Quite a few years ago, I was working as a Business English trainer in Paris, in a company that made and sold cosmetics around the world.
During one class, the manager entered the room without knocking. She told me she wanted to discuss something important with me after class. She was a very serious-looking, silver-haired person in a sharp suit, so I nodded quickly until she closed the door, then took a moment to myself before continuing the lesson.
One hour later, I sat opposite her across possibly the largest desk ever made.
She said: “We have a big negotiation in Korea, two weeks from now.” “Okay.” “I’m thinking about sending Dimitri.” “Right.” “Is he ready?”
This was worse than anything I had imagined while waiting outside her office. Going to Korea would be great for Dimitri, but now it seemed that the decision depended on me.
At the same time, I couldn’t exactly tell her the truth (I had no idea if Dimitri was ready) because that would mean admitting that our lessons (on the present perfect) were perhaps not totally aligned to his real needs.
He needed training on how to get a good deal in a negotiation with people from a culture I knew nothing about, on a topic I had barely asked about, using language that was definitely not on the photocopied handouts in my little bag.
A Change in What Employers Expect
As I said, this was quite a while ago. Since then, Human Resources departments have realised that paying an English teacher to explain the difference between the 1st and 2nd conditionals may not always bring the Return on Investment they had hoped for.
So today, very few companies want to spend a lot of money on language training for their employees.
Instead, they divide into two camps: some will hire you because your language skills are already good enough (usually around B2 or higher) while others will expect you to learn ‘on the job’.
This is not only true for languages. The World Economic Forum’s report on the Future of Jobs says that 94% of business leaders expect employees to learn new skills while working (WEF, 2020).
What Does This Mean for Me?
In my humble opinion, your best chance is to prepare for both types of company.
You want to show that you have followed a structured course that has helped you to interact clearly, fluently and appropriately, as well as improve your grammar and range of expressions.
Yet, what an employer values most is professional knowledge and traditional language courses find this difficult to provide because every job is different.
Workplace language is highly context-bound. It depends on the situation: the task, your role, the people you are speaking to, and your relationship with them.
How many coursebooks cover how to build professional relationships, understand different points of view, give structure to meetings, ask for detailed information, explain things clearly, or use the special words and phrases from your future industry?
How Can I Learn Language Like That Then?
Formal language training cannot teach you everything you will need. To do that, someone would have to record, transcribe and study hundreds of hours of meetings from your future profession - not realistic.
The aim instead is for you to become a successful informal learner.
That means:
- finding your professional community
- spending a few minutes each day collecting useful words and phrases
- connecting them to real professional situations
- frequently using tools like translators, wiki articles, video tutorials and AI to help you grow
Do you want to be an ethical hacker? There’s a 12-hour YouTube course. Interested in animal husbandry? Join the subreddit. Every community has its own language: common words, expressions, questions, jokes and ways of explaining things.
Social media, videos, forums, blogs and podcasts are full of real language. Your job is to filter out the messy or useless stuff and take what you need in order to join your professional community of practice.
For more ideas, find the OLS activities called “I Want to Know” and find out how to curate your own learning materials and become the driving force behind your own progress.
A Cautionary Tale
Back in the manager’s office in Paris, I looked across the enormous desk and made the only possible professional decision.
“Of course!” I said. “Dimitri is absolutely ready.”
I don’t know what happened to him after that. Neither of us stayed at the company much longer, for some strange reason.
But wherever Dimitri is today, I am sure of one thing: he is using the present perfect just fine.