Page 55 - Horizon Han22

Can’t I just hire someone who speaks the language I need?
While it may be possible to hire someone who not only has the range of skills required for your business but also speaks the particular language you need, this is in several respects a sub-optimal solution.
Firstly, the positive image impact of having a UK employee who speaks their language should not be underestimated. It demonstrates a great sensitivity to your overseas partners: you have made the effort to develop your language skills to make it easier for them to communicate with you. Hiring in a (for example) Spanish speaker does not have the same cultural impact.
Secondly, the cost of an additional hire is almost certainly higher than the cost of training an existing member of staff to a fluent standard in the language concerned. Modern language training methods allow for rapid progress to be made on a flexible schedule, minimising operational disruption.
Strategic Benefits
Linguistic competencies: delivering multiple positive second order effects
Companies which prioritise the development of linguistic competencies among their workforce (i.e. individuals’ language skills) benefit from a range of positive second order effects at a strategic level.
Cultural intelligence, which is most easily described as the ability to interpret the behaviour of others in the way it is intended to be, is a standard consequence of learning a language. After all, a language cannot be separated from the culture of the people(s) who use that language – they are two sides of the same coin. Organisations with higher cultural intelligence are considerably more likely to successfully employ value-based selling, which delivers maximum profitability for a given product-market at any given moment in time.
The extent to which the entire organisation is export oriented (meaning how fundamental to its culture and operations establishing international partnerships is) is also highly correlated with linguistic competencies. Export orientation is a cultural concept: for the entire organisation to be appropriately focussed on making international sales, a high degree of strategic alignment is required. Everyone needs to be working towards the same goal and recognise that the decisions they make (whether directly related to overseas clients or not) all relate back to the over-arching objective of selling products and services to overseas clients for a maximum profit.
Employees who have acquired language skills are considerably better able to understand how the decisions they make and the actions they take can help achieve strategic export goals, as a consequence of their enhanced cultural intelligence. Such employees working within truly export-oriented organisations also report higher levels of job satisfaction and demonstrate lower turnover rates, reducing HR overheads and the risk of losing staff into whom considerable investment has been made.
The combination of enhanced cultural intelligence with a strong export orientation leads to stronger sales and profitability in businesses
trading internationally.
Becoming a Learning Organisation
Learning organisations are those which institutionally prioritise constant professional development. This includes both that training organised and delivered by the organisation itself, and the fostering of a culture in which individual employees prioritise their self-development, supported by organisation resources. Learning organisations have lower staff turnover, higher strategic alignment and reduced HR overheads compared to other organisations in the same industry.
Companies which provide language training to their employees are 64% more likely to be learning organisations than those which do not.
For businesses which trade internationally (or which aspire to do so), language training is a vital piece of the tactical and strategic puzzle. InTuition Languages’ personalised 1:1 programmes deliver rapid results in a tailored and flexible way.
Language skills as a communication tool
Building the language capacity of a business can be seen as investment in a specific tool, as well as investment in skills. Obtaining this communication tool allows more approaches to be taken when interacting with commercial partners, with commensurate improvements in corporate efficiency and productivity. For export-oriented businesses, an expansion of communication tools bears particular dividends in business development and sales.
55. Speak the Language
Horizon issue 2.indd 55 14/12/2022 14:50:31