Dear Friends,
Please suggest me some ideas, how I can implement English as official language?
In our company employees are often found talking in their mother tongue even after insisting to talk in English. Please provide me with some innovative ideas to promote and motivate our employees to communicate in English.
From India, Varkkallai
2Please suggest me some ideas, how I can implement English as official language?
In our company employees are often found talking in their mother tongue even after insisting to talk in English. Please provide me with some innovative ideas to promote and motivate our employees to communicate in English.
From India, Varkkallai
Hi Sangeetha,
- You can make communication skills a KRA.
- You can also make a rule that all meetings must be in English only, even small team meetings.
- You can tell all the team leads / managers about this prob and ask them to help you out. Once they all start talking in English with their team members, the team may also follow.
Rest, I dont think so can be controlled, people will continue talking in their mother tongue to an extent. And I also think that you must not be bothered about it, as long as official communication is in English.
Regards,
Shikha
From India, Mumbai
- You can make communication skills a KRA.
- You can also make a rule that all meetings must be in English only, even small team meetings.
- You can tell all the team leads / managers about this prob and ask them to help you out. Once they all start talking in English with their team members, the team may also follow.
Rest, I dont think so can be controlled, people will continue talking in their mother tongue to an extent. And I also think that you must not be bothered about it, as long as official communication is in English.
Regards,
Shikha
From India, Mumbai
Hello Sangeetha
Shikha has made some very practical observations and suggestions. To that let me add a few thoughts.
- building up on the third point made by Shikha there must be a top down approach to tackling the problem. The seniors must be requested to implement 'English ' only at work policy and this will then percolate down the line.
- if you have a bulletin board, start a small campaign to have interesting post in English which can be contributed by employees. It can be downloads of interesting forwards or blogs, cutting from newspaper or magazines - the focus being inspirational / motivational material and /or informational material. To make it more participative and competitive, you can even have prize for the best post for the week / fortnight / month.
- depending on the number of employees and the type of industry you are in there could be other motivational means like having a book review or book reading session / public speaking sessions / sharing on a theme in English, once a week to be held department wise or company wide.
- often employees speak in the local language because of peer pressure, where the natives speaking in English are subtly made fun of or sarcastically responded too as being too anglicized. You would therefore have to take a sterner view with management support that ' English' is the medium of communication officially. However this can be tricky since there are enough 'local language' fanatics in all states who can inject nuisance value to your noble intentions.
Trust these suggestions help you in your quest to encourage your employees to use English more often in their official communication.
Regards
Jacob
Effective Written Communication, English Language Skills, Create Web Content – website
Actspot's Blog – Blog 1
Academy for Creative Training – Blog 2
From India, Mumbai
Shikha has made some very practical observations and suggestions. To that let me add a few thoughts.
- building up on the third point made by Shikha there must be a top down approach to tackling the problem. The seniors must be requested to implement 'English ' only at work policy and this will then percolate down the line.
- if you have a bulletin board, start a small campaign to have interesting post in English which can be contributed by employees. It can be downloads of interesting forwards or blogs, cutting from newspaper or magazines - the focus being inspirational / motivational material and /or informational material. To make it more participative and competitive, you can even have prize for the best post for the week / fortnight / month.
- depending on the number of employees and the type of industry you are in there could be other motivational means like having a book review or book reading session / public speaking sessions / sharing on a theme in English, once a week to be held department wise or company wide.
- often employees speak in the local language because of peer pressure, where the natives speaking in English are subtly made fun of or sarcastically responded too as being too anglicized. You would therefore have to take a sterner view with management support that ' English' is the medium of communication officially. However this can be tricky since there are enough 'local language' fanatics in all states who can inject nuisance value to your noble intentions.
Trust these suggestions help you in your quest to encourage your employees to use English more often in their official communication.
Regards
Jacob
Effective Written Communication, English Language Skills, Create Web Content – website
Actspot's Blog – Blog 1
Academy for Creative Training – Blog 2
From India, Mumbai
Hi Sangeet,
Just keep one big piggy bank at you office center. Whenever anybody speaks in Non-English ask there to put one 5 rupee coin In. They need to do this honestly.
Initially the piggy might get filled in just few hours but as it goes on the piggy will start being empty.
WHEN YOU FIND THE PIGGY EMPTY YOU REACHED YOU MISSION. THE MONEY WHAT EVER YOU HAVE COLLECTED USE IT FOR POOR KIDS EDUCATION AND FOOD.
From India, Hyderabad
Just keep one big piggy bank at you office center. Whenever anybody speaks in Non-English ask there to put one 5 rupee coin In. They need to do this honestly.
Initially the piggy might get filled in just few hours but as it goes on the piggy will start being empty.
WHEN YOU FIND THE PIGGY EMPTY YOU REACHED YOU MISSION. THE MONEY WHAT EVER YOU HAVE COLLECTED USE IT FOR POOR KIDS EDUCATION AND FOOD.
From India, Hyderabad
Dear Sangeetha,
First you need to know why you want English as official language and how does it matter if employees are using their mothertongue. After understanding its impact you may then like to conclude its impact on the organisation as a whole.
Understand that people in the organisation will follow your instructions better, if they found it useful for themself too. If you just push them to use English as officla language, they probably see it as an "order" and not any value addition to their persenality/growth etc.
Surendra
From India, New Delhi
First you need to know why you want English as official language and how does it matter if employees are using their mothertongue. After understanding its impact you may then like to conclude its impact on the organisation as a whole.
Understand that people in the organisation will follow your instructions better, if they found it useful for themself too. If you just push them to use English as officla language, they probably see it as an "order" and not any value addition to their persenality/growth etc.
Surendra
From India, New Delhi
Hi, I think during induction also you should specify this that English is an official language and any communications in company should be in English. Regds, Sara.
From India, Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
Dear;
This is really heartening to learn that Indian Corporate Houses are thinking in terms of compelling their employees to speak English only. None of the country in the world has made, English an official language to converse with other colleagues. Not even in Britain. It is different, when French talks with an Indian, or, if it is a public speech, it is preferred to speak in English, as it is an international language. But when French talks to French, he prefers to talk in French only for better communication. In several European countries English is not welcomed. But we remained slave for 150years under British rules and we are so much fascinated by white skin and English language, that white skin has become a symbol of beauty and English has become a symbol of intellect in India. We need to come out of this slave mind set. Specifically the boys and girls who are educated in English medium and that too in missionary schools, have strong English phobia. I understand that for better communication, better understanding of the subject, fearlessness, art of good orator, magnetic voice, good writing and presenting, charming personality, science of posture and gesture and practice is required. Language can never be an obstacle for good communication. Corporate houses should look for good communication skill rather then insisting or forcing any a language on employee. This is my personal view and this has nothing to do with the policy of your corporate house. I know that you are an employee of the company and abide by the policy of the company. You may proceed by the suggestions given by others, as you have to retain your job. I need not have to satisfy your management. But I took an opportunity to convey my feelings to the other members of this group. Many may not agree with me, but may definitely think on the subject and few may try to come out of the slave mind set, which is the gift given by British to this country.
Thanking you.
His Blessings;
Sharad
From India, Ahmadabad
This is really heartening to learn that Indian Corporate Houses are thinking in terms of compelling their employees to speak English only. None of the country in the world has made, English an official language to converse with other colleagues. Not even in Britain. It is different, when French talks with an Indian, or, if it is a public speech, it is preferred to speak in English, as it is an international language. But when French talks to French, he prefers to talk in French only for better communication. In several European countries English is not welcomed. But we remained slave for 150years under British rules and we are so much fascinated by white skin and English language, that white skin has become a symbol of beauty and English has become a symbol of intellect in India. We need to come out of this slave mind set. Specifically the boys and girls who are educated in English medium and that too in missionary schools, have strong English phobia. I understand that for better communication, better understanding of the subject, fearlessness, art of good orator, magnetic voice, good writing and presenting, charming personality, science of posture and gesture and practice is required. Language can never be an obstacle for good communication. Corporate houses should look for good communication skill rather then insisting or forcing any a language on employee. This is my personal view and this has nothing to do with the policy of your corporate house. I know that you are an employee of the company and abide by the policy of the company. You may proceed by the suggestions given by others, as you have to retain your job. I need not have to satisfy your management. But I took an opportunity to convey my feelings to the other members of this group. Many may not agree with me, but may definitely think on the subject and few may try to come out of the slave mind set, which is the gift given by British to this country.
Thanking you.
His Blessings;
Sharad
From India, Ahmadabad
Hi Sangeetha,
english is universal business language. we need it at work place because of global business scenario. we need a common language in which we can do our business giving results effectively.
in my point of view when it comes to business requirement, every asociate must speak in english for that you need not to make it complusary, as associates know it well.
rest they can speak in any language they feel comfort. there should not be any complusion.
please note that being into HR our job is to facilitate employees to work smoothly, not to restrict them from this and that.
regards,
nishu
From India, New Delhi
english is universal business language. we need it at work place because of global business scenario. we need a common language in which we can do our business giving results effectively.
in my point of view when it comes to business requirement, every asociate must speak in english for that you need not to make it complusary, as associates know it well.
rest they can speak in any language they feel comfort. there should not be any complusion.
please note that being into HR our job is to facilitate employees to work smoothly, not to restrict them from this and that.
regards,
nishu
From India, New Delhi
Dear Sharad,
It was interesting to read your point of view. I partially agree with your view. Therefore I think that spoken English must not be 'thrust' upon workers for the heck of it.
Now coming to why we need english.........
Since all work is actually in English (our computers have an English keyboard, right? Also our appointment letters, interviews, official notices, memos, presentations, emails, seminars etc are in English. So this automatically becomes the undeclared 'official' language.
If you think of it, its not because of slave attitude or any such thing, but simply because we are a widely multi-linguistic group of people and hence HAVE TO have a common language - so that evryone is on the same platform. Otherwise, we have to be strictly regional, employ people speaking one langauge only and use that language freely. Is that practical?
Thats why office HRs, administrators, managers face a problem when some people from a team refuse to communicate in English.
Lastly, I beg to disagree with your point of English has become a symbol of intellect in India. We need to come out of this slave mind set. Specifically the boys and girls who are educated in English medium and that too in missionary schools, have strong English phobia. (By the way phobia is a wrong word here); because I have seen plenty of individuals who have studied in vernacular medium schools but still speak very good English.
Regards,
Shikha
From India, Mumbai
It was interesting to read your point of view. I partially agree with your view. Therefore I think that spoken English must not be 'thrust' upon workers for the heck of it.
Now coming to why we need english.........
Since all work is actually in English (our computers have an English keyboard, right? Also our appointment letters, interviews, official notices, memos, presentations, emails, seminars etc are in English. So this automatically becomes the undeclared 'official' language.
If you think of it, its not because of slave attitude or any such thing, but simply because we are a widely multi-linguistic group of people and hence HAVE TO have a common language - so that evryone is on the same platform. Otherwise, we have to be strictly regional, employ people speaking one langauge only and use that language freely. Is that practical?
Thats why office HRs, administrators, managers face a problem when some people from a team refuse to communicate in English.
Lastly, I beg to disagree with your point of English has become a symbol of intellect in India. We need to come out of this slave mind set. Specifically the boys and girls who are educated in English medium and that too in missionary schools, have strong English phobia. (By the way phobia is a wrong word here); because I have seen plenty of individuals who have studied in vernacular medium schools but still speak very good English.
Regards,
Shikha
From India, Mumbai
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