Учебное пособие по английскому языку для студентов неязыковых вузов специальности "Государственное и муниципальное управление". Касторнова О.Н. - 96 стр.

         defects. Around 1970, it is said, a group of investment analysts visited a world-
         famous UK engineering company. They asked the questions of their trade: about
         profit margins, stock control and balance sheets. The company's executives
         seemed honestly puzzled. They did not see the point of all this, they said. Their
         products were the finest in the world. Why all these detailed questions about
         numbers?
                Rolls Royce, the company in question, duly went bust in 1973. The
         trouble with old-style quality, it seemed, was that it encouraged supply - driven
         management. The engineers would make the product to the highest possible
         standard and price it as a result. If the public was so uncultured that they turned
         it down, so much the worse for the public. And so old-style quality got a bad
         name in business circles. It was all very well for artists to produce masterpieces.
         The job of companies was to please the market.
                Additional damage to old-style quality was done by the rise of Japan.
         When Japanese cars, toys and television sets first reached the market in the US
         and UK, local manufacturers considered them cheap trash. In the beginning,
         they were. But under the teaching of Edward Deming, the Japanese were
         learning about the second definition of quality. Western customers then began to
         realise that while Japanese cars might be tin cans, they did not keep breaking
         down, as did British and American cars.
                In time of course, Japanese cars stopped being tin cans, and became
         stylish and comfortable vehicles instead. That is, they achieved old-style quality
         as well. As western manufacturers discovered to their cost that was in some
         respects the easy bit. New-style quality was harder.
                Quality has a third meaning: that of value for money. To qualify for that
         meaning, a product must be of certain standard; and it should express a sense,
         not of outright cheapness, but of being sold at a fair price.
                The US fast foods group McDonald's, for example, talks of its “high
         quality food”. But at 99c or 99p, its hamburgers are as close to absolute
         cheapness as any person in the developed world could wish. They are also
         highly reliable. Eat a McDonald's anywhere around the world and the results
         will be approximately similar. But as 100 anyone who has eaten a really good
         American hamburger knows, a McDonald's is also a long way from quality in its
         original sense.
                3. Discuss these questions.
                1.    Why were the Rolls Royce executives “puzzled” when the analysts
         asked their questions?
                2.    According to the writer, what mistake caused Rolls Royce to go
         bankrupt?
                3.    What advantage did Japanese cars have compared with British and
         American cars?
                4. Complete the definition below.
                Nowadays, high quality products have three essential features:


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