Hey Jack, As a matter of fact, you may use either the past simple tense (''decided'') or the present perfect tense (''has decided''), depending on what you consider to be a ''finished event''. As opposed to what Teacher Allie said, I dare say that you should take both options into consideration. * If ''this year'' (which refers to the year concerned) is almost over, then it is permissible to use ''decided''. In this case, you conceptualize the year as being over or past in terms of the possibility that the staffing committee recruit more than 100 new employees for an ambitious project again. So the past tense is fine. HOWEVER, the present perfect tense ''has decided'' could be said at any time during the year and is stated as one of the things the staffing committee has done, with no implication as to whether or not you think a further recruitment is possible. Did you get the idea? * Here is another example FOR YOU TO MAKE A COMPARISON: ''I watched a lot of movies on Netflix today.'' (in this case, the past tense is fine! That can be explained due to the fact that, although 'today' is not finished, you are not expecting to watch any further movies, so you conceptualize the chance of watching other movies as over or past.) ''I have watched a lot of movies on Netflix today.'' (in this case, the present perfect could also be used and would befit the context quite perfectly = that can be explained due to the fact that you might consider that ''today'' is not yet finished, and that you expect to be able to watch a few more movies on Netflix until the day ends.) Hope that helps!!!

"Has decided" is NOT wrong. You can use either the past simple ( "decided") or the present perfect ("has decided") in this sentence. They are both equally correct. The difference is subtle. If you say "The committee has decided..." this sounds like a recent decision. It's the kind of announcement you might see in a company newsletter, for example. If you say "The committee decided..." , this puts the decision further back in the past, perhaps several months ago. Without further context, you cannot know which is the better tense to use. For example: "Hey, have you heard? The staffing committee has decided to recruit more than 100 new employees for an ambitious project this year." "That's great. Now we can start to set the budget." ---> This is telling us something about the present. or The staffing committee decided to recruit more than 100 new employees for an ambitious project this year. However, then they subsquently realised that they didn't have the funds available, and the project was cancelled. ----> This is telling us something about the past. I'm presuming that this is the question you answered: 5. The staffing committee ___to recruit more than 100 new employees for an ambitious project this year. (a)decision (b)decide (c)decided (d)was decided Of the four options given, (c) is the only possible key. Options a, b and d are wrong, and the option "has decided" is not available. This means that (c) has to be the right answer.

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Hi Jack, I found a possible source of your question, and "has decided" isn't one of the options there. We just have "decision / decide / decided / was decided". https://www.i-qahand.com/Questions/2018012800001 You can certainly put "has decided" into the sentence.

If the process of deciding has taken some period of time, has decided is also correct. Bests,