Verbs for Decline

Things go wrong in specific ways, and having the right word for each makes you clearer and more credible when you describe them.

This quiz covers exacerbate, languish, protract, squander, and succumb, five verbs for deterioration, delay, waste, and surrender. You will find them in business analysis, strategic reviews, and any discussion of how opportunity gets lost.

Worth noting: to exacerbate a problem is to make its severity worse; to protract it is to make its duration longer. The same crisis can be both exacerbated and protracted, but by different failures.