Let your employees be free with their English

I think weekly speaking clubs along with course-based learning is really effective and beneficial, not only for the people who attend, but for the company in general. I have picked a few areas where I think having an English speaking club at least once a week helps your company and of course your employees.

Free Usage

So, you work in IT, all your work is IT-related, and everything you talk about in English is IT. That could drive you crazy. Especially when you understand you are only using English to talk about one thing. Speaking clubs usually come with a different topic each time, which is a relief for most people who are stuck using their language skills on one topic. Different topics allow you to use the different areas of English that you have in your head. A topic about film and tv not only opens you to using different tenses like the Present Perfect to talk about your film watching experience or Narrative Tenses to tell everyone what the film is about, but it also opens up a whole lot of adjectives to describe things and people connected to film, something you might not get when just talking about IT. Speaking clubs aren’t restricted, and that’s the beauty of them, a time for you to use your English freely and forget about work.

Fun

Speaking clubs aren't designed to be very serious, although some topics can be quite serious, they are or should be approached in a way where everyone feels comfortable. They should be a place where not only do they give us the chance to use our English, but a place that makes us feel entertained by interesting communication and of course educated. If a speaking club doesn’t feel fun, it’s not being done right. A speaking club should be something your staff look forward to, a highlight of working at your company.

Critical Thinking

Speaking clubs are a chance to speak. A chance to express yourself, your ideas, opinions, and experiences. Speaking clubs don’t really contain closed questions, but questions that are designed to provoke you to think and analyse and then reply. A skill we should encourage in our daily lives, and a valuable skill for any employee. The danger of falling into a work-home-work-home routine without giving too much thought about things and running on autopilot can be a dangerous thing, so mental stimulation when you have to use your brain on topics that you might not even talk about or think about in your daily life is a brilliant way to get that brain working and that mind widening, leading to a healthy style of thought.

Team-building

You might think this sounds strange, but speaking clubs bring your colleagues closer together. How? Well, during working hours your employees probably don't really know much about their co-workers. They work together, yeah. They might exchange some small talk about the weather or a current event in the kitchen or before a meeting, but do they really know what they like, dislike, and have opinions about? This is where speaking clubs help with building a better bond between your colleagues, they get to find out more about each other, have a better understanding of who they work with and creating a closer connection which is good sign for a healthy and productive working environment.

When we take into account all the above, we can see speaking clubs are good, very good, and not just for languages purpose, but for a stronger team, a better team, and a close-knit team. If you are thinking about bringing a speaking club to your office here in Lviv, then I can make that happen.

Cheers
Native Speaker UK