Business English vs. Conversational English | Know The Difference | Go Natural English

- Hi, Naturals!

I'm Gabby Wallace, your American English teacher

from GoNaturalEnglish.com where you can learn

to speak English fluently, confidently like a natural.

This video is for you if you are working

on your professional life as well as your English skills

because you know that English skills

can unlock a lot of doors.

It can unlock a lot of opportunities for you

to build the professional life of your dreams.

So in this video, I'm going to share how business English

is different from general conversational English.

There's five key ways that it is different

plus I'm going to share 12 points that you should focus on

within business English to build your skills.

So if you have ever felt hesitant,

if you have ever felt shy or unsure

about the correct professional way to express yourself,

tell me in the comments.

This video is for you.

So come along with me and let's get fluent.

First, this video is sponsored by our partner Lingoda,

an online language learning company

where you can take one-on-one or group classes

taught by a native, qualified teacher.

So I'm going to tell you more about

a very special business English offer

from Lingoda at the end of this video.

If you wanna know more, the link

is in the description right down there, okay?

Now, one of my favorite English teaching jobs ever

was when I taught in Japan in a company.

I was training English learners

who were working in sales, marketing.

I was training English learners how to become

more confident and fluent in business English specifically

because they worked in sales, marketing,

pharmaceutical research, customer service,

human resources, all different aspects

of a multinational company.

So what I saw from my students was that they

had studied English for many years

and they were pretty confident with reading,

grammar, and taking tests.

But when it came to business English skills

like participating in meetings with counterparts

from all over the world,

taking teleconference calls, making presentations

in front of people in English,

well, my students felt shy, they hesitated,

and they weren't able to share their knowledge and expertise

in a clear way, and that made me sad

because my students were really, really smart.

But their shyness or their doubts about speaking English

in a professional way kept them from sharing

their brilliance and their expertise

and their knowledge with others.

So I don't want that to happen to you.

So let's learn about five ways that business English

is different from general conversational English.

First of all, the biggest, most important point,

I'm just going to say right away

because I can't wait.

So, vocabulary.

In general conversational English,

we use more casual, generic words like thing,

or we use slang like, oh, you're such a chicken

if you don't speak up in English.

Well, that's slang and we don't use it

as much in professional situations.

In contrast, in business English, we use more academic,

high level, refined vocabulary.

We use more specific terms as well

especially specific terms for your field.

This could be technical English, getting

into specific terms that are used only in your field,

also called jargon.

In business English, we use more transitions

to express our ideas with fluency and with flow.

This would be like however, therefore, nevertheless.

We use these to logically express our opinions

or information or facts to backup our ideas.

We also use less linking

and carefully, clearly pronounce our words.

So linking would be saying gonna instead of I am going to,

or wanna instead of I want to,

or whatcha doin' instead of what are you doing?

So in professional situations, it's important

to carefully annunciate your words to sound professional.

So, to quickly summarize, we use more academic,

high-level vocabulary, more specific

and technical vocabulary, more transition words,

we use more careful pronunciation, and less linking.

So five ways that business English is different

from general English conversation.

I'm also gonna share 12 points

that you need to learn in order to master business English.

And these are also the 12 points that Lingoda focuses on

in their business English course

that I'm gonna tell you about at the end of the video.

You need to learn business correspondence.

This could include email, telephone, teleconferences,

video conferences like Skype, and how to write reports

in business English style.

Also, how to participate in meetings and office culture.

You need to learn things like negotiation

and conflict resolution, presentation skills,

and travel for business.

Working with contracts which have a very specific kind

of language, customer service which also has

a lot of specific phrases that we use

when we want to be polite and professional working

with clients, and finally, English for interviews

which is possibly one of the most important points

because in order to get a job where you need to use English,

well, you need to go through an interview, right?

And once you climbed the ladder in that job,

you may be the person on the other side of that interview

actually interviewing someone else.

So you need to learn how to be able

to be an interviewee and interviewer.

Business English is not taught in general English classrooms

or textbooks, and you're not gonna learn it

just by listening to music or talking

to any English speaker on the street.

So you need to specifically focus

on your business English skills to develop them.

And when you develop your business English skills,

you will open up more opportunities for yourself

like perhaps the ability to work abroad

in an English speaking country

in an English speaking company to deepen your knowledge

of your field by looking at research

and records that were written in English.

Business English allows you to expand

your circle of influence as well when you network

with other professionals in your field

who speak English as well.

And finally, having English fluency on your resume

can definitely increase your earning potential.

If you're ready to invest in your business English skills,

let me explain about Lingoda's

special business English offer.

There's a link in the description where you can sign up

for a free trial lesson where you need to make a deposit

and then when you show up for your free trial lesson,

you get the deposit back, so it's a great way

to try the course without making a big commitment.

The actual full course is 90 lessons over six months.

The course is taught by native, qualified English teachers.

It is a group course that is online, live tutoring.

You can schedule your classes anytime

they have courses at different times 24/7.

It's a one time payment and you can check the prices

in the description as well as how to sign up.

So how do you know if your level is good enough

to start with business English skills?

Well, I don't recommend specific business English classes

for beginners but if you are an intermediate

English learner, if you're at the B1 level

on the CEFR Scale, you're ready

to try business English classes.

So if you're understanding me right now,

if you understand generally what people are talking about

at work, at school, or when you're traveling

and you're hearing English speakers,

or if you understand generally what people

are saying and some specifics when people speak clearly,

like I'm speaking now, or if you understand

facts about topics that you're interested in in English,

then you're probably at the intermediate level.

So if you are ready to signup for business English classes,

check out the link in the description.

If you enjoyed this video, let me know in the comments.

Subscribe to Go Natural English,

we're just about to hit one million subscribers

and this is so exciting.

So I appreciate it if you share the channel,

if you share this video with your friends

who are interested in business english lessons.

And whatever you decide, I want you to keep working

on your skills because when you learn another language,

opportunities will appear.

Opportunities that you can't even imagine right now.

This is what's happened with me as I learned Portuguese.

I moved to Brazil, I have opportunities

teaching in businesses, teaching businessmen and women

and I'm meeting incredible people

because of my language skills.

And I'm able to make presentations in Portuguese

at conferences, at business conferences,

and so I just want the same possibilities for you.

So thank you for watching.

Again, subscribe, like, comment, share, I love you guys,

have an amazing day and I'll talk to you again soon.

Bye for now.