TAKING A TOUR Around My Office — English for WORK

One of the most common reasons people learn  English is to get better job opportunities. But  

what if you've already got the job and you still  feel like your English is not good enough? Well,  

in today's lesson I'll walk you through my work  day and we'll look at some of the most essential  

vocabulary that you need to know around the  office. I'll also teach you some useful tips that  

you can use so you no longer have to feel anxious  or nervous when using English at work. Let's go?

So, this is the reception area and if most  workplaces you'll find that this is the first  

point of contact for clients or visitors to your  office. And you might find that you usually have a  

receptionist or someone who welcomes the clients  or the guests into the office. So as this is a  

co-working office that's not the case, there  are many different people from many different  

companies working here. But there is space for  clients or visitors to sit over there and now I'll  

show you around this desk, the reception desk.  So over here she has a desk organizer and this  

is used to basically separate documents according  to the actions that she needs to take. Down here  

she has a desk drawer pedestal and these are  useful for keeping and organizing your documents,  

especially if you need to keep it safe. It  usually comes with a little key. And the top  

drawer usually has a little organizer as well. So  this is quite useful for keeping your stationery.  

And you can see over here she has a stapler,  a punch, scissors, pens and this is sellotape. 

Something useful you might want to to know  about is the difference between stationary  

with an A and stationery with an E. So stationery  with an E is pens and things like that. Anything  

you use around the office. But stationary,  with an A, means to stand still and not  

move. So when something is stationary, it's  standing still. It's still, it doesn't move.

So the next thing we're going to look at is the  printer, scanner and copier. So most offices  

have these and I'm sure you know what they're  used for. Over here we have ring binders and  

these are really durable files or folders  that allow you to keep your documents neat  

and tidy without the edges getting, you know,  really messy and tearing or things like that.

So I'm gonna leave Jeanne alone  for now. Thanks, see you later.

So there's a myth that the work environment  requires perfect English, but what is perfect  

English anyway? It doesn't matter if you're not  at bonds, because English for work is not about  

sounding fancy or smart. It's about using your  English to solve problems and to communicate  

efficiently. You don't have to sound flawless,  but you do need to familiarize yourself with  

business grammar and vocabulary such as idioms,  collocations and phrasal verbs. To make it easier  

to remember everything you learned in today's  lesson, we've included a free downloadable PDF  

document. Watch until the end of the lesson,  because I'll reveal how you can access it. 

Most of us start our work day by checking  emails and other communication. Well,  

I have a useful tip for you when it comes to  responding to work emails and texts. Ever noticed  

how quick emails are often made up of 2  or 3 sentence paragraphs, many of each  

often start with the pronoun I for example? "I'm glad to hear from you" or "I'm looking  

forward to our meeting on Monday." To avoid having  a series of paragraphs that begin with the word I,  

we drop some, but not all of the pronouns.  For example, "I'm glad to hear from you"  

would become "Glad to hear from you",  or "I'm looking forward to our meeting  

on Monday" will become "Looking forward to our  meeting on Monday." The same is true for texts  

and other quick business communication with  expressions like these. Before we continue,  

if you're loving learning English that you can  actually use in your daily life, then be sure  

to hit that subscribe button and bell down below,  so you never miss out on any of our new lessons.  

Now let's look at four business idioms that  you're bound to encounter in the workplace.  

The first idiom we look at is "to think outside  the box" and this means to think creatively,  

unconventionally and to come up  with original ideas. For example,  

"If you want to succeed in the marketing industry,  you need to be able to think outside the box."  

Next we have "to get down to business" and this  means to start getting serious about something.  

For example, "After they introduce themselves  in the meeting they got down to business."  

Next we have "to get someone up to speed." Now to  get someone up to speed means to update someone  

on the current situation or to provide them with  all the necessary information they need in order  

to complete their task. For example, "After she  returned from her vacation, her boss called her  

aside and got her up to speed on what had happened  in the office." Now the final idiom we look  

at today is "to roll up your sleeves" and this  means to prepare to do hard work. For example,  

"She rolled up her sleeves and showed her boss why  she deserved a promotion." So now I'll be entering  

the meeting room and, since I meet my team online,  this meeting room is used for filming. I use it  

for filming my Learn English with TV and RealLife  English lessons, but for most people it is common  

to use the space to get together with a small  team and basically use the facilities here,  

such as the desk, the whiteboard and the markers  over there, to brainstorm ideas or to just have  

a chat about different topics or issues that  they are currently facing. Now let's look at  

some vocabulary related to meetings. Now when we  talk about meetings, we typically use the verbs  

"have" and "hold". For example, "We usually have  a department meeting on Mondays" or we could say  

"Let's hold a meeting about the issues we've been  facing this past quarter." Now when you're talking  

about a meeting that's going to take place in  the future, you can use the words "schedule",  

"arrange" or "organize" to talk about a meeting  that you're planning to have. Now for normal way  

of talking about participating in a meeting  would be to say that you're attending the  

meeting. Less formal would be to say that  "you're going to the meeting". For example,  

"I'm going to attend the meeting on Friday" or  "He wasn't able to go to the meeting, because  

he was stuck in traffic." Now let's talk about  business phrasal verbs. And the first one we're  

going to look at is to "come across something." Now, if you come across something, it means that  

you find it unexpectedly. For example, "If you  come across my keys in the break room, please  

return them to me. I've been looking for them all  morning." The next phrasal verb we'll look at is  

"drop by", which means to visit briefly or to meet  without having an appointment first. For example,  

"My boss asked me to drop by her office after  the meeting." Next we have "to run something by"  

or "pass someone." Now, this means to discuss  something with a person in order to get their  

opinion. For example, "I need to run this proposal  by my manager before I submit it." Next we have  

to "zero in on something or someone". Now this  means to focus on that thing or that person. For  

example, "After the team performed poorly, the  manager decided to zero in on all of the staff  

members." You'll find that after learning these  common phrasal verbs and repeating and practicing  

them, you'll start to feel more comfortable with  using them and understanding them. And this is  

important, because very soon you'll find that  you're using them in your own word vocabulary.  

Are you ready to zero in on your English and  become a confident natural English speaker? Well,  

with our RealLife English app you can do  just that for free, you'll have access to  

real life conversations with our podcasts. Where  we talk about how to best learn English, movies,  

culture and so much more. The best part is  that you can practice with new transcripts  

and flashcards every single week. You'll also  be able to practice the new words that you've  

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We're about to enter the boardroom and this would  be the place you would come if you want to have  

more serious discussions with clients or your  team. And it's larger than the meeting room,  

as you can see there's a lot more space for  everyone to sit or stand. Maybe you'd like to do  

some team building in the boardroom, so boardrooms  are usually equipped with things that allow for  

longer meetings and more in-depth discussions.  So this is where you'll find things like  

the smart TV, where you could display your work or  your presentation, there's also a power point in  

the middle of the table over there. Oh there! There's also a whiteboard and an eraser and  

whiteboard markers and there's a lot more space  here. So as I mentioned, you could have a team  

building session where people are getting  up and standing. You can have food here,  

You could have... There's a lot of different  things you could do in the boardroom depending  

on your team's needs. It's really a space  that's meant for, you know, sitting down,  

coming up with ideas and thinking, but I think,  depending on your team, you could use the space,  

as I said, for different purposes. There are  tons of vocabulary points that I could cover  

related to The Boardroom and presentations  and more serious meetings, but instead,  

today we'll focus on four areas of serious  meetings and I'll show you how you can respond  

to these different areas. Which are interrupting,  giving your opinion, agreeing and disagreeing.

Now there will certainly be times that you want  to interrupt a discussion and it helps to use  

polite phrases to do so. So here are three of my  favorite ones: "Sorry for interrupting, but...",  

"Excuse me, could I say one thing?",  "May I please add something?"  

Let's look at sharing your opinion. Now let's  imagine that you believe that the strategy  

will be a success and you want to share this  opinion with your teammates, so you could say  

"I strongly believe that it will be a success."  "I'm convinced that it will be a success." "I'm  

positive that it will be a success." "I have  no doubt whatsoever that it will be a success."

But if you would like to base your opinion on your  experience you could also say "In my experience,  

this will be a success." While agreeing, is  usually a positive thing, it helps to know how  

to do it and here are three common ways to agree  during a meeting. You could say "I completely  

agree" or "I couldn't agree more" and if you're  agreeing with something, someone else said,  

you could say "I'm with them." For example, "Kate,  I'm with Kate on this." In English saying that  

you disagree with someone can come across as too  direct and can seem impolite. That's why it helps  

to know some useful phrases and ways to disagree.  So you could say "I see where you're coming from,  

but..." or "That's a valid point, but..." or you  could say "I see things differently because..."  

Using the words "I'm sorry" can also make  the phrase seem more polite. For example,  

"I'm sorry, but I completely disagree" or "I'm  sorry, but I don't agree with that at all."  

Now you might be wondering "what can I possibly  do to improve my job related vocabulary?" And  

the answer is simple: read, read as much as you  possibly can about business and specifically about  

your area of expertise or your field of study.  One of my favorite resources when it comes to  

job related topics is "indeed.com". From resumes  to interviews to salaries to Career Development,  

there are articles on almost any topic. It also  helps to read business news articles like Forbes  

or Business Insider as these help you stay up to  date with current events or trending topics within  

your industry. LinkedIn is one of my favorites  and, although it's structured like a social  

media site, there are tons of benefits to using  it, the top three benefits that I would like to  

share with you is that it's great for professional  networking, job searching and there are also tons,  

tons of free resources that you  can use to develop your skills.  

So it's common office culture for co-workers to  talk around a water cooler and what this involves  

is stepping away from your desk and having  chit chat or small talk with your co-workers  

and basically talking about personal things  so not work related and you would be having  

conversations about your life your interests and  sometimes even gossiping, which is obviously,  

not a good thing to do. And basically the space  is meant to make you feel like you can relax and  

not worry about your work. If you're meant to  feel as though you're stepping into a different  

space and another thing that you might have in  your break room is a kettle for making coffee,  

a microwave for heating up your food and of  course a refrigerator. And of course this  

is meant to be a space where you can relax,  so this is where you would take a break, put  

your feet up and just relax between meetings or  between tasks that you still have to complete.

Such an awesome day spend with you guys here  at the office, but it's getting late you might  

have noticed that it's quite dark and empty so  I'm getting ready to leave now but before I do,  

do you remember all the words tips and  phrases that we've shared today? Well if not,  

don't worry because we put together a free  downloadable PDF document that you can access  

by clicking on the link in the description below,  so you can practice whenever you have a chance. 

One more question before we get going do you  enjoy these types of lessons about everyday  

activities? Well if so, let us know down in  the comments what other everyday activities  

would you like to learn more about and we  might just do a listen about it soon if you  

would like to continue your learning with us  then be sure to check out this lesson next: