Enhancing workplace communication: The new role of language assessments in business success

Andrew Khan
two business people sat together in a meeting both looking at a laptop
Reading time: 4 minutes

The integration of AI tools into workplaces around the world is starting to change the way people communicate professionally. that the use of AI to help draft documents and emails is driven not only by convenience and efficiency but also by a desire to be clear and precise in language.

While potentially useful, tools to translate, generate, or ‘correct’ written text won’t help with the effectiveness of the verbal communication that powers business relationships.

Is your teams communication effective?
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The importance of effective communication

Whether it’s customer support calls, sales presentations, health and safety instructions or day-to-day engagement with colleagues, our personal and professional interactions in the workplace rely on our ability to understand and be understood.

Equally, clarity of communication is central to many of the ‘future skills’ that employers have identified as critical to sustained success – notably .

It can be challenging for people who have English as a first language to feel confident in these skills – and even more difficult for those who may use another language at home but are required to speak English at work.

Challenges faced by second-language English speakers

When designing assessments that measure English proficiency, we need to balance the convenience and duration that enable them to fit into a fast-paced hiring workflow with the coverage that gives businesses confidence in the results. This means focusing on the most essential elements of effective communication.

Introducing the Versant by 蜜桃app English Speaking and Listening Test

With the new Versant by 蜜桃app English Speaking and Listening Test, we take just seventeen minutes to give a comprehensive picture of communicative English competence. So where do we focus?

Get in touch to learn about our corporate solutions

Effective verbal communication: Balancing listening and speaking skills

As a starting point, the businesses that we heard from in our research were clear that listening is just as important a skill as speaking when it comes to making hiring decisions.

Anyone who has been through sales or customer support training in the past will likely be familiar with the phrase “you have one mouth but two ears,” meaning that, in a professional context, our ability to listen, actively and attentively, for detail and nuance, can be twice as valuable as speaking. A test that didn’t place equal weight on comprehension and productive speech when assessing communicative ability would be missing the mark.

Evolving expectations around speech

Our research also pointed to expectations around speech having shifted in recent years. The range of jobs where English is required at the point of hiring has increased in many countries – with professionals from taxi drivers to online tutors often asked to demonstrate communicative competence.

With this in mind, 蜜桃app has introduced the Global Scale of English Job Profiles framework to help employers define appropriate English requirements for a variety of different positions.

Customer Support roles and communicative ability

Customer Support roles, historically the main use case for testing English in the workplace, are also evolving. Employers are placing a much greater emphasis on true communicative ability to help resolve complex problems rather than scripted or pre-prepared responses delivered with US-style accents.

Designing effective assessments

Taking this into account, we recognized a need to design a more effective way of testing both the manner of speaking and the content of that speech. Manner-of-speaking scores bring together the measurement of fluency or the fluidity and cohesion of a spoken response, pronunciation and intelligibility.

Pronunciation is different from accent – a test taker can have an Indian accent, a French accent or a Japanese accent and still pronounce English words in a way that first-language speakers will expect to hear them. Intelligibility reflects the reality that we all speak in different ways, with a voice authentic to ourselves, and looks to assess whether that voice can be easily understood by others.

Measuring communication skills

The most relevant measure of communication skills isn’t whether you sound like a fluent speaker but whether you can use your ability with language to convey meaning effectively. Our speech also needs to be relevant and appropriate, with suitable vocabulary and grammatical accuracy.

We’ve found the most successful way to measure speech content is to blend short questions with a limited set of potential responses with more open-ended items. This enables test takers to speak organically and really show what they can do with their language skills.

The value of fair and objective assessments

Whether used as a hiring tool, to diagnose employees' learning and development needs or to benchmark improvement over time, English assessments can be a great asset to businesses – but only if they’re fair, objective and laser-focused on the skills that underpin true communicative competence.

Join our webinar to learn more

Join us for an insightful webinar where we will delve deeper into the role of language assessments in enhancing workplace communication and driving business success. Sign up now to secure your spot and learn how the Versant by 蜜桃app English Speaking and Listening Test can benefit your organization.

Sign up for our webinar here

References

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  • A young girl sat at a desk smiling at the front of the class, with other students in the background.

    Four motivating activities to teach core values through reading

    By Nicola Schofield
    Reading time: 4 minutes

    Teaching our?children core?values is so important in helping them to become?happy,?well-balanced?citizens who will make a positive contribution?to?our future society.?

    Values are present and visible everywhere and they are?the?foundation or starting point from where we make our decisions, which ultimately determine our futures. It is,?therefore,?important that our children learn a strong, moral set of values that will help guide them as they grow older,?inform their decisions,?help them to?know right from wrong, solve problems, assert themselves and build self-esteem and confidence.

    Values can be?built?on a?personal level or even?shared at?a group level such as a family and friendship group.?However, we often see them on a larger scale within communities, countries or even the whole world.?

    Having a shared set of values connects people?on a deeper level?and helps us to all work towards the same goals and standards – they can?even encourage people to see the similarities between each other, rather than the?differences.?

    Learning values through reading

    Children learn about values through their families, friends, and teachers, through what they watch or listen to and through their life experiences. They also learn about values?through the books they read.?These lessons?can be subtle but are often?extremely powerful and?can?have a significant impact and influence.

    As an example, let’s have a look at how shared values?are?explored in the?new graded readers series for young learners,?Disney Kids Readers, where special emphasis has been put on exploring values within a story.?At the end, you will find several?value-based activities?that you can download for use in the classroom or?as?an activity at home.?

    How?do Disney Kids Readers teach core values?

    1. Learning through stories that are already familiar can help children to trust in and take on board the key messages much more easily. Familiarity can break down many barriers to communication and help us understand that values are often universal.?
    2. Many children are also familiar with the Disney characters and can find inspiration from reading how they react to situations in life, make decisions and behave. Children often look up to characters and can see them as role models within their own lives. As a result, the readers can be a reference point on how to respond to key life moments and how to incorporate values into real life.
    3. Also, depending on the child's age, some values may be new and children may not yet have experience with them in the real world. Therefore, the Disney stories allow them to explore these key messages through their favorite Disney character’s point of view.?

    Each Disney Kids Reader is linked to a key value?and contains a ‘Values’ page with a?short?comic?strip?that brings to life a specific value.?

    The list below details?a selection of?key values taught across the readers.?You could ask?the children?in your class?to talk about which values are most important to them and why. Ask them to give an example?of?a time when they have demonstrated this value in their own lives.?

    Friendship, positivity, curiosity, confidence, open-mindedness, courage, determination, self-belief, responsibility, resilience, respect, honesty.

    Examples of key values in?Disney stories

    In?The Jungle Book,?friendship?is a key?value,?and we learn that it is important to help our friends. Baloo helps Mowgli when he is alone in the jungle and scared. An angry tiger wants Mowgli to leave the jungle, but when Mowgli meets Baloo, he finds a friend in him. Baloo sees that Mowgli is scared and looks after him.?We learn that it is important to help our friends when they are in need.?

    Do:?Ask the children when they have helped their friends.

    In?Inside Out, we learn about?sincerity?and?how?important?it is to talk about how we are feeling. Riley is a teenager struggling with a whole range of emotions and we learn that life isn’t about being happy all the time and that it is okay to be sad sometimes. The children learn that this is a normal part of life and that talking it through with a friend, a parent or a teacher can help.

    Do:?Ask the children if they share their feelings with others.

    Here are some activities for you to use with your class to help put into practice the core values from the readers. You can use these activities with any book, in and outside the classroom.

    1. My Values Road Sign (L3-4)

    This activity?is?a great way of talking?to?children?about their values. By creating a road sign poster,?it will help them to decide which values are most important to them and it is something that they can?refer?to again and again in challenging times. They can stick it on their bedroom wall, display it on the fridge or you could even make a classroom display of shared values?when children have finished?their?books!

    Download the worksheet

    ?2. Kindness Calendar (L4-6)

    This activity can be done as a family, with friends or as a class. The children fill in the calendar with kind actions they are going to do for 7 days. They can cut them out and place?them?into a jar and ask a different family member/friend/classmate to choose one a day. Do this for a week and discuss how carrying out kind actions makes them feel.?Chances are?it will make them feel good!

    Download the worksheet

    3. Core Values Quiz (L5-6)

    Try this quiz with your class and test their values. The questions focus on the following values: sincerity, honesty, positivity, resilience and friendship. If they answer mostly As, then they already demonstrate most of the values in their lives. If they answer mostly Bs, talk to them about why it is important to be honest, positive, strong and kind. The quiz will start a meaningful conversation about their own values and how they react to common situations in life.

    Download the worksheet

    4. My future self (L1-2)

    The children?fill in the crystal ball with pictures of who they would like to be in the future. Do they want to be smart, funny, have a good job, live abroad, have a family, be rich, be a good friend or help the planet? Which of the plans make one person?(themselves)?happy?and which plans make the world better? Do they need to change any of them?

    Download the worksheet

    Read our blog posts 'Fostering self-care and wellbeing through the world of reading'?and 'The importance of teaching values to young learners'.

  • A teacher sat outdoors with young students looking at a book togethr

    Fostering self-care and wellbeing through the world of reading

    By Nicola Schofield
    Reading time: 6 minutes

    Growing up is an exciting time. Children are curious and open-minded, and every day welcomes a new thing to learn. They are constantly exploring and discovering themselves and the world around them. But children also have to face many challenging times too as they get older. It is, therefore, important that we teach our young people to be aware of their own wellbeing and self-care, what they can do to lead a balanced and healthy life, and give them the tools they need to help them in difficult times, both mentally and physically. ?

  • A child sat on a bed reading a book

    Motivating children to read English books with fun activities

    By Nicola Schofield

    Why is reading important??

    Apart from being a?great hobby?and fun?activity, it can help children improve in many areas of their lives through developing?key transferrable skills. Reading in their native language and English can bring a whole range of benefits. To engage everyone, they must?understand the benefits themselves.? ?

    Ask your students why it's important and create a mind map of ideas. You may also?wish to use some of the points below to start the conversation. Having a common idea that everyone agrees on can help build motivation and engagement in the classroom.?

    Improves?language skills?

    Regular reading develops children’s linguistic skills – it helps them learn good?sentence structure, grammar, vocabulary and?improves?spelling in their own language and in the English language too. Reading aloud?also strengthens?knowledge of phonics and improves?pronunciation?and articulation.??

    Improves memory?

    It can help to develop knowledge of phonics and vocabulary?recall and improve focus and concentration?– all necessary skills when learning a language.?

    Cultivates curiosity?

    Books help kids’ imaginations to grow?and?encourage them to be?more open-minded. They?help us to learn about other cultures and encourage us to think more creatively. Through subtle messages,?reading?builds?an?awareness of the world in which we live and?enables?children to form?their own?opinions?and ask questions.?

    Creates empathy?

    Stories help to develop children’s emotional intelligence?and?empathy towards?others. Exploring?topics and characters allows them to learn about?real-world situations?and think about how they would feel?in?somebody else’s shoes. It encourages?respect for others’ feelings?as well as?other?cultures.??

    Reduces stress?

    It is a great way to?calm the mind and help us relax and destress. Children can learn to use it as a helpful tool in their day-to-day lives.???

    Develops key life skills?

    Children develop their confidence, communication, resilience, patience, social skills and connect?with the wider world, culture?and communities.?

    So how do we motivate our young learners?(even our most reluctant readers)?to develop a passion for reading??

    It?must?be fun,?purposeful and relevant?

    Well-known adaptations?can remove barriers, support and encourage students’ imagination,?and?spark?a genuine interest. They?give purpose and relevance to the students as most students have watched a movie?at some point in their lives and most students have a?favorite movie?or character.??

    Let your young learners choose?

    There are plenty of English Readers to choose from?– if the students can choose their own readers, they will likely be more motivated and focused. Choice gives the students power and makes it more relevant to them. Ask your students to choose their?favorite movie?and?have a vote as a class. Get to know your students, find out what interests them, and base your?book choice around this.?

    Rewards??

    To motivate students, they?must know that they are?making progress. Reward students for their achievements – for example,?create?a vocabulary wall or?a class book chart and give rewards?like?a?sticker?or?a postcard?to take?home.?