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ДЕЛОВОЙ ЯЗЫК, ЯЗЫК ДЛЯ СПЕЦИАЛЬНЫХ ЦЕЛЕЙ, ТЕРМИНОВЕДЕНИЕ • BUSINESS FOREIGN LANGUAGE, LANGUAGE FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES, SCIENCE OF TERMINOLOGY
УДК 81'243:81'33:811.111-26:81'373
Элжбета У. Джендрих Высокочастотная терминология бизнес-языка
Корпусные исследования как метод определения ключевых слов делового языка широко используются в процессе создания современных учебных материалов во всем мире. Сегодня стоит вопрос об оптимизации корпусных исследований в учебных целях. Предлагается идентифицировать особенности деловых текстов не только с точки зрения показателей ключевых слов, а и других характерных лексических единиц: коллокаций, фразовых глаголов и словосочетаний, бизнес метафор, сокращений и акронимов.
Ключевые слова: материалы АСЦ (английский для специальных целей), деловой английский, корпусные исследования, высоко частотная бизнес-терминология
Elzbieta Jendrych High-frequency Business Terminology
In a course of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) vocabulary selection is a particularly important task. The main question that we need to answer is how to identify the vocabulary and terminology students need most. Students need to learn the words that are used most frequently in oral and written communication by professionals working in a given area. Talking about key business terms we have to consider the key terms that specialists in business, management and economics most often use. These are the words students should learn first in their ESP courses. In order to identify these terms we need to examine a corpus of business texts and analyze the specialized terms that are used in them. A corpus study was used as a method of identifying core business terms. By means of a quantitative analysis it was possible to measure the frequency of business terms excerpted from the corpus texts. The aim of the study was to find out the highest-frequency terms in authentic business texts. These terms were presented in the form of frequency lists that can, and indeed should, be used by course-book authors and language teachers. Teaching materials that are based on corpus studies include the terminology that is crucial for business communication; these terms should be prioritized in all coursebooks used in ESP courses. Corpus studies are likely to be explored more extensively in the future as they offer a unique opportunity of making teaching materials much more effective.What the paper suggests is not only corpus studies aimed at identifying the core business terminology. To increase the effectiveness of teaching materials we also need to identify other most characteristic elements in the language of business: the highest-frequency business lexis items, collocations, compounds, multi-word phrases, business metaphors, abbreviations and acronyms.
Keywords: ESP materials, business English, corpus studies, high-frequency business terms
1. Introduction
In the teaching practice of today, teachers need materials that can help the Business English learner achieve good language competence in a shorter period of time. The same holds true not only to Business English courses but to all ESP courses as well. Adult learners often need courses which can help them to learn more intensively; they are willing to take the courses that are most effective. The effectiveness of Business English courses depends on many factors, with teaching materials being the factor that can be significantly improved in a relatively short period. In order to produce more effective teaching materials we should first identify which language elements are used with the highest frequency in authentic business texts.
How to identify these key Business English elements? The only way to get the information is to examine a corpus of texts that are authentic and represent the language that specialists in business, management and economics use for professional purposes. «Areas that we see as crucial to the development of the relationship between language teaching and corpus linguistics relate to actual corpora: 1) there is a need for a wider availability of corpora and corpus tools, especially online, and 2) there is a need for diversity in the type of corpora that are available» [15, c. 247].
Course-book writers seem not to use corpus evidence. Most often corpus linguists carry out corpus studies from a purely linguistic point of view. It is their intention to examine and evidence a given language, not to produce materials for language teachers. If we need to maximize the effectiveness of Business English courses, course-book authors and teachers need corpus evidence on the highest-frequency language elements which students should learn first. Therefore, it is crucial to carry out corpus studies which would result in producing frequency lists showing the language elements that are most common in authentic business texts. With such frequency lists, course-book writers can produce much more effective teaching materials. These new generation teaching materials will help learners concentrate on the core language elements and learn the input material they will need most frequently in real-life business situations.
2. The importance of vocabulary in ESP courses
The following quotation confirms the importance of vocabulary in learning a foreign language: «Words are very important in language learning. When asked what advice he could give to someone wishing to become a successful language learner, one well-known applied linguist identified learning words as being one of the main strategies - „Try and deliberately build up a large vocabulary", he said. Grammar is of course important, and so is pronunciation. But you have to use words when you speak, and the more words you know, the more likely you are to be able to say what you want in a
foreign language» [8, c. 28]. The linguist quoted above was Paul Meara who appeared in the BBC programme Lingo! How to Learn a Language [8, c. 42].
S. Thornbury also confirms the central role of vocabulary by quoting a famous saying of David Wilkins: «without grammar little can be conveyed but without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed» [21, c. 13].
These quotations refer to the language for general purposes. However, they also refer to ESP and, in this case, to the language of business. E. Frendo in his book How to Teach Business English says that «one of the key influences on business English teaching in recent years has been our deepening understanding of the role of lexis» (5, c. 8). In recent years, the understanding of the role of lexis has also been deepening in teaching other varieties of ESP, e. g. English for Finance or English for Human Resources.
E. Frendo is of the opinion that businesspersons need the language to earn money. He says: «they need English to do business, not just to talk about business» [5, c. 8]. For them, doing business in the increasingly global environment of today is practically impossible without a good command of English.
According to corpus linguists, «the 95 % level (9000-10000 word-vocabulary perhaps) is probably achievable in tertiary level education with extensive reading programmes and intensive vocabulary teaching materials. (...) Research also suggests that vocabulary gains may be quite impressive (up to 2500 new words per year) if the learner is in a native-speaker environment, for example, on a study abroad programme, as reported by Milton and Meara (1995), or adapts a more specialized focus, for example, academic vocabulary - Academic wordlist by Coxhead (2000), where up to a 10 % leap in comprehension can be gained simply by learning small, carefully chosen academic word lists consisting of fewer than 1,000 common core words» [15, c. 50]. However, we need to remember that «vocabulary learning is not just about learning more words; it is also concerned with knowing more about the words you already know (e. g. how they relate to other words with a similar meaning)» [14, c. 101].
S. Thornbury says that such core word lists help students to memorize core vocabulary items; students know that the words contained in the list are most important and need to be remembered. «Some researchers estimate that up to thirty words an hour can be learned this way» in a popular «How to teach vocabulary» by S. Thornbury [21, c. 33]. Not all authors are equally optimistic. Looking at the problem of specialist vocabulary acquisition, we should not expect that we can introduce new language and have students use it instantly in communicative activities [2]. It takes more time and practice to be able to master the key terms and vocabulary items and use them well in professional communication.
People involved in various kinds of business activities need to specialize in the area-related terminology and vocabulary and should know the most frequently used words and phrases. «The best option is to encourage learners to specialize - specialization of any kind can produce dramatic results, whether it be reading cookery books or garden-
ing books, or pushing the vocabulary of music, business or politics» [15, c. 55]. S. Donna stresses the importance of teaching materials in effective ESP courses: students should focus on the most vital language input materials [4]. Time and energy of ESP students should be used to learn specialized language elements first - they will need them most in professional communication.
To sum up, we can say that lack of specialist terminology and vocabulary will certainly disqualify the speaker, who may otherwise be very competent in communication skills and functional language. I. McGrath says that «having a good vocabulary means knowing a lot of words. Many language learners have problems expressing themselves not because their grammar is weak but because they have a limited vocabulary» [14, c. 98]. This statement is particularly significant when designing teaching materials for an ESP course.
3. Corpus studies for teaching needs
J. M. Sinclair gives a short definition of a corpus as a collection of naturally occurring language texts, chosen to characterize a state or variety of language [17, 18]. According to another definition given in Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics «a corpus is a collection of materials that has been made for a particular purpose, such as a set of textbooks which are being analyzed and compared or a sample of sentences or utterances which are being analyzed for their linguistic features» [16, c. 88].
Why should corpus studies be used when developing teaching materials aimed at increasing students' lexical competence? Corpus studies, according to many linguists [13, 21], give precise information on the most frequently used single words as well as multi-word items such as compounds, collocations and phrases. If these vocabulary items are carefully selected from the corpus, included in a language course and treated as priority items, it can considerably speed up the ESP acquisition process and contribute to increased effectiveness of language courses.
«It was a renewal of interest in the role of vocabulary in language learning and teaching which provided computer corpus-based research with the first opportunity to influence language teaching methodology. From the late 1980's, there was a revival of interest among applied linguists in the place of vocabulary in foreign language learning (...). [18] went so far as to advocate corpus-based lexical syllabuses for language learning. They suggested that «the question of lexical selection has passed many course writers by» [18, c. 50] and that, for learners of English at least, the main pedagogical emphasis should be on the most frequent words (supplemented by words of particular use in specific domains)» [9, c. 288-289]
Speaking at the plenary session of the BESIG Conference in Bonn M. McCarthy, co-author of Cambridge International Corpus (1 billion words), CANBEC (Cambridge and Nottingham Spoken Business Corpus) and Cambridge Corpus of Business English, who has worked on corpuses for over 30 years, said that frequency lists of key words and col-
locations («chunks») are particularly important when developing teaching materials for students [13]. In his presentation, he stressed the importance of corpus studies for practical teaching purposes. Other corpus linguists, e. g. [15] share his views. Publishers and course-book authors, however, do not seem to recognize the importance of the solid and unquestionable evidence coming from corpus studies. This evidence can serve as a powerful database which makes it possible to intensify language acquisition by focusing on the language elements that occur most frequently in professional business communication and should be learned first.
When we analyze most frequent business terms with the aim to prioritize them in a course of Business English, it seems to be a good idea to present a definition of key terms first. According to Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics, key terms are «the special lexical items which occur in a particular discipline or subject matter» [16, c. 545]. The definition of a technical word / technical term in Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics says that it is «1) a word whose occurrence is limited to a particular field or domain and which has a specialized meaning. (...) 2) a common word that has a specialized meaning in a particular field, such as significance in statistics» [16, c. 544].
Polish linguists, J. Lukszyn and W. Zmarzer [11, 22], give a definition of a term as an area-specific lexical item the meaning of which can be very clearly defined and which can be used in specialized texts in professional communication. When analyzing business texts, it is evident that this quality makes terms the core elements of the language for specific purposes which learners should know.
It is clear that students who want to acquire core business terminology need a list of the most frequent terms which is based not on experience and intuition of coursebook authors but on quantitative corpus study evidence. The corpus from which core business terminology is excerpted should include authentic and up-to-date texts used by business professionals. It should be well balanced and cover all basic areas of business.
Without corpus studies the selection of core terms in any ESP course depends on the experience of the author and / or teacher. It, however, does not guarantee that students will learn the terms and other lexical items they are likely to need most in reallife professional business situations.
3. 1. A corpus-study aimed at identifying core business terminology -materials and methods
The main goal of the paper is to present a corpus study aimed at producing a list of core business terminology items excerpted from specialist texts. The corpus included business texts of more than 210 thousand running words from three types of sources: academic sources, press and internet sources and texts from real-life business situations. The corpus included fragments of academic textbooks in business studies (20. 2 % of the corpus texts), management (11 %) and economics (8. 4 %), articles published in quality
business newspapers and magazines (23. 2 %), business reports (5 %), letters and emails (4. 2 %), case studies (3 %), interviews with business people (2 %), business news found on internet sites (4. 5 %) and business plans and trade contracts (1 %). The author also included fragments of the book «CEO Speak» (17. 5 %) in the corpus [1]. This book gives the authentic language in which top executives communicate things to their staff and other groups of stakeholders.
All these texts were authentic and monolingual. They referred to all areas of business e. g. management, human resources, promotion, advertising and public relations, production (primary, secondary and tertiary), distribution, transport and logistics, international trade and domestic trade, sectors of economy, business law, finance, accounting, banking and insurance.
The corpus was examined with the aim to identify the most frequently used business terms. The methodology used in the study followed the four-stage model created by S. Grucza [6]. First, all business vocabulary items were excerpted from the corpus texts. Then, they were analysed in order to identify those which matched the definition of a term given by J. Lukszyn and W. Zmarzer [12] and W. Zmarzer [23]. The lexical items that failed to meet the criteria of a term were excluded. The remaining ones were organized:
1. alphabetically,
2. in a frequency list starting with the highest-frequency items,
3. semantically - according to the area of business they belong to.
Some core terms did not appear in the corpus texts with a reasonably high frequency that qualified them for inclusion (minimum 5 tokens), others were missing. Hence, following the methodology proposed by S. Grucza [6, 7], it was necessary to supplement the list according to the principle of pragmatic usefulness. A preliminary decision on which items to add to the list was based on the author's knowledge and experience. Additionally, however, the decision was consulted with four university teachers - specialists in management, finance, economics and marketing. The final decision was to include eleven more items from outside the corpus. The consultants also suggested that eight items, which appeared in the corpus more than five times, should be excluded, as they are not very important terms (e. g. micro-credit).
3. 2. A corpus-study aimed at identifying core business terminology - results
The final list includes the most frequently used specialized terms every learner of Business English at B2 level of language competence (according to the European Framework of Reference for Languages - CEFR [3]) should memorize and be able to use. This list can be further supplemented by many other specialist terms during the course. What is important is that students can learn the key terms first and that teachers should prioritize these items in Business English courses.
The frequency list of core business terms that was compiled for B2 level contains more than 1,100 items. This list can be used for lower levels of language competence as
well. By cutting down the least-frequent items on the list, we can easily adapt it to level B1 or A2 requirements. The list can also be used when choosing core business terminology for C1 or C2 level. Here two options are possible: we can either use the same corpus texts and lower the criteria for inclusion from 5 to 4 or, which seems to be a better option, increase the research corpus by adding more business texts. This way we can create a universal frequency list of key business terms for all levels of language competence.
It is important to remember that business terms can be used as single words (e. g. cheque, invoice, demand), as multi-word items (e. g. bill of exchange, Chief Executive Officer, Human Resources Department, Managing Director) or as acronyms (e. g. B/E, CEO, HQ, MD, R&D) and abbreviations (e. g. demo, dept, rep). The corpus-based evidence clearly shows that the list of the highest-frequency business terms included all the above-mentioned forms of terms [23, 19, 20].
When designing ESP teaching materials we need to include the abbreviations and acronyms which appear in the corpus texts most frequently. Sometimes an acronym is much more frequently used than a full form. In the examined corpus, the acronym CEO appeared 74 times whereas the full form Chief Executive Officer only 4 times. The importance of acronyms and abbreviations seems to be growing fast in contemporary business communication and it is absolutely necessary to teach Business English learners the highest-frequency short forms of business terms excerpted from the corpus texts.
The language input of Business English course books changes all the time - we can say that now texts on creating great brands, globalization, customer satisfaction, emerging economies, fair trade, crisis management or sustainable growth seem to be more attractive to students than texts on agriculture, the extractive industry, the methods of production or trade unions. Materials writers want the texts in their course-books to be interesting for the language learner. As a result, they choose the topics they consider more attractive and neglect those that the learner may be bored with. Therefore, when conducting corpus studies, it is extremely important to balance corpus texts; otherwise some important business terms may be missing in the list of key business terms.
Another important consideration is that business English changes over time - now, probably faster than ever before. Evidence of the real business English currently used should be up-dated regularly. It is in the last decades that the words like «ageism», «cafeteria plan», «cluster», «e-tailing», «flexitime», «hybrid car», «tax haven» and «telework-ing» appeared.
New business words identified when examining the corpus texts can be attributed to some changes in business. These include (a) progress in information technology and the extended use of the internet in business, e. g. «bricks and mortar», «dot com business», «e-banking», «e-commerce», «golden-collar worker» or «on-line shopping», (b) changing realia in the world of business, e. g. «biofuel», «business angel», «go green», «mystery shop test», «no-frills airlines», «personal shopper», «quality audit», (c) globalization, e. g. «nearshoring», «off-shoring» or «outsourcing», (d) greater importance of hu-
man resources in business, e. g. «outplacement», «flexitime», «temporary secondment» or «work-life balance», (e) progress in management studies, e. g. «bottom-up management», «crisis management» or «knowledge management» and (f) greater importance of advertising in business, e. g. «ambient advertising», «B2B», «brand image», «digital signage», «infomercial», «pop-up advert», «shock campaign» or «viral web advertising».
3. 3. Corpus-based teaching materials for Business English
What needs to be stressed is that corpus linguists tend not to examine ESP corpora specifically for teaching purposes. Consequently, course-book writers do not have empirical evidence showing highest-priority language elements. In fact, what we lack most is corpora for professional purposes that are small but representative for a specific area. «The other deficit that we see is in terms of small, specialized corpus resource. For example, a small corpus of sales encounters, meetings, business presentations and office interactions is far more useful for someone who is developing materials for a business language course, as opposed to a multimillion-word corpus of general language» [15, c. 247].
It is generally agreed that the effectiveness of a teaching process depends, among others, on the quality of teaching materials. If publishers wish to produce teaching materials that help students acquire high-frequency language elements most effectively, they need small, specialized corpus-based resources. Without those authors of teaching materials do not know what to include in their course-books; as a result they select materials in a purely intuitive or incidental way. This is not the method of choice; some words and phrases in such course-books are redundant (relatively rarely used in real-life professional communication) whereas others (frequently crucial ones) are missing.
Intuitive selection can be avoided provided that course-books and other teaching materials are based on corpus studies that can identify all high-frequency language elements in authentic Business English texts. Core specialist terms are considered to be the most important component in all courses for professional purposes but under no circumstances can other characteristic elements of language for specific purposes be disregarded. Without them, the linguistic competence of a learner would never be high - close to that of a native speaker.
Therefore, it is strongly postulated that teaching materials and course-books in particular, should be based on extensive corpus studies aimed at identifying all high-frequency Business English elements. These elements should not be confined to specialized terms, such as e. g. break-even point, distribute, income, manager, PR or profit. They should also include other characteristic language elements such as highest-frequency:
- business lexis items, e. g. department, forecast, goal, instrument, opportunity, task, team;
- business collocations, e. g. easy credit terms, focus group, generate profits, labour market, make money, reasonable price, shop steward, shortlisted applicants, target customers;
- multi-word expressions (formulae) and phrases, e. g. apply for a job, at your earliest convenience, keep up with competitors, meet the quality standards, payment is due on, place an order with;
- figurative language elements (metaphorical expressions), e. g. bottleneck, business angel, deadline, economic recovery, flat organization, fringe banks, money laundering, poison pill, repayment holiday, sleeping partner, tax haven;
- acronyms, e. g. AIDA, CEFTA, CEO, CIF, HR, IMF, PR, OPEC, PLC, R&D, SWOT, USD;
- abbreviations, e. g. ad, co-op, demo, e-bank, est., FOREX, fi-fo, info, INCOTERMS, int'l, rep, repo.
All these highest-frequency language elements should be identified in corpus studies of authentic and well-balanced business texts. Then, a frequency list should be prepared for each category. When this language evidence becomes available for coursebook authors, they will be able to select the content materials and write texts which can reflect the language of authentic business communication.
This way it will be possible to develop new teaching materials, based on corpus-based frequency lists of all relevant language elements. Students will learn and practise the core language they will need most in business communication. These new generation teaching materials will not include any irrelevant input; they will focus learners' attention on language essentials and concentrate their time and energy on what is likely to be used most often in real-life business situations.
The idea of increasing the effectiveness of the learning process thanks to corpus-based frequency lists and proper selection of teaching materials content is based on the following assumptions:
- highest-frequency language elements (business-specific terms, business lexis items, compounds, multi-word phrases, collocations, metaphors, abbreviations and acronyms) should be taught / learned first as they appear in authentic business texts most frequently,
- highest-frequency items can only be identified by analyzing corpus texts,
- such an analysis should be aimed at producing frequency lists of professional terminology and vocabulary items, compounds, multi-word phrases, collocations, metaphors, abbreviations and acronyms,
- the frequency lists are the basic source of information on top-frequency elements in authentic Business English
- they should be used by course-book writers and publishers when developing teaching materials for ESP,
- the frequency lists can be useful as a supplementary material for teachers who wish to develop their own tailor-made materials,
- they can also be treated as self-study material for students who prepare for exams or wish to check on their own how advanced their language competence is.
A corpus study of business texts targeted at identifying core business collocations is an important research area. Collocations reflect the way in which people combine words to express their thoughts. The remaining areas listed above (i. e. business lexis items, and multi-word phrases) also require corpus studies. This way it will be possible to establish all the highest-frequency language elements.
Additionally, we need to analyze the authentic language used in typical business situations such as e. g. sales pitch, meetings or negotiations. If we analyze transcripts of such texts, we will be able to identify core language elements used in specific types of business communication. It seems to be difficult to obtain transcripts of business meetings and negotiations, yet they can be made for research purposes; not all business meetings and negotiations are confidential.
Such complex corpus-based research studies are a prerequisite for developing new generation course-books and supplementary teaching materials. The research work, however, needs to be done to increase our knowledge of the highest-frequency language elements in English for Business Communication.
4. Teaching core language elements combined with teaching business skills and culture
Proper selection of vocabulary, terminology and other core language elements is very important in all ESP courses. Without corpus studies the right selection of vocabulary is hardly possible. The same refers to selecting collocations, metaphors, acronyms and abbreviations and presenting them in the form of frequency lists excerpted from corpus texts.
The second important component of a course of Business English, however, is teaching the language needed when performing typical professional skills. Now, we can see that quite frequently upper-intermediate and advanced students need to learn these skills. Speaking about Business English, J. Harmer says that «an enormous growth area in English language teaching has been in the area of Business English because many students perceive a need for the kind of language which will allow them to operate in the world of English-medium commerce. Once again there is specific vocabulary and language events (presenting to colleagues, the language of contracts, etc.) which are unlikely to appear in a general English course, but which are vitally important for business students. And so teachers find themselves training classes in such procedures as the art of negotiating, the correct use of phones and e-mail, or the reading of business reports» for example in Jeremy Harmer's «Just Reading & Writing: Intermediate British English Version: The Just Series. 2003. P. 10.
Therefore, it is important to concentrate not only on teaching and learning core business terminology and other essential language elements but also on teaching
business and managerial skills. This paper mainly aims at presenting the importance of extensive corpus studies for teaching purposes. However, from the point of view of Business English teaching, new generation corpus-based teaching materials can increase the effectiveness of the course provided they are combined with two other vital components: practising business skills and making students aware of cultural differences. Otherwise, learners will learn the language well but they may turn out to be poor performers. Therefore, Business English teachers should not ignore the two additional components that greatly contribute to the effectiveness of a course: business skills and business culture.
In the 21st century, companies are interested in hiring staff with good language competence and good communication skills, who are able to create great teams and to strive to be high performers in the increasingly competitive world of business. In order to be more competitive, companies are looking for employees able to perform specific tasks better than others are. Good interpersonal, managerial and business skills can significantly increase career opportunities and improve performance and effectiveness. Those business people who are able to set ambitious goals for themselves are likely to go up the career ladder.
How does it translate into business English teaching practice? What students and language teachers need to do is first to learn the core business terms, and then to go beyond language correctness, mastery of grammar, terminology, phraseology, good communication skills and interpersonal skills. The traditional business skills are not enough. In a course of Business English at a higher level, negotiations, presentations, meetings and telephoning need to be combined with managerial skills. Now, such new skills as conflict management, assigning roles in a team, setting goals and communicating them, taking on responsibility, planning tasks, assessing performance and organizing teamwork need to be incorporated in a business English course. Moreover, when looking through the most recent business English course-books published in 2009-2013, we will find units on crisis management, strategic management, personal development and the like.
The importance of practising business and management skills in a course of Business English is confirmed by many experts in ESP teaching in the mentioned above book by J. Harmer; [14]. I. McGrath is of the opinion that «knowledge and skill combine in efficient communication. However, teaching for knowledge is very different from teaching for skill. Knowledge can be «presented» or «discovered»; it can also be forgotten. Skill, on the other hand, can only be acquired through practice, and once acquired is relatively easily maintained. The fact is that while we can «teach» knowledge, we cannot teach skill. Skill has to be learned, and practice is a central element in that learning» [14, c. 98].
Many skills needed in the world of business are transferrable which means that they can be acquired. Learning new skills requires practice in performing various realistic business roles. It is usually done either in groups (e. g. negotiations, meetings) or
individually (e. g. sales presentations, business writing). Students can practise new skills most effectively through task-based learning. This is a method which requires students' involvement in real-life business tasks such as e. g. planning new investment portfolio for your client, applying for a bank loan, presenting new sales targets or discussing sales figures. Instead of doing language exercises students perform various roles in various business situations and practise transferrable skills.
Task-based learning is effective in the process of acquiring new skills because it is an active form of learning. The teacher is only a facilitator and students perform a given task by themselves. Their performance can be assessed immediately by other students and by the teacher. Generally, students like to do tasks which give them a sense of independence and competition and in which they are decision-makers. Such tasks, if completed successfully, give them more satisfaction than traditional language exercises. They have a sense of achievement and progress which motivates them to master business skills. At the same time, they practise language skills, especially the active skills of speaking and writing.
When learning business skills students need instructions from their teachers on the techniques each skill requires and on the factors determining effective skill mastering. Students also need to learn the relevant language input (lexis and phraseology) from the teacher. Our experience shows that teachers usually select materials from various coursebooks to supplement the course materials when practicing new skills with their students. Sometimes they develop their own materials and design new tasks for students.
Mastering business skills results in more effective communication. To illustrate it with a few practical examples that relate to English for Business we can list the following typical non-linguistic skills students should learn to be better business communicators in real-life situations: the skill of negotiating, writing emails, writing business reports and analyzing them, writing business letters, presenting the case, taking part in and chairing meetings, analyzing business case studies, giving business presentations, telephoning or the skills of interpreting graphs and figures, reading numerals and calculations. They are all very important when teaching Business English at upper-intermediate and advanced levels.
It is a challenging time for business people operating in a fiercely competitive environment. In addition to business skills, a successful career also means awareness of cultural differences, being tolerant to others and using this knowledge to the benefit of your company. Business people need to know and understand their own cultural background, their attitudes and priorities. If business people operate globally, they also need to know and respect other cultures. To avoid culture clashes with their business partners, they have to be flexible and tolerant and remember that cultural differences cannot be an obstacle to transacting business and generating profits.
Nowadays more and more Business English courses include a cultural component and explain the importance of cross-cultural communication in business. The cultural
component can be helpful in identifying the aspects that are characteristic of a given culture, they can teach students what to do and what to avoid, how to address people, how to greet them or how to use body language properly. Learners who know the dress code, business etiquette and who have good manners are likely to be more effective in their future business contacts. «Manners make man» - this old proverb is true in the world of global business nowadays. Those who do not know the principles of business etiquette may find it difficult to establish and maintain good business relationships.
As regards corporate culture, it does not need to be included into Business English courses. Each company has its own unique corporate culture, its own values, beliefs, norms and guidelines to follow. They are to be learned and followed when working for a particular company.
5. Conclusions and Discussion
Today effective language teaching and learning requires teaching materials that prioritize highest frequency specialized terms, business lexis items and other language elements that are most typical of the language of business. These highest-frequency language elements should be included in Business English course-books and other supplementary materials prepared by teachers. However, first, they need to be identified in quantitative corpus studies of authentic business texts.
A corpus study was carried out by the author and provided frequency lists of over 1000 core business terms. What remains to be done is to popularize this list and make it available to course-book writers and publishers. Business English teachers can use it for testing purposes, as the basis for preparing supplementary teaching or when evaluating the course-books they intend to recommend to their students. The list can also be used as a benchmark by autonomous learners who want to check how well they know business terminology.
The research study needs to be followed by other corpus studies on the most frequent business lexis items, compounds, collocations, metaphors and on the most popular acronyms and abbreviations. Such an extensive evidence of the basic, most frequent elements in the language of business is expected to increase the effectiveness of coursebooks and lead to better quality language courses. Without corpus studies carried out for ESP teaching purposes, the language content of teaching materials is often chaotic or even irrelevant from the pragmatic point of view. As a result students do not learn the things they will need most in business communication and they complain that courses are not effective and do not meet their expectations.
By creating authentic business language tasks and by simulating business situations, new teaching standards postulated in this paper can give students an opportunity to learn highest-frequency lexical items first, deal with issues of real business and at the same time develop skills required in a modern business context. What we need now
is active learning in which the student is provided with a variety of relevant, effective, tailor-made and corpus-based teaching materials and flexible teaching methods.
New generation teaching materials based on extensive corpus studies should preferably be combined with practising roles and performing tasks that are typical in the world of business. This approach to teaching is expected to produce better results and encourage active learning of both language and non-linguistic skills. Learners will be sure that, on the one hand, they have a chance to learn the language that they will need most frequently at work and, on the other - they have an opportunity to practise the most important business and managerial skills.
Effective use of language is difficult. It is a complex goal covering many elements: good language knowledge, use of specific job-related terminology and vocabulary, social skills, communication skills, use of proper structures, style and tone. Certainly the fact that you know the rules of business etiquette, business culture and business ethic, that you care for sustainable growth, that you are tolerant, flexible and open to others, increases your chances to be a good communicator. Along with that, many business people need transferable skills that can be learned. These primarily include business and management skills (classified broadly into: group skills, interpersonal skills and communication skills) that are essential in successful business dealings.
It does not, however, suggest that the role of core professional vocabulary is becoming less important. On the contrary, more and more students and teachers understand the crucial role of core professional terminology and vocabulary in second language acquisition. This view is supported by many linguists who recognize and emphasize the crucial role of lexis and terminology in the development of linguistic competence [6, 10, 13].
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