Have vs Get Comparison — Advanced Exercises

At advanced level, the causative offers two distinct structures for describing actions involving people. Have someone do uses the bare infinitive and implies authority — the speaker has the power to give instructions: "The director had the actors rehearse the final scene." Get someone to do uses the to-infinitive and implies persuasion — the speaker convinced or encouraged the person: "She got her parents to lend her the car." The verb form signals the type of relationship between the speaker and the doer.

Register plays a role here too. Have someone do is more formal and common in professional and written English: "The CEO had her team prepare a detailed report." Get someone to do is more informal and suggests effort or negotiation: "I finally got the landlord to fix the broken window." In some situations, make someone do expresses stronger force: "The teacher made the students rewrite the essay" — they had no choice. Understanding these three levels — make (force), have (authority), get (persuasion) — is tested in Cambridge C1 Advanced and demonstrates sophisticated grammatical control.