Success / Failure

to come to an abrupt end / halt; to come / grind to a halt; to bring sth to a temporary halt; abruptly; out of the blue; on the spur of the moment; at short notice; at the drop of a hat; to take sb by surprise; to crop up = arise (about problems; to get / come to grips with the problem; to tackle; a daunting / awesome / challenging / formidable / arduous / time-consuming / tough / uphill task; a mundane / routine / tedious task; to accomplish / complete the task; an uphill struggle / battle / task;

to achieve one’s goal; the ultimate goal; a daring goal; tremendous / conspicuous / spectacular / outlandish / towering success; amazing / astonishing / stunning/ overwhelming success; modest / moderate success; to achieve success; to attribute one’s success to ; to be vital to one’s success; to be / prove / appear hugely / immensely / remarkably / spectacularly / wildly successful; modestly / marginally successful; to be eventually / ultimately successful in; success does not come overnight; from humble beginnings to worldwide acclaim; from rags to riches; to fully/richly/rightly/rightfully deserve;

failure = lack of success: to end in complete / total / abject / humiliating failure; to be doomed to failure; to blame the failure on sb/sth; to attribute one’s failure to sb/sth; a possibility of / risk of failure; a failure = an unsuccessful person or thing : a complete / dismal / conspicuous / total / utter / disastrous / miserable failure; the ultimate failure; apparent failure; to feel like a complete failure; to experience / have failure; to learn from past failures; it’s not all doom and gloom; a sense of impending doom; outlandish success; to steal sb’s thunder; to land on one’s feet; a shrinking job market; shrinkage; to snowball; to have a snowball effect on; to mushroom beyond all expectations; job-wise, time-wise, dress-wise; to be on the look-out for sth; to play second fiddle to sb; to be accountable to sb; to encroach upon; lucrative; to offer lucrative opportunities; an unmitigated disaster; not to put a foot wrong; to put one’s best foot forward; to have a stroke of luck; to be born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth; to exacerbate; to aggravate; to alleviate; to cushion the blow of redundancy; to juggle work and family responsibilities; to miss the boat; to squander one’s chances / opportunities; to gain a toehold; to reach a crossroads in one’s life; to be faced with an acute / appalling / big / difficult dilemma; a no-win situation; a vicious circle; in close proximity to; to beaver away at sth; an eager beaver; a jack-of-all-trades;

to bear the brunt of; to have a gruelling / tight / hectic / tight / busy schedule; to alter / juggle one’s schedule; to work to a tight schedule; to try to fit sth into one’s busy schedule; to slip behind schedule; to run ahead of schedule; to have a tight schedule to keep;

a tantalizing choice to make; a tantalizing prospect; a justifiable risk to take; to treat sb in an appalling way; a clever / smart / prudent / sensible thing to do; a horrible thing to say; to look bright / good / promising / rosy; to look bleak / grim;

to be faced with a tough choice; to be faced with Hobson’s choice; to have no choice but to do sth; to have little / no option but to do sth; one’s only option; to leave sb with little / no choice but to do sth; a range of available choices; in terms of the options available; a limited range of choices available to sb; to consider / look at the options available; easily / readily / widely available; to change a tremendous amount; to improve vastly /drastically / dramatically / tremendously; a vast / huge / marked / tremendous / tangible improvement; a marginal / modest / slight improvement; to be aimed at improving sth; a considerable / huge / overwhelming / advantage; tangible benefits; to vastly / greatly outweigh the disadvantages; to improve considerably/dramatically/vastly/ marginally/ modestly; to deteriorate steadily/sharply/severely/rapidly/further;

to the detriment of; to be detrimental to; to be a serious / severe / major handicap to one’s success; to be badly / seriously / severely handicapped by sth; self-handicapper; to impede greatly / seriously / severely / significantly; ; impediment; to hinder greatly / seriously / severely; a hindrance; to hold sb back; a plausible / valid excuse; a flimsy / lame / far-fetched excuse; to find / make up an excuse; to kid / delude oneself into believing / thinking; to sabotage; to undermine;

to be excruciatingly / painfully / astoundingly / crushingly obvious; to be ravenous for profits / revenues etc; to have a ravenous appetite for; a handsome profit; to have the Midas touch; to seek a lucrative career;