Non-English Speakers Are Shut Out of the Top Jobs

A recent study looked at what happened when a Chilean engineering company, the subsidiary of a US group, changed its corporate language from Spanish to English. The motivations were the usual ones: to become more global, to win non-Spanish speaking clients and to facilitate communications with the US corporate headquarters.

The company put an unusual effort into ensuring that everyone became competent in English, particularly given its small size. It hired three language specialists for its 60 staff and scheduled hours of lessons each week. The language specialists observed meetings and conference calls and ran workshops on functional vocabulary.

They rearranged seating to put fluent English speakers next to less advanced colleagues. They created glossaries for employees and posted English-language invoices and quality control documents on the company intranet. Six months after the change, the company ordered that all internal emails should be in English.

How did the staff fare? The researchers, Sebastian Reiche of Iese Business School and Tsedal Neeley of Harvard Business School, studied the employees’ progress for two years, looking at how attitudes to the language change affected learning progress and whether staff stayed with the company or left.

The change was an anxious one for many. A memo from the language experts noted that “employees expressed dissatisfaction, anger, frustration and fear of making mistakes as people attempted to get the job done while also learning English”. A meeting between low-fluency Chilean employees and US colleagues resulted in “communication failures and a disheartened feeling”.

Unsurprisingly, those who felt least negative about the language switch made the most progress. That did not mean it was always easy for the best English speakers. Those who had a higher level to start with became frustrated by their struggle with what the researchers called “abstractions and nuances in the language”. This is a familiar feeling to anyone who has learnt another language. Even after years of progress, you have conversations that leave you disheartened as your language falls apart during more complex conversations.

Perhaps the most surprising finding was which employees thought they would be better off leaving the company. It was not those who struggled with English who were most likely to go. The better an employee’s English, the higher their desire to move to another job.

The researchers suggest this might have been because the best English speakers became frustrated working with colleagues who were less fluent, or possibly because, with their English language skills, they found it easier to get another job. The second seems particularly likely.

Professors Reiche and Neeley acknowledge the limitations of their research. The number of employees they studied was small and they would need to go beyond two years to understand the long-term impact of the language switch.

Similarly, it would be interesting to see research on the long-term career outcomes of those who achieve high-level communication skills in English and those who do not. Even in countries where English language instruction starts in primary school, some people will do better at English, just as some do better at maths or kicking a ball.

This means it is not enough to master business skills, whether they are in marketing or, as with the Chilean company, in engineering. You can be a top-class engineer and be held back by an inability to speak the global business language.

Vocabulary:

subsidiary – a business or company that is completely owned or controlled by another larger, primary company, “The local supermarket chain is actually a subsidiary of a massive global corporation.”

facilitate communications – to make it much easier for people to talk, share information, or understand one another, “Installing the new messaging app helped facilitate communications between the design and sales teams.”

competent – having enough skill, knowledge, or practical ability to do a task successfully or to a satisfactory standard, “She is completely competent at managing the store when the owner is away.”

intranet – a private, secure computer network that can only be accessed by employees within a specific company or organization, “The HR department posted the holiday calendar on the company intranet.”

fare – to progress, succeed, or cope when dealing with a specific situation or challenge, “How did you fare on your final university exams yesterday?”

disheartened – feeling disappointed, discouraged, or losing your hope and confidence after a failure, “He felt disheartened when his job application was rejected for the third time.”

nuances – very small, subtle differences in meaning, expression, tone, or feeling that can be hard to notice immediately, “To speak a language perfectly, you must understand the subtle nuances of its humor.”

falls apart – breaks down, fails completely, or loses its structure or correctness, “Her English grammar always falls apart whenever she gets nervous in front of a crowd.”

better off – an idiom meaning to be in a better, happier, safer, or more successful position or financial situation than before, “You would be better off buying a durable winter coat rather than a cheap, flimsy one.”

limitations – weaknesses, boundaries, or missing elements that prevent something from being perfect or fully accurate, “The scientists admitted the limitations of their study because they only tested a small number of people.”

long-term impact – the powerful effect, result, or consequence that something has over a very long period of time into the future, “Cutting down the forest will have a devastating long-term impact on the local wildlife.”

master – to learn or practice a skill so thoroughly that you become completely expert at it, “It takes years of daily practice to completely master a new language.”

held back – delayed, prevented from making progress, or stopped from achieving full success, “His career was held back because he lacked confidence during client meetings.”