Better Business English - A Proposal (continued)

This all seems rather obvious

Yes, I agree that these points are rather obvious. However, I am surprised at how little these two rather simplistic points are taken into consideration when it comes to communications in a multi-national business environment. Students who may have just struggled for a year to get a basic grasp of the language are often put into situations where they are expected to understand a native speaker's presentation. In such a situation, native speakers come away feeling frustrated at the lack of understanding on the part of the non-native speaker and non-native speakers often become convinced of their own lack of ability. What has happened? Clearly, the non-native speaker expects "standard" English usage and the native speaker expects someone who understands "English". And the two pass like ships in the night… My Suggestion I would like to suggest that management consider investing in both sides of the equation. Instead of investing a large amount of money (and years of study time) in English lessons for non-native employees only, I think that native speakers should also become sensitized to this issue. Developing workshops for management and staff who work with non-native speakers could easily be done working with ESL teachers sensitive to the matter. Companies could invest in 2 years of study for non-native speakers and a few hours working with native speakers to develop presentation skills in "standard", non-idiomatic English. Compare this to 4 years of study to bring a class of 5 students up to an "advanced" level. You can see that this approach could save quite a bit on the "bottom-line".

Staff and management need to be made aware of the fact that asking, "How can we get around that sand-trap?" may confuse non-native speakers. A non-native speaker however, would probably be quite capable of understanding, "How can we avoid that problem?" This training could be made extremely specific by working on individual presentations and the content included in these presentations. Another suggestion would be to tape conversations and have the native speaker listen to him/herself to become aware of just how much idiomatic language he/she is using.

By combining both English training and non-native English speaker sensitizing for management and staff, the international business community could save themselves quite a few headaches and improve overall communication between various locations. The investment required by native speakers (i.e. management and staff) would be quite minimal and would certainly lessen the considerable investment required for non-native English speakers.

More on the idea of "Global English" and English in the workplace:

English in the Workplace: Resources

03/02/99-Global English
An introduction to the issue of the importance of the emerging "Global English" approach to English learning.

05/06/98 - Business Letter Writing Lesson Plan
An example of an effective lesson plan employing all four language skills while focusing on business letter production skills.