Business Communication

Communicating well is one of the most important skills there are nowadays, especially in business. When it comes to learning a second language, communication relies on an effective vocabulary scope and knowledge of some structures. That’s why, in this chapter, you will learn some verbs, collocations, and idioms. You will also learn about the formation of nouns from verbs as well as time expressions that refer to the present and past. Now, look at the script of The Four Cs.

THE FOUR Cs

Each and every day, it becomes more important that we be well prepared for the job market, especially considering the hyperconnected world around us. Nowadays, we have access to a large amount of information online, and that changes the way that we study and learn. Yesterday, students who knew the multiplication table by heart used to get the best grades. In other words, education used to favor memorization. But, today, we need a little more than that. We are just a click away from a lot of information. However, it’s no use memorizing a great amount of data if you don’t know what to do with it. The goal of today’s educational processes is to develop the skills required to fulfill the standard set for students’ professional and personal lives. What’s the point of naming all capitals in the world? Or knowing the scientific name for every species of insect? We have bigger fish to fry… Problems that may affect current and future generations, such as: securing water and food for a whole world population; improving the quality of the air that we breathe; or finding sustainable energy sources… See? They are much more complex issues, whose solutions demand so much more than just memorizing names and lists. And they include developing the essential skills known as “the four Cs”. Let’s start with the first one: critical thinking.?

To think critically involves knowing how to work with the information you receive, by selecting what is more relevant and by linking ideas from the acquired knowledge. Creativity is also considered a fundamental skill for future professionals: it has an important role in the processes related to innovation and problem-solving. And since no one does anything alone, we need to develop the skill of collaboration. Under this perspective, the math is a bit different: the sum of 2 + 2 is not 4, but 5. Collaborating means to understand the results the group achieves together is much larger than the sum of each individual work. Well, so far we’ve addressed three of the four fundamental skills the new job market demands: critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration. But there’s still the last C we need to complete the list: communication. Effective communication is really important in our lives and careers. So, let’s take a closer look at this subject. For communication to happen, we need three basic elements: the sender, the receiver, and the message. For instance, right now I am the sender, and I am sending you a message. And you are watching this video, which makes you the receiver. So, the message must be sent by the sender, then received, analyzed, and understood by the receiver. But does the same message reach different receivers identically? If you tell your partner and your boss the same story, will you use the same words? The same channel? Will you tell the story the same way? You’ll probably use different structures, different channels, different wording… And the emotions, and the environment, and everything else will be different. And if you tell a friend the same story via email, you’ll tell it some other way. If you send a voice message telling it to your parents, it will not be the same message either. Summing up: each interaction demands specific formalities, channels, structures, and wording to reach its goal. And what goal is that? To communicate effectively. And the same applies to the corporate world. In this module, we are going to see the most common interactions in the work environment, from the job interview through the retirement day. You will see some of the strategies and skills that you’ve got to develop to clearly and appropriately get your message across.