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Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on how to start a meeting in English.
Many jobs require us to spend a lot of time in meetings. Sometimes we might think there are too many meetings. In part, we might feel this way because a lot of meetings aren’t run very well or facilitated effectively.
There’s a good chance that you will have to run meetings some day, if you don’t already. You have a chance to make sure those meetings are effective by running the meeting well. Fortunately, running a meeting involves skills that you can learn.
Today we’ll focus on starting a meeting, which begins with getting people’s attention and acknowledging them. Next, you might clearly state the purpose or goals of the meeting before reviewing the agenda with everyone. Then you may invite someone to begin speaking about the first item on the agenda.
In this lesson, we’ll hear the start of a meeting about budget cuts at an international shipping company. The meeting is being led by Martin, the General Manager. We’ll also hear Sandra, David, and Sam, employees who are attending the meeting.
Listening Questions
1. What does Martin apologize for as he is acknowledging the meeting attendees? 2. What does Martin say is the objective of the meeting? 3. What does Martin invite Sandra to do at the end of the conversation?
Welcome back to the Business English Skills 360 podcast as we look at how to build a collaborative workplace culture.
Even in the most competitive companies, collaboration is key to success. In our last lesson, we looked at the benefits of collaboration, like innovation and employee engagement. Now we’ll look at the systems and approaches to make it happen.
Collaboration starts with leadership. Leaders need to focus on “we,” not “I.” That means trusting their teams, being open about goals and challenges, and involving others in decisions. When teams feel trusted and included, they’re more likely to work together.
Communication is key too – and it changes when you give up control. It’s no longer just about giving clear instructions. It’s about listening, understanding different ideas, and building consensus. That takes more time and effort, which means teams need some flexibility in their schedules.
Collaboration also needs structure. Cross-functional teams, shared roles, and communities of practice all help break down silos. And digital tools like Slack or project management platforms make it easier to share work and ideas.
Of course, not every decision has to be made as a group. Some are simple or urgent. And when trust is low, it may be best to focus on rebuilding that first.
But if you want the real benefits of collaboration, you need to create the right environment: one built on trust, open communication, and the systems to support teamwork.
Welcome back to the Business English Skills 360 podcast as we look at how to build a culture of collaboration at work.
Collaboration is more than just working together or coordinating tasks. It means people share goals, ideas, decisions, and responsibility. True collaboration often involves people from different teams coming together to solve shared problems or create something new.
So why is collaboration so important? One key reason is innovation. When people with different backgrounds and skills come together, they bring fresh ideas. These creative clashes often lead to breakthroughs. Collaboration also helps spread knowledge across teams. If one team finds a better way to work, others can learn from it – if they’re connected.
Stronger connections also lead to greater resilience. When teams share skills and experiences, they can support each other when challenges come up. And beyond business results, collaboration boosts employee engagement. People feel more connected, valued, and motivated when they work toward shared goals.
But collaboration takes effort. It’s not instant or easy. It takes time, trust, and a willingness to share control. If you want others’ input, you have to be open to their ideas, not just your own.
Collaboration can bring big rewards, but it also comes with challenges. In part two, we’ll explore what teams and leaders can do to support collaboration through strong communication, trust, and the right systems.
Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on English for purchasing. This lesson looks at language for evaluating proposals from vendors.
Business is all about buying and selling. And just as your company sells products to individual consumers or other companies, you also have to purchase goods and services to make it all happen. For ongoing purchasing relationships, this means evaluating different vendors to find the best match.
So, when you sit with your team to evaluate vendor proposals, what will you talk about? These discussions often involve comparing pricing, timelines, quality, and service. You might also talk about warranties, reliability, and risks. And just like any group process, the quality of the decision will come down not just to the facts in front of you, but your ability to communicate clearly about them.
In conversations about vendor proposals, there are several aspects you might consider. You might assess risk as well as vendor capacity. You might also evaluate the total cost and compare value, as opposed to the basic contract price. And finally, you might prioritize the different criteria you use to assess the vendors.
In today’s dialog, we’ll listen to a conversation between managers at a fitness equipment company called xFit. Hazel, Adam, and Nick are evaluating proposals to choose a manufacturer of a specific part for their line of treadmills. In previous lessons on purchasing, we heard xFit choose a company called VinMech to produce a part for a different exercise machine.
Listening Questions
1. What does Adam say about SteelWorks production capacity? 2. What does Nick say adds value to VinMech as a possible vendor? 3. Which criteria does Adam say are the most important consideration in this decision?
Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on English for purchasing. This lesson looks at language for evaluating proposals from vendors.
Business is all about buying and selling. And just as your company sells products to individual consumers or other companies, you also have to purchase goods and services to make it all happen. For ongoing purchasing relationships, this means evaluating different vendors to find the best match.
So, when you sit with your team to evaluate vendor proposals, what will you talk about? These discussions often involve comparing pricing, timelines, quality, and service. You might also talk about warranties, reliability, and risks. And just like any group process, the quality of the decision will come down not just to the facts in front of you, but your ability to communicate clearly about them.
In conversations about vendor proposals, there are several aspects you might consider. You might assess risk as well as vendor capacity. You might also evaluate the total cost and compare value, as opposed to the basic contract price. And finally, you might prioritize the different criteria you use to assess the vendors.
In today’s dialog, we’ll listen to a conversation between managers at a fitness equipment company called xFit. Hazel, Adam, and Nick are evaluating proposals to choose a manufacturer of a specific part for their line of treadmills. In previous lessons on purchasing, we heard xFit choose a company called VinMech to produce a part for a different exercise machine.
Listening Questions
1. What does Adam say about SteelWorks production capacity? 2. What does Nick say adds value to VinMech as a possible vendor? 3. Which criteria does Adam say are the most important consideration in this decision?
Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on the skills you need to succeed in a first-round job interview in English.
A job interview is a chance to highlight your achievements and talk about the amazing things you’ve done in your career. By talking about what you’ve achieved, you can show how your experience fits the position. And by showing how your strengths have helped you, you can convince the interviewer that you’re the right person to hire.
If only it were that easy, though! Interviewers aren’t going to ask you only about the good stuff. They’re going to ask about difficult things as well. That means they might ask you about problems in your current or past jobs. And they might also ask you that dreaded question: what are your weaknesses?
But don’t worry. You know these questions are coming, so you can get ready. Think of some difficult situations you’ve been in. Focus on the ones where you were able to solve a problem or deal with difficult people. And think about your weaknesses honestly, and how you’ve tried to improve on these things. In that way, you’ll be able to face the tough questions confidently.
In this lesson, we’ll rejoin William as he interviews for a position at a bank in Hong Kong. William is being interviewed by Mike, an HR manager at the bank. You will hear how William deals with difficult questions, and how he isn’t afraid to discuss problems and how he dealt with them.
Listening Questions
1. William talks about a problem with short-term loans. What does he say was the cause of this problem? 2. What does William say is one of his strengths? 3. What does William say is one of his weaknesses?
Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on key skills for a first-round job interview in English.
If you find job interviews stressful, you’re certainly not alone. Many people struggle to feel confident and comfortable in interview situations. And there’s the added worry that the stress you feel will make it even more difficult to answer the questions well. But you can reduce this stress with effective preparation.
You know that you’ll be asked certain types of questions. So you can make notes about your responses, or make an outline of important ideas that you want to talk about. You can also develop skills to make sure you’re being clear and accurate in your responses.
So what should you prepare and what skills should you develop? Well, for starters, you should be ready to introduce yourself and your career path, and to summarize your current job responsibilities. In terms of skills, it’s good to practice clarifying the words you use, buying yourself time, and connecting your answers back to the question.
In this lesson, we’ll listen as William is interviewed for a position in business development at a bank in Hong Kong. He’s being interviewed by Mike, an HR manager at the company. This is a first-round interview, and you can hear William show how comfortable and skilled he is at responding to the questions.
Listening Questions
1. What information does William give about his education and work history? 2. What does William say about his management style? 3. What does William say to buy himself time to think of an answer?
In this Business English News lesson on recent hiring trends, we look at business English vocabulary related to IT English and the DeepSeek AI chatbot.
A surprise development in artificial intelligence is making waves across the industry. DeepSeek, a Chinese AI lab, has upended expectations, drawing global attention and raising new questions about the future of AI. With new players entering the field and established giants forced to respond, this moment could redefine how AI is built, funded, and controlled in the years ahead. The drama kicked off at the start of the year, as the Financial Times reports:
A small Chinese artificial intelligence lab stunned the world by revealing the technical recipe for its cutting-edge model. This has transformed its reclusive leader into a national hero who has defied US attempts to stop China’s high-tech ambitions. DeepSeek, founded by hedge fund manager Liang Wenfeng, released its R1 model, explaining in a detailed paper how to build a large language model on a bootstrapped budget.
Welcome back to Business English Pod for the second part of our series on English idioms related to technology.
Every day you use dozens of high-tech devices and apps to communicate, plan, organize, monitor and store information. It’s almost impossible to imagine the workplace before modern technology. It’s also almost impossible to imagine the English language without all the idioms we use related to technology.
If you want to be on the same wavelength as expert English speakers, you can’t ignore idioms. And I just used a prime example there. If you are “on the same wavelength,” it means you understand each other. This comes from radio technology, where you have to be tuned to the same frequency to receive a signal.
As you can see, an idiom has a special meaning that isn’t always clear. You can think about the words on their own, but that won’t help you. You need to learn idioms as chunks of language, with a special meaning beyond the individual words. In this way, you will be able to communicate even better in English.
In this lesson, we’ll rejoin a conversation at an engineering company between Maggie, Antonio, and Finn. They are continuing their conversation about upgrading the tech systems in their company. In their discussion, they use many idioms related to technology. See if you can spot some of these, and we’ll explain them later in the debrief.
Listening Questions
1. What does Antonio say about HR and their training plans? 2. Why didn’t the company move to PayWorks software a couple of years ago? 3. How does Antonio describe the new servers that are available?
The world of tech has given rise to a host of new vocabulary and terminology. Think about a phrase like “to reboot,” which originally referred to restarting a computer but is now commonly used to mean starting over in any context. Idioms like that highlight how mastering language goes beyond just grammar.
Indeed, many language learners spend a lot of time trying to figure out the nuts and bolts of a language. By that I mean the grammar, writing system, sounds, and basic vocabulary of a language. The thing is, once we’ve got the nuts and bolts, it can feel like our progress stalls. Getting to the next level requires you to move beyond basic vocabulary and master expressions like idioms.
For example, a second ago, I mentioned the “nuts and bolts” of language. Nuts and bolts are a way of connecting things made of metal. So why am I using those words when I talk about language? Because “nuts and bolts” is used as an idiom to refer to the basic parts or pieces of something. And with technology as such an important part of our lives, it’s no wonder we have so many English idioms related to technology.
In this lesson, we’ll listen to a conversation at an engineering company. The company is led by Maggie, Antonio, and Finn. They’re talking about how the growth in their company requires upgrades to all their tech systems. In their discussion, they use many idioms related to technology. See if you can spot some of these, and we’ll explain them later in the debrief.
Listening Questions
1. Near the start of the meeting, what does Finn say he wants to avoid doing? 2. What does Maggie worry might happen if they don’t improve or “level up” their tech systems? 3. What does Antonio say the company did with Zoom not long ago?
Business English News 56 – Deglobalization
Apr 01, 2024
In this Business English News lesson on the trend toward deglobalization, we look at business English vocabulary related to economics and global trade. The past few years have been a very interesting time for the world economy. A pandemic has exposed the vulnerabilities of global supply chains. Geopolitical tensions around the world have intensified, stoking […]
Business English News 55 – 2024 Global Economic Outlook
Jan 07, 2024
In this Business English News lesson, we look at business English vocabulary related to the economy and finance and the global economic outlook for 2024.
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