Teaching Business English is fantastic! I like teaching motivated adults for a specific purpose and I consider myself extremely lucky having as students experts in various sectors: banking, insurance, pharmaceuticals, IT, health care.
However, I must admit that, despite many years of experience, I still feel secretly insecure when I meet professionals from the business world, as I always worry that they might mistake me for some young inexperienced English teacher…
But, during time, I‘ve come to realize that, by using this “insecurity” proactively, namely by turning it into curiosity and letting them “teach” me about their job and business, I’ve learned so much, and, through them “teaching” me, a lot of language emerges, which gives me the opportunity to really see both their discourse strategies and the issues they have when communicating on a daily basis. It is amazing what asking the right questions can teach me!
This way, I manage to tune into my students’ feelings and interests, be aware of their learning styles and thus, adjust my teaching to what they really need and deliver bespoke lessons, tailored to suit their business functions and relevant to their use of English.
