Critical Reasoning

Source: Knewton free test

In an attempt to save money by decreasing its spending on office supplies, the marketing department of Company Q implemented an electronic communications system that eliminates paper copies of memos and reports. After shifting to the new system, the quality of the marketing department's work improved significantly.

Which of the following, if true, would most strongly dispute a decision on the basis of these results to implement this system throughout the company?

* (A)The only competitors which have implemented electronic communications systems so far are significantly larger than company Q.

* (B)Unlike other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department.
correct

* (C) Members of the marketing department found it easy to share and review electronic versions of each other's documents.

* (D) A reorganization of Company Q's management hierarchy would also improve the quality of employees' work.

* (E) Apart from the higher quality of the marketing department's work, the significant decrease in office supply expenditures made this system worthwhile for Company Q.

[spoiler]OA is B. But i think, for B to be OA we need to assume that electronic communication system requires computer skills. Don't you think that this will mean assuming a lot/assuming beyond what the argument says.[/spoiler]

Its always better to hide the answer before posting the question.
That will make others solve the question without knowing the answer and it will always leads to a good discussion.

In an attempt to save money by decreasing its spending on office supplies, the marketing department of Company Q implemented an electronic communications system that eliminates paper copies of memos and reports. After shifting to the new system, the quality of the marketing department's work improved significantly.

Argument: Electronic Communication helped marketing department in reducing their Cost and improving their Work.


Which of the following, if true, would most strongly dispute a decision on the basis of these results to implement this system throughout the company?
We have to choose the option that will suggest that electronic Communication can not be implemented through out the company.


* (A)The only competitors which have implemented electronic communications systems so far are significantly larger than company Q. It Does not Matter whether competitors of company Q use which communication System. Out of Scope.


* (B)Unlike other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department. Author is Saying that marketing department employees are better skilled in computer than other department, So may be if we implement electronic communication system in other departments employees may not be able to perform that well. With in the Scope. ( Good Contender )

C) Members of the marketing department found it easy to share and review electronic versions of each other's documents. It does not matter whether the marketing department employees find it easy or difficult to share the information Out of Scope.

* (D) A reorganization of Company Q's management hierarchy would also improve the quality of employees' work.
Reorganization will also improve the quality of employee but by which means not mentioned so Out of Scope.

* (E) Apart from the higher quality of the marketing department's work, the significant decrease in office supply expenditures made this system worthwhile for Company Q. They are praising the electronic communication system but it does not matter we are looking for a option that can weak the recommendation of electronic communication system for other system but by no means if one system is good for one department it will be good for others. So OUt of scope.

ONLY B stands Out so its the official answer and with in the scope.

weakening questions comes in the category where outside information is welcomed so its not assuming much.

Hope this helps.

goyalsau wrote:Its always better to hide the answer before posting the question.
That will make others solve the question without knowing the answer and it will always leads to a good discussion.

Please look carefully. Answer is already under spoiler.

this_time_i_will wrote:

goyalsau wrote:Its always better to hide the answer before posting the question.
That will make others solve the question without knowing the answer and it will always leads to a good discussion.

Please look carefully. Answer is already under spoiler.

Apply spoiler. Check the below in your post. The answer is marked right next to the option.

* (B)Unlike other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department.
correct

this_time_i_will wrote:Source: Knewton free test

In an attempt to save money by decreasing its spending on office supplies, the marketing department of Company Q implemented an electronic communications system that eliminates paper copies of memos and reports. After shifting to the new system, the quality of the marketing department's work improved significantly.

Which of the following, if true, would most strongly dispute a decision on the basis of these results to implement this system throughout the company?

* (A)The only competitors which have implemented electronic communications systems so far are significantly larger than company Q.

* (B)Unlike other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department.
correct

* (C) Members of the marketing department found it easy to share and review electronic versions of each other's documents.

* (D) A reorganization of Company Q's management hierarchy would also improve the quality of employees' work.

* (E) Apart from the higher quality of the marketing department's work, the significant decrease in office supply expenditures made this system worthwhile for Company Q.

[spoiler]OA is B. But i think, for B to be OA we need to assume that electronic communication system requires computer skills. Don't you think that this will mean assuming a lot/assuming beyond what the argument says.[/spoiler]

I know answer is under the spoiler but you marked it above as well.
LOOK CAREFULLY

Interesting

I quite jumped on my seat on seeing the question making a switch from talking about saving money to talking about quality of work. I was very sure before even looking at the answer choices that the correct answer must have something to do with this unexpected switch. A pattern I've seen zillion times. I was wrong!! (duh)

Anyway, why B is correct? Well, I thought of Darryl, the warehouse guy from "The Office" Does he need computer skills for his day-to-day work? Umm, quite not. Will introducing an e-mail system prove helpful in improving quality of warehouse work? Umm, no. So, there can be departments in the company where computer skills are not a requirement. Therefore, introducing e-mail system company wide may not improve quality of those departments.

Guys, in the tussle of spoiler/no spoiler my question remained unanswered.
Anyother member out here who can help me answering my question.
thanks.

this_time_i_will wrote:Guys, in the tussle of spoiler/no spoiler my question remained unanswered.
Anyother member out here who can help me answering my question.
thanks.

Well, B is indeed making an assumption as you stated. However, it appears to be the best answer among all. So can't do anything

g000fy wrote:

this_time_i_will wrote:Guys, in the tussle of spoiler/no spoiler my question remained unanswered.
Anyother member out here who can help me answering my question.
thanks.

Well, B is indeed making an assumption as you stated. However, it appears to be the best answer among all. So can't do anything

Indeed! Thanks for the reply.

No problem pal

Hello!

Good conversation here- "this_time," you're right that there is a little bit of a terminology leap there between "electronic communications" and "computer skills," but as the others say, that is not enough to make answer choice B incorrect. The test does sometimes provide slight terminology leaps, but this occurs more often on the Reading Comprehension questions than on the Critical Reasoning section, so you're right to be suspicious here.

However, when compared to the other answer choices, choice B is certainly the best. The logical precedent behind this answer choice is that one cannot infer that results in one area transfer to another, ESPECIALLY if there is an element of the original area that does not transfer to the others. In this case, the marketing department is being used as a test case for the entire company, and answer choice B points out an explicit and very meaningful difference between the marketing department and the rest of company, qualifying the argument's conclusion. Choice B is correct, despite the computer/electronic communications inferential leap.

-One quick grammar note, btw- there is a slight grammatical error in choice B as well, for all you SC fanatics. The test actually does use incorrect grammar on non-SC questions from time to time, believe it or not. For extra points, who can spot the GRAMMATICAL (not logical) error in choice B?

Unlike other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department.


As is NOT the case with other departments of Company Q, computer skills have always been an important qualification for positions in its marketing department

OR

Unlike other departments of Company Q, the marketing department always has positions that require computer skills

Well done, ov25!

The comparison in the original answer choice was illogical, comparing "computer skills" to "other departments of Company Q." Personally, I find the phrase "As is not the case with..." rather jarring and difficult to parse. That is, it's a perfect GMAT phrase! :twisted:

On the other hand, "unlike" is one of the most common GMAT words, so your second correction is perhaps even more accurate.

We at Knewton find your new answer choices no more confusing but with substantially higher grammatical quality than that in the original question.

The question basically asks us to weaken the basis of implementing this strategy in the entire company. In other words, it wants to weaken the argument " because the strategy worked in marketing department, it should be implemented in the entire company". So basically, we want to find a flaw in the logic (some extra info) that proves that this strategy wont work elsewhere.

According to me B is the correct answer. Infact its pretty straight forward.

A is irrelevant because it talks about other companies when the topic is this company

C too is irrelevant or at best a strengthener because it shows the benefit of electronic versions (opposite of what we wanna do)

D the biggest problem with D is that it uses the phrase " A reorganization.. would improve" It means this did not actually happen. Secondly, it does not prove that using electronic versions won't improve efficiency. This means that the conclusion remains unaffected.

E This is irrelevant.We don't wanna know why this system was established/used. We wanna prove that this system is not worthwhile to implement in rest of the company


Hope this helps..

Knewton Student

(Taking GMAT on 26th October)