Mainland China has an insatiable appetite for business English.

It is a continui ng need that, left unfulfilled, could throttle its industry giants future growth and ambitions for overseas expansion. This may be a one- or two-generation problem that will continue to require invest ments, says Tom Kahl, president of corporate education provider GlobalEnglish. Whi le levels are going to continue to improve over time as more and more people are going to need to use business English to do their jobs as they work with people that are farther and farther away, it s going to be a slow, gradual process. GlobalEnglish enables employees of multinational companies ess English through its online, on-demand software service ely. Its company mission is to advance enterprise fluency nd that is exactly what it is doing in China, where demand grown rapidly over the past 10 years. (MNCs) to learn busin and apply it immediat one company at a time , a for its services has

It s going be a long-term trend. Individuals will continue to be motivated to learn business English because they know it means more money, a better life and more career opportunities. Businesses will also remain motivated because they ve got gl obal aspirations, Kahl says. As the size of the employee base in China grows, so does the perceived need. Thes e days it s not just senior executives and managers that need English. We re seeing significant growth in the variety of individuals we re serving. The explosion in broadband internet services in China over the past decade has h elped GlobalEnglish ride this wave. More and more people are able to use GlobalE nglish s service because they have got better internet connectivity. The company s business nature also enables it to maintain a very scalable operatio n. It only has about 30 employees in China, yet it is able to serve its clients 3 0,000-plus employees. To track the need for business English training, GlobalEnglish publishes an annu al Business English Index report. Based on tests conducted with employees of MNC s, the report allows client companies to benchmark how they re doing versus their peers and to see if their index is getting better or worse. The report also presents an analysis at the macro level. For instance, in the 20 11 report, China moved up to 4.44 on its 10-point scale, where one represents th e beginner level. What s unique about China is that it s improving quicker than any other country. The way the Chinese are now operating international businesses, often by buying Euro pean and American companies, is making other economies see that English is becom ing more important, Kahl says. They know that their growth is going to depend on how well they integrate their operations. It s not just a China story any more. It s a global story where Chinese multinationals are becoming major players. In order to sustain growth, MNCs are becoming less willing to leave their compet itiveness to chance. Three or five years ago, companies in China would view Engli sh as more of an employee s problem. If he wants to improve, he must use his own m oney. Now, companies are willing to spend money to help employees improve their skills, says Kahl. MNCs have also recognised that English training can be a competitive differentia tor for attracting talent. If your company is willing to improve this key skill, it s going to mean that you ll be more promotable, more employable, and you ll earn mo re money throughout your life. That gives employees more reason to come join thi s company over another, says Kahl.

Unlike learning in a classroom setting, GlobalEnglish offers employees greater f lexibility by providing them with tools that will help them get their job done a nd enable companies to put their English to work. Every company has between 2,000 and 5,000 English words that they use in a unique way. We enable companies to i nput these words into applications which employees can get at through their mobi le devices and browsers, says Kahl. If you re sitting in a meeting, you re a new starter and they start throwing around j argon, instead of interrupting the meeting and looking ignorant, you can quickly look up those words on your app and understand the meaning. That s a really big a rea in which companies want to put their English to work. GlobalEnglish s range of products suit a number of different company needs. We ve got formal-learning applications for online structured-learning experiences. We ve got courses that cover level zero to level 10, so you can work your way all the way up the scale. There are self-paced courses with access to virtual classr ooms and live-collaboration technology to talk with GlobalEnglish teachers onlin e. And you ve got other services like GlobalEnglish LinGo, a mobile application, t o help you put English to work instantaneously. We also have a social-collaborat ion service called GlobalEnglish Bloom that s a much more informal way for employe es to feel connected, Kahl says. Customers can decide on how they want their employees to access GlobalEnglish. Ev ery company takes a different approach. Technically there are no restrictions. A ny device that has access to the internet can access GlobalEnglish services. On average, half of the time spent using GlobalEnglish services is done so outside working hours. Some companies have a different view, however, where they want mo re control, so they only let staff use GlobalEnglish while they re physically at w ork, Kahl says. To assess students progress, GlobalEnglish also provides a testing service the St andard Test of English for Professionals (STEP). Other tests like TOEFL are desig ned for more academic purposes. STEP is a business-application test. It tests pe ople s business English skills. Almost every GlobalEnglish user will go in and tak e the test to find out what level they are at and they ll receive a plan for how t o develop to the next level, Kahl says. About 200 companies representing a variety of industries use GlobalEnglish in Ch ina. Customers include technology companies Lenovo, Hewlett Packard and General Electric; heavy manufacturer Caterpillar; energy firm Emerson; and other MNCs su ch as HSBC, Baosteel, Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, Jabil and Hong Kong Broa dband. The universal theme that weaves its way through GlobalEnglish s case studies is pr oductivity gain. A technology manufacturing company with big operations in mainla nd China reported that, on average, employees who had been utilising GlobalEngli sh for a set period of time had improved their productivity levels. They were sa ving two hours per week through not wasting time asking people to help them with their English, read and write e-mails, or how to better participate in a confer ence call, Kahl says. The cost savings are difficult to ignore. The old way of sending a few people to classes to improve their English was very expensive and inefficient. It cost fiv e to 10 times per person to use this method versus GlobalEnglish, Kahl says. Another way employees use GlobalEnglish is as a tool for informal support. People can access tools to help them put their English to work. Instead of the company using GlobalEnglish for 500 employees, now they re looking at us for literally 50

,000 employees. We re seeing the number of people using GlobalEnglish grow dramati cally, Kahl says. Kahl admits that many of GlobalEnglish s newest and most innovative functions were conceived with the help of the users. We ve got a community online where we intera ct with our buyers and administrators. They learn how to better use our products and give us feedback into what features they want to see enhanced. Turnaround time regarding feedback is fast, with software updates that provide g reater functionality released every three weeks. Customers love that because they can see a nice evolution in our software that happens very routinely, Kahl says. While GlobalEnglish s online model has been successful, many employers still see t he value of learning English in a classroom setting. At HSBC, employees in the b ank s China offices (including Hong Kong) can enrol on various foundation and adva nced training programmes that focus on key elements of effective business writin g and grammatical accuracy. They can also enrol on advanced programmes which cov er techniques for expressing complex ideas and issues more effectively. It is important to offer effective English training as it helps increase our staf f s confidence. English is still the key international language, says Michael Fracc aro, head of learning, talent, resourcing and organisation development for AsiaPacific at HSBC. Most of those who attend the courses generally need to improve their English ski lls because they re dealing with overseas customers or colleagues in other countri es, Fraccaro explains. In addition, HSBC employees can enrol in a comprehensive English communication p rogramme comprising a series of evening classes held over a 20-week period. Cove ring both verbal and written skills, the programmes are intended mainly for empl oyees personal self-development. Either a staff member recognises that this is a need that requires further develo pment, or their manager, during development discussions, may point out that as p art of their career development they should enrol in one of these programmes, Fra ccaro says. Global firms with out any shortages tance, the firm s oficiency is at a staff consisting mostly of professionals often do not worry ab in business English skills. In the case of KPMG China, for ins meticulous recruitment process ensures that candidates English pr satisfactory level for them to take on the job.

When we recruit new graduates or experienced professionals, the selection process includes aptitude tests that are conducted in English. We also conduct individu al interviews in English. Though we are not actually testing their English level as much as their analytical abilities with numerical data, we are able to decip her an individual candidate s verbal and written English standard from the results , says Margaret So, director at KPMG China. KPMG s recruits are mostly made up of university business graduates with a high le vel of English proficiency. So admits, though, that in terms of business English , some individuals may not be as good as others . Help is available for those who need it. Some may only need reminders, while othe rs require training. We have English training classes available internally that are open to everyone, So says. Besides classroom training, most employees are able to brush up their business E nglish while on the job and through feedback. We re a professional firm. We work as

a team. Our people can rely on constructive feedback from managers and partners with whom they work, So says