Do you want to be a part of the conversation in a business setting?
Are you trying to gain confidence and make business connections?
Get Your Transcripts Today!
Make sure you understand every word you hear on All Ears English.
Bring your English to the advanced level with new vocabulary and natural expressions.
Subscribe and get the transcripts delivered by email.
Learn to speak naturally with the American accent.
Being Able To Talk In A Business Setting
What do the phrases lay of the land and talk shop really mean?
How can you use this to make magical connections in the workplace?
These are just a few phrases that you might expect to hear in a business setting.
Being able to talk in a business setting is so important, and it can help you to gain confidence and be better at your job too.
We just launched our business English course in July, and have had a great response.
This is a course that can help you to achieve your goals in a business setting, and become more confident in your conversations.
You can learn about formal and informal vocabulary in the business world, which is so important.
There are helpful sections that can help you to have successful conversations, and you can also learn about context and meanings of things.
We offer formal and informal, and many business courses in English don’t offer you the informal which is just as important.
You want to know how to carry on conversations and make this work successfully in your professional environment.
This course can be really helpful, and we’re going to talk through some examples today that may help.
You can register today at AllEarsEnglish.com/real to become a part of this course and learn so much that can help you.
Being A Part of the Conversation
Sometimes you just want to be a part of the conversation, and that isn’t always easy.
Learning new phrases, particularly ones that you can use in the workplace, can be really helpful.
In talking to students from various countries, we’ve heard some wonderful stories.
One such story is of a student who worked with native speakers every single day–and yet she felt a gap in how to talk to them.
This student learned the idiom “talk shop” in the course, and this has proven to be very helpful.
A phrase such as this may help you as you are able to talk to natives on their level.
To talk shop means to talk to people within your industry.
This is to say that you are talking about issues and events going on within your shared industry.
It’s a great way to connect as you likely have a lot to share with this person that you are talking to.
You are both interested in this one common thing and you are part of the same industry.
This is not a formal idiom, but it can lead you into a more formal or professional conversation.
The lines between formal and informal may blur sometimes, and this is a perfect example of that.
You may see somebody at a social event and you two want to “talk shop” for a bit, but then you start to talk about other things.
So you may be moving between formal and informal conversations at a social setting, and most definitely in a professional environment.
Learning Other Useful Phrases
Another student that we talked to touched on a phrase that may be used quite often, which is “lay of the land.”
This is used often with English speakers, and it comes up in the business course as well.
This student heard it used in a business setting, and she felt confident because she knew what it meant.
When you say “lay of the land” this may mean the bigger picture or a long term plan.
This is what you may see happening, or the steps that need to happen.
Lay of the land can be used in a business setting, but also in another way.
You may say this in more of a physical way as you are trying to get used to your surroundings.
You are trying to figure out where everything is and therefore get settled in and comfortable.
This is a perfect example of connection and not perfection–these opportunities to use such phrases are there and you have to use them!
When you can throw out an idiom or an expression, it almost feels magical.
When you recognize an idiom and you can use it in conversation, then it’s all worth it.
Learning Skills For Phone Conversations and Every Other Type
You might be surprised at just how important your skills can be on the phone when it comes to English speaking.
One last example is of a student who learned about telephone English, as this was an important skill for them.
If you are in a job where you are on the phone all the time, you want to be aware of how to make this all work.
The telephone templates in the business course can help you with so many things on your calls.
You can learn how to say everything from “hello” and “goodbye”, and even how to work through the transitions throughout the call.
This helps you to be good at your job, but also helps you to be a strong professional too.
Phone skills are an important part of business conversations, but then these lessons can be applied elsewhere too.
You may find that the skills that you build on the phone also helps you to be better at other aspects of your job.
This is just one way that you can improve upon your job, but also be more confident in your English speaking overall.
The business course can help you to ensure that you can handle phone calls, interactions, conversations, and ensure that you are a confident English speaker in your business environment.
Takeaway
There are some phrases that can really help to know, particularly in a business setting.
When you know these phrases then you can be a part of the conversation, and you can speak like natives do.
These phrases can be especially helpful in your conversations at the workplace, and that’s where the business course can really help you.
Try one of these phrases out and see how it can help in your conversations.
Be a part of the conversations, and recognize that sometimes the line between formal and informal conversations can be blurred.
If you have any questions, please leave them below in the comments section.
We’ll get back to you as soon as we can.