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1 Tailor business English Training to your company needs
Ensure the courses are practical and relevant. Your teams are likely to be too busy for standard courses. They need business English classes where they can talk about and reflect on their work. An experienced teacher and coach can design classes around their daily tasks.
2 Allow your teams to determine their needs
When people need English for their work, they can mostly best say what they need support for e.g. to feel confident when talking with clients. Their needs should (and mostly will) align with the company needs. If they can also talk about what they feel passionate about, engagement will be high.
3 Allow your teams to test drive the training
Don’t lock your team into a long term business English training or coaching course without giving them an exit plan. If the course doesn’t work, they shouldn’t have to attend. Allow them to try courses for 1 month or 3 months. Then get their feedback. If they are engaged and/ or making progress, only then should they continue.
4 Link learning with daily work
Whatever is learned in a business English class should be applied in team meetings, daily stand ups, client calls and business English emails etc. Your team can use the classes to prepare and English check content for work. Daily work tasks in English can also be used for homework. This boosts motivation and positively impacts a team’s work.
5 Foster an engaging and positive learning environment
Create a learning environment that sees mistakes as a learning opportunity. Your team needs to know they can use English at work and it doesn’t have to be perfect. Show patience and understanding and watch as your team stay motivated and progress over time.