3
Business English
Oral Examination
Case study
Bonhomme
Bonhomme is a Chinese company based in
Shanghai. It exports over 70 per cent of its
production, some of its profitable markets being
in non- Chinese speaking countries. It was
recently taken over by the Brant Corporation, a
US multinational. Soon after the takeover,
Brant’s President Carlson J. Overend held a
meeting with thirty senior executives of
Bonhomme.
During the meeting, Mr. Overend told these
senior executives that there would be some
changes after the takeover, in organization,
personnel and products. He thought this piece of
news would make them sit up, but there was no
reaction!
And then, to his astonishment, Mr. Overend
found out that these people had no response
because they even did not understand a word of
what he had said just now. He realized that it
would be a big problem if his people did not
know English.
He told the President of Bonhomme, Michael
Chen, that he wanted an English languagetraining programme put into effect without
delay. John Wang, the Personnel Manager of
Bonhomme, was then instructed to produce a
report defining which groups in the company
needed English language training and how
urgent that need was.
One week later he had finished the report
“English language proficiency in the Bonhomme
company”.
This first report included only head office
personnel that would use English for various
purposes in the normal course of their duties. It
showed that altogether 134 are weak in English.
The chart below shows the estimated training
needs for these people:
TRAINING
Numbers
who are
weak or
average in
the three
categories
Essential
and
urgently
needed
52
Essential
and needed
as soon as
possible
72
Desirable
when
convenient
10
Once the report had been circulated John
Wang received a memo from M. Chen in which
two points were made:
1. Brant will finance the training scheme
for one year. Results will then be reviewed. And
the training should be cost effective.
2. Promising junior executives may well
be promoted to important positions in Brant
Corporation at some future date.
Wang decided to gather information about
the training programmes available and to present
them for discussion at a meeting with the
President of Bonhomme and two other head
office managers. At the meeting four possible
approaches to the problem are discussed.
.
Meeting – instructions
At the meeting each of you is for one of the possible approaches described below. You enact the meeting
in the examination room and should conclude with a decision on which approach you will choose.
You should also be prepared to answer questions from the examiners in connection with your meeting.
You may bring this task paper and notes taken during preparation into the examination room.
June 2002
1
Business English
Oral Examination
3
Four different approaches
Michael Chen, President
You suggest that Bonhomme should use the
services of the New Horizon Study Center, an
independent language school whose premises are
about two kilometres from Bonhomme’s office.
Established two years ago, the school is run by an
American who has constantly been sending
publicity material to John Wang.
It runs specialist English courses. The Director
has offered tailor-made, full- or part-time courses
for Bonhomme staff at his school. These courses
will be fairly expensive. The school at present has
no language laboratory.
John Wang, the Personnel Manager
You yourself feel that the company could start
in a modest fashion by appointing a full- time
English language instructor/administrator. This
person would be empowered to hire other parttime teachers when necessary.
The courses would be given on the company’s
premises, although there might be a few problems
finding suitable rooms, and they would be
developed slowly and steadily. Personnel
urgently needing training would be given priority
on the courses that were set up.
Tom Li, Sales Manager
You are in favour of an offer made by a
representative of a Swedish company some days
before. His company sells ultra-modern language
laboratories and complete audio-visual courses
for self-tuition.
You argue that Bonhomme are going to need
these one day, so the company might as well
invest in them now. The representative also
claims that the courses have been successful in
other Asian countries.
The sophisticated package he offers, which
includes the installation of a language laboratory,
is expensive, but seems good value for money.
Ada Zhang, Training Manager
You have a different approach to the problem.
You have visited the Shanghai office of the British
International Advisory Council and talked to the
English Language Training Adviser there.
He convinced you that since Brant considers
English language training to be a top priority,
Bonhomme should do things properly and send
staff on short, intensive courses to an Englishspeaking country – preferably Britain.
The British Council would offer advice on
suitable courses and provide a number of
contacts.
June 2002
2