Life lessons from villains, crooks and gangsters - Reading Test Answers
Complete answer key with detailed explanations
Matching Information
Question 1
C
Answer location: Paragraph C, line 2
Answer explanation: A line in the given paragraph suggests that “making a break for it required creative thinking, long-term planning and perseverance – essential skills similar to those needed to achieve success in big business.” Hence, we can see that the author escaped from prison (jailbreak) and found something. Therefore, upcoming enterprises and businesses need to break free from traditional thinking and come up with innovative and creative business models.
Question 2
G
Answer location: Paragraph G, last line
Answer explanation: Paragraph G puts forward the information that “they picked out five common traits among this group: the ability to hustle, pivot, provoke, hack and copycat.” Here, author suggests the 5 common traits of rule breakers are ability to hustle, pivot, provoke, hack and copycat.
Question 3
B
Answer location: Paragraph B, line 1
Answer explanation: Paragraph B puts forward the information that “far from encouraging illegality, these gurus argue that – in the same way, big corporations sometimes emulate start-ups – business leaders could learn from the underworld about flexibility, innovation and the ability to pivot quickly.” According to the passage, large businesses who wear the criminal hat are highly adaptable in their approach, agile on their feet, and always ready to innovate on their present strategy. Big firms sometimes try to follow the startups/act like criminals to attain their goals.
Question 4
A
Answer location: Paragraph A, line 3
Answer explanation: The answer is clearly mentioned in the said paragraph and line. You must note the paraphrasing here. In the passage, it is said that “beyond the morally reprehensible side of criminals’ work, some business gurus say organised crime syndicates, computer hackers, pirates and others operating outside the law could teach legitimate corporations a thing or two about how to hustle and respond to rapid change.” From this information, we can learn that drug baron’s escape teach legitimate corporationsto try and learn from Guzman’s creative thinking and his ability to think out of the box to create an avenue for escape not once but twice.
Question 5
H
Answer location: Paragraph H, line 1
Answer explanation: The Saudi entrepreneur Walid Abdul Wahab founder of DesertFarms made his company sell camel milk to giant retailers like the Wholefoods Market. Hence, he can be considered a great entrepreneur.
Question 6
D
Answer location: Paragraph D, line 2
Answer explanation: The answer is clearly mentioned in the said paragraph and line. You must note the paraphrasing here. In the passage, it is said that “some cartels stay in business despite multiple efforts by law enforcement on both sides of the US border and millions of dollars from international agencies to shut them down.” The perfect example how criminal groups deceive the law is the Sinaloa Cartel dug which created underground tunnels and recruited family members as border agents, who used catapults to transport drugs in areas with high-tech fences. Devin Liddell, who heads brand strategy for Seattle-based design consultancy, Teague, while he condemns the violence and illegal activities of the cartels he was intrigued by the techniques used by them to circumvent the law.
Question 7
E
Answer location: Paragraph E, line 4
Answer explanation: Few lines in said paragraph discusses that the “Liddell argues the difference between the two groups is that criminal organisations often have improvisation encoded into their daily behaviour, while larger companies think of innovation as a set process.” This line from the passage provides the difference between legal (think of innovation as a set process) and illegal organizations (often have improvisation encoded into their daily behaviour).
Question 8
FALSE
Answer location: Paragraph F, line 3
Answer explanation: Paragraph G intimates that “both criminals and start-up founders “question authority, act outside the system and see new and clever ways of doing things,” said Goodman.” So, the similarity between criminals and start-up founders is that both question authority, act outside the system as well as see new and clever ways of doing things.
Sentence Completion
Question 9
perseverance
Answer location: Paragraph C, line 2
Answer explanation: According to the information given the the passage, “making a break for it required creative thinking, long-term planning and perseverance – essential skills similar to those needed to achieve success in big business.” Hence, Joaquin Guzman, in order to escape the prison used such traits as creative thinking, long-term planning, and perseverance.
Question 10
catapult
Answer location: Paragraph D, last line
Answer explanation: If you read thoroughly, the author in the given paragraph mentions that “it built a vast underground tunnel, hired family members as border agents and even used a catapult to circumvent a high-tech fence.” Thus, to transport drugs, the Mexican drug gang Sinaloa built a huge subterranean tunnel. They hired family members as border agents to transport the narcotics, and they employed catapults to get across the high-tech fences.
Question 11
Improvisation
Answer location: Paragraph E, 2nd last line
Answer explanation: In the said paragraph, refer that,“the brand has all but faded from view. Liddell argues the difference between the two groups is that criminal organisations often have improvisation encoded into their daily behaviour, while larger companies think of innovation as a set process.” The main difference between the two groups is that criminals, unlike large corporations never repeat the process that they have previously used and this helps them in avoiding the law enforcing officers.
Question 12
network
Answer location: Paragraph H, line 3
Answer explanation: If you read thoroughly, there’s a line that claims, “through perseverance, he eventually found a network of Amish camel milk farmers and started selling the product via social media.” It suggests that Saudi entrepreneur Walid Abdul-Wahab because of this persuasive nature found a network of Amish farmers to supply camel milk.
Multiple Choice
Question 13
C
Answer location: Complete Paragraph
Answer explanation: This paragraph discusses the difference between legal and illegal firms in that illegal firms are prepared to venture down unexplored pathways, are unconstrained by traditions, and will not hesitate to breach the rules in order to find novel solutions to their issues.