Mind your language
Global English is an 8-year old company with about 100 employees, revenues of USD 20-30 million and profitable. Their business: teaching English to employees of multinationals using unique online methods. What is fascinating is the growth of its business in India, which has traditionally been regarded as endowed with a large English speaking human resource base. But as Mr. Desai the CEO put it: “People need to learn how to converse in different situations”, so its more than just the language.
Global English model is a brilliant entrepreneurial response to a new business reality: the importance of communication and specifically English in today's global business world. Even as record number of foreigners sign up for Mandarin lessons, “global English” is the true lingua franca of today. Often as we pronounce Bangladesh the next investment Eldorado, we glibly proclaim how our colonial legacy has left us with the inherent advantage of English language skills. But the reality, as most employers know, is that the standard of communication skills and English in particular amongst job seekers is generally very poor. In less than a generation we have gone from national public universities and colleges that produced students who spoke English and Bengali correctly, to the abysmal situation today where we have teachers who lack the requisite training and skills themselves. I am amazed during interviews where highly 'qualified' applicants insist on speaking in English that is so fundamentally wrong that one would not know where to start to correct them? Often the Bengali is equally flawed.
Now before I am crucified for being an Anglophile/ neo-colonialist I would like to submit the following facts:
- English is the official language of the European Central Bank and of the ASEAN trade group, although in both cases the number of people speaking English as a first language among the member countries is minimal.
- 70 percent of the content on the internet is in English but only 41 percent of the users are native English speakers.
- English is the de-facto working language of 98 percent of German research physicists.
So if the French, Italians, Japanese and Germans (almost as passionate about their languages as Bengalis) can dispassionately accept the reality of English, maybe so should we?
The crime was committed by some of our leaders who tried to earn populist support by abolishing English as official medium of instruction and downgrading its importance for decades. Whilst violently berating the private schools that came up to fill this void, they of course sent all their own children to English medium schools, here and abroad. Some of our finest institutions with rich traditions of English teaching were ruined during this time. English has been reintroduced in the national school curriculum, but the damage is done. Whole generations have been denied their fair chance to acquire English proficiency, a basic skill for a global worker today.
What do a Keralite Nurse, a Danish mariner and a Sri Lankan maid have in common? They are all highly desirable in the job market, and one major reason is English. Even a populist leader like Laloo Prasad Yadav, Indian Minister for Railways, today demands teaching of English in schools.
In the UK, Government, Industry and Unions have joined to invest in workplace English language skills, especially amongst new immigrants needed by the economy. Listen to John Cridland, Deputy Director of the CBI: “The business benefits of investing in the language skills of the workforce are clear, many firms have seen improvement in productivity, savings in recruitment, lower turnover and higher employee motivation” . This, in India and UK, where on average, English levels are slightly higher than ours.
English is spoken today by more than 300 million native speakers and 400-800 million non native speakers. It is the official language for air transport, shipping, science and technology, computers and commerce, a medium of education, publishing and international negotiations.
As the Bangladesh economy gets more plugged into the global economy, communication skills have become critical for success. Without English, too much is lost in translation. Whether we are communicating with buyers, suppliers or employers, for now, we are getting by. But we could leverage ourselves so much better, if we had better communication and English language skills. Just by providing basic English skills to our workers going abroad we could greatly enhance their competitiveness.
The usual suspects who moan that increased emphasis on English will somehow weaken or diminish our own language and culture, hugely underestimate Bangla. Our language is vibrant and dynamic and sustained by great minds using their creativity. Strong communication skills in English and Bangla are not mutually exclusive, indeed both are critical for success. Only then can we get our own story out to the world.
One needs only to listen to the new Bangla music today to realize that English maybe our window to the world, but Bangla will always be the window to our soul.
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