I have a question about three words. The first word is take stock, the second is size up, the third is scrutinise. I don’t know the words’ difference. So would you like to tell me about these words?
Albert
This week Li and William answer a question from our listener Albert about three words, all of which are very useful in business:
Take stock
Size up
Scrutinise
Can you guess which of these three phrases is the most formal? The answer is in the programme.
We use take stock when we want to review a situation or look back at a process.
A year after the company introduced the helpline, they did a review to take stock of their customer service.
“It’s been an interesting morning. Shall we chat over lunch to try and take stock?”
We use this phrase to describe getting a general idea of something or somebody we don’t know.
“I only joined last week. I’m still sizing up my new team.”
“It’s a huge project. It’s taken me two weeks just to size it up”.
When you scrutinise something, you look at it closley
If we scrutinise (or scrutinize in the US) something, we examine it very carefully.
“Get the lawyers to scrutinise that contract as closely as possible.”
A special committee scrutinised the activities of the organisation.
Listen to the programme for more examples of these words in use.
Don’t forget, if you have a question about English, email it to questions.chinaelt@bbc.co.uk. We may answer it in this programme.
formal 正式的
review a situation 评估或判断一个形势
look back at a process 回过头去看一件事情的过程
helpline 热线服务电话
examine 检查，察看
contract 合同
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