships without trust, let alone good ones.
In the workplace, too, trust is (26) ______. An organization without trust will be full of fear and (27) ______. If you work for a boss who doesn't trust their employees to do things right, you'll have a (28) ______ time. They'll be checking up on you all the time, correcting “mistakes” and (29) ______ reminding you to do this or that. Colleagues who don't trust one another will need to spend more time (30) ______ their backs than doing any useful work.
Organizations are always trying to cut costs. Think of all the additional tasks caused by lack of trust. Audit departments only exist because of it. Companies keep large volumes of (31) ______ because they don't trust their suppliers, their contractors or their customers. Probably more than half of all administrative work is only there because of an ever-existing sense that “you can't trust anyone these days.” If even a small part of such valueless work could be (32) ______, the savings would run into millions of dollars.
All this is extra work we (33) ______ onto ourselves because we don't trust people—the checking, following through, doing things ourselves because we don't believe others will do them (34) ______—or at all. If we took all that away, how much extra time would we suddenly find in our life? How much of our work (35) ______ would disappear?
Word Bank
全文翻译
信任是生活的基础。如果你不能信任任何事物，生活就变得难以忍受。没有信任就没有人际关系，更不用说好的关系了。在工作场所，信任也是必不可少的。一个没有信任的组织将充满恐惧和怀疑。如果你为一个不信任员工能做好事的老板工作，你会过得很艰难。他们会不断检查你，纠正"错误"，并不断提醒你做这做那。互不信任的同事需要花更多时间互相提防，而不是做任何有用的工作。组织总是在努力降低成本。想想所有由缺乏信任导致的额外任务。审计部门的存在就是因为它。公司保留大量记录，因为他们不信任供应商、承包商或客户。可能超过一半的行政工作只因为一种持续存在的感觉，即"如今谁都不能信"。如果这些无价值的工作即使只有一小部分能被消除，节省下来的钱将达数百万美元。所有这些都是我们因不信任他人而强加给自己的额外工作——检查、跟进、亲力亲为因为我们不相信别人会正确完成——或者根本不相信他们会做。如果我们去掉这一切，我们的生活里会突然多出多少额外时间？我们的工作压力会消失多少？Answers & Explanations
26. C (essential)。解析：在系动词 is 之后作表语。上文说信任是生活的基础，这里指在职场同样是“必不可少的”。
27. M (suspicion)。解析：与 fear (恐惧) 并列的名词。没有信任的组织充满了恐惧和“怀疑”。
28. G (miserable)。解析：修饰 time。在不被信任的老板手下工作，你会过得很“痛苦/糟糕”。
29. A (constantly)。解析：修饰现在分词 reminding。意为“不断地”提醒。
30. O (watching)。解析：动宾搭配 watching their backs 意为“提防他人/小心背后”，符合不信任的语境。
31. J (records)。解析：动宾搭配 keep records。公司保存大量的“记录”是因为不信任。
32. K (removed)。解析：位于 could be 之后，需填过去分词。意为如果这些无价值的工作被“移除/消除”。
33. L (stacks)。解析：动词填空。stacks onto ourselves 意为“堆积/加在自己身上”。
34. I (properly)。解析：修饰动词 do。意为不相信别人能“正确地/恰当地”做事。
35. F (load)。解析：构成复合名词 work load，意为“工作负荷”。