English Classes for Your Staff with an English Expert

Customized Programs to Improve Workplace Performance

The importance of clear pronunciation

Clear communication is essential for a workplace to function effectively. Many Australian companies have employees from overseas who have great technical skills, but issues with their English pronunciation may mean that colleagues and customers cannot communicate with them confidently, leading to mistakes and frustration.

English tuition for international and Australian employees  

People from overseas may benefit from an English language program that improves their clear English pronunciation or speaking skills. In addition, people educated in Australia may benefit from support in specific communication skills where they are lacking, such as punctuation, business writing skills, public speaking, presentation skills, and above all, increased confidence, which is a byproduct of all our courses in their professional English and general English skills..

Personalized training with Needs Assessment Reports           

Speak Better English is able to draw on a range of widely experienced English and English as a Second Language teachers to provide customized programs for your individual staff members.

These programs begin with a Needs Analysis to identify specific goals for the personalized English program. Speak Better English manager, Danielle Kuter, will discuss the problem you want to solve, identify the tutor/s with the most expertise in that field, and work with you to design a program to meet your goals.

Individual and Small Group English Training for Employees of Veli Velisha Fresh Produce in Melbourne's West in 2018-2019

At the request of Veli Velisha Managing Director Catherine Velisha, Speak Better English is providing tutoring for a range of staff members with English levels ranging from minimal to moderate. 

In 2019, tutor Meryl Johnson worked on Skype with staff members, either singly or in pairs. 

This program has caught the attention of SBS, and you can see their report here: 

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-australian-farmer-providing-english-lessons-for-her-migrant-workers

Group Training for Powernet by Speak Better English  in March 2017

Powernet IT Solutions is an Australian company that provides superior technology solutions for businesses. The Powernet consultants often work with their clients online or on the phone, so the Melbourne office approached Speak Better English to design a program to help the IT consultants polish their verbal communication skills in order to increase the effectiveness of their service. Sally Landers was the tutor who designed and conducted this program on behalf of Speak Better English.

The following feedback was provided by Chris Goddard, the Quality Manager at Melbourne Powernet:

Time organisation

Marianne / Speak Better English were very responsive, great at organising and great at collecting relevant information regarding the coordination of the training. It all felt well-choreographed. They drove everything from their end, which was great and really assisted me (with my extreme time/resource constraints) to organise everything.

Materials organisation

Sally / SBE were fantastic at organising tailored material ahead of the training. I was extremely grateful at how attentive it was and how she ensured that she had researched ahead of the sessions to know the consultants’ abilities and personalities. Sally is quite clearly a master of her trade. Funnily enough, just being around her made me think about my grammar and even enunciation (which I tend to get lazy with).

Personal

Marianne and Sally are extremely personable and friendly, and great to work with. They are both extremely easy to get along with and are very approachable.

Training style

Sally appeared to embody a nurturing, caring style of teaching. There was an obvious feedback loop, which she was adept at utilising throughout the course. This meant that each trainee seemed to get full value from the teaching.

Material

All consultants had nothing but good things to say about the content. They were extremely happy with the material, confident at having picked up useful information, and seemed assured from the course. Two consultants went out of their way to tell me about specifics of the language that they had not realised, especially regarding inflection. We were kindly provided with the course material post-sessions along with a relevant interesting article. We intend to work these into some general best practice workshops on time entries (which appear on client invoices).

Recommendation

We would not hesitate to use Speak Better English again or recommend them to other organisations – both for groups and for one-on-one sessions.

PS Sally is simply awesome by the way! The consultants all said that they would not hesitate to recommend the training or the training provider.

Chris Goddard

Manager | Quality

Phone: +61 3 9927 6000

https://www.power-net.com.au/

A Customized Program for ACASE (October-November 2016): Pitch Coaching 

Recently the CEO of the Australia-China Association of Scientists and Entrepreneurs asked Speak Better English to design a program to help candidates to prepare for the ACASE Entrepreneurs Pitch Night at the Melbourne Town Hall. We provided a seminar focusing on the structure and content of a “pitch” (very different from academic writing, which most scientists are skilled at), and followed that up with private sessions coaching individual presenters on their written and oral presentations for the competition. 

The feedback from the projects was very positive, and two of the three winners of the competition, Cheng Huang and Melvin Lee - two of the coaching recipients - will be travelling to China in December to meet potential investors and manufacturers, and explore markets for their inventions.

How to Deliver Your Pitch

This workshop was conducted for 50 participants in September by Speak Better English tutor, Sally Landers. After the workshop, Sally and tutor Deb Williams discuss the challenges and the possibilities with participants.

At the Melbourne Town Hall on October 20, nine ACASE members made their pitch to potential investors from government and the private sector. It is no mean feat to explain your product persuasively in three minutes, when English is not your native language!

Cheng Huang (Smart Smoke Alarm), David (Airly), and Melvin Lee (Synermatic) won great prizes including a travel package to the China Roadshow where they will have face-to-face discussions about their product with government and private sector investors.

After the very successful Pitch Nig ht, some of the ACASE organizers and some of the Speak Better English pitch coaches (English teachers!) posed in front of this brand new, hard-to-forget banner!