VOCABULARY
What do we call a problem that is preventing progress?
a blocker
Complete:
"We _____ the report by Friday."
This is a firm commitment.
→ 'll deliver
Which word means the amount of risk a company is willing to accept?
→ risk appetite
Complete the phrase:
“The proposal ___ merit.”
→ has
You need a colleague to review your draft. They are busy, and you want to make a very gentle request.
Which verb fits best?
→ nudge
What do we call a person responsible for making sure a task gets done?
→ the owner
“We ___ to finish this by Friday, but it depends on QA.”
→ are aiming
“This risk is ___ likely, but the impact is ___.”
→ highly / negligible
Your colleague’s idea has a problem at one specific stage. What can you say?
→ “The logic breaks down at…”
You asked a colleague to send the report yesterday, but they haven’t done it yet. You want to prompt them about it.
Which verb fits best?
→ remind
What phrase means "a possible effect of a decision that happens later"?
→ a downstream effect
“If we proceed with SSO, we ___ need to push the reporting module.”
→ will
A new feature may delay QA, push another task to the next sprint, and affect the launch date.
What do we call this chain of consequences?
→ a ripple effect
Replace the personal criticism with feedback on the idea:
❌ “Your approach is fragile.”
→ “The approach is fragile.”
You want a colleague to try a new process because you think it will make their work easier.
Which verb fits best?
→ encourage
What do we call a serious boundary that we are not willing to cross?
→ a red line
“If we had known about the dependency, we ___ the deadline.”
→ would have changed
Complete with the correct conditional:
“If we proceed with SSO, we ___ the reporting module to the next sprint.”
→ will push
Complete:
“The data ___ the proposal, but we still need to ___ the results.”
→ supports / validate
You want your manager to agree to your proposal. You give them reasons and try to change their opinion.
Which verb fits best?
→ persuade
"We need to _ buy-in from the other team before we proceed."
→ secure buy-in
Correct the sentence:
“You should caught the issue.”
→ The process should have caught the issue.
Use a 3rd conditional:
The team didn't know about the dependency, so they missed the deadline.
→ If we had known about the dependency, we would have changed the deadline.
Give a professional counterargument using this structure:
Context → Observation → Impact → Next step
“The proposal has merit, and the approach is sound. However, the logic breaks down at the payment step, because it assumes every user already has an account. This could create friction for new users. I’d suggest validating this assumption with additional data before we proceed.”
Complete the sentence using convince + object + to-infinitive:
“The data was strong enough to ___ the client ___ approve the new approach.”
→ convince the client to approve