SHAW ACADEMY

NOTES

[ENGLISH FOR BUSINESS – PART 1]

 Business Etiquette
What is it?
 Building relationships with other professionals
 Providing basic social comfort and creating an environment where individuals feel
safe
 Achieved through better communication

How to practice?
 Professionalism
 Business dress code
 Punctuality
 Office politics and diplomacy
 Cultural sensitivity
 Business ethics

Forging and Fostering Professional Relationships

Client Relations
• Build a solid client base
• Maintain existing client relations
• Understand and focus on client needs
• Respect, trust, integrity, patience, empathy, dedication and sincerity
• Communicate and listen
• Pay attention to feedback
• Be a problem-solver
• Balance honesty with diplomacy
• Remember that the customer or client is always right

Interacting with Colleagues and Management

• Be courteous, friendly, diplomatic, respectful, co-operative and helpful
• Develop natural rapport
• Communicate effectively
• Ask for advice
• Law of reciprocity
• Incentivise colleagues
• Initiative
• Don’t complain
• Empathise
• Articulate
• Individual work vs. teamwork
• Socialise
Cultural Sensitivity and Norms
• Respect the practices as a professional in your country of work, or multicultural
environment

Networking
• Creating mutually beneficial business relationships with other professionals
• Creates opportunities
• Information sharing
• Project collaboration
• Can be done in the workplace, at lunch, at conferences/seminars, etc.
• Social media networks, e.g. LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.
• Every individual is important
• Understand the networks you create
• Be natural, not calculating
• It is not a sell!

Compound Nouns and Adjectives

Nouns or adjective made up of two or more words.

They can appear:

 Separated (e.g. finance department)
 Joined (e.g. software)
 Hyphenated (e.g. vice-president)

Modal Verbs
Auxiliary verbs that express necessity or possibility.
Form = ‘subject + modal verb + infinitive of verb (base form)’

Have to = external obligations from an authority, like your boss

e.g. You have to follow the code of conduct in your workplace.

Must = personal obligations or written rules

e.g. You must be ethical as a professional.

Should = recommendations, advice or opinions

e.g. You should be culturally sensitive and diplomatic in the workplace.
 THANK YOU

english.business@shawacademy.com