Lesson 3. Reacting to suggestions

Warm up

I. Do you have any colleagues with the following habits?

· They make personal calls in a loud voice.

· They arrive late and leave early.

· They never return items they borrow.

· They use bad language all the time.

· Their only subject of conversation is their children (any other variant).

· They waste time and never get anything done.

· They smoke continuously.

· They never pay for drinks or meals when you go out.

II. Which of the habits do you find most annoying?

III. How could you deal with these colleagues?

Active Vocabulary

When we react to a suggestion, we often suggest specific action, or propose a possible alternative for action. Look at the expressions used to react to the following suggestion.	Everyone in the office seems a bit down. Why don't we all go out together? That's a good idea... ... We could have dinner and then go out dancing. ... Let's start planning it right now. ... It would be even better if the company paid for a party! ... Shall we put up a poster?
Shall is used with we and I, especially in British English. It is often used to make suggestions along with let's.	Shall we leave now? Yes, let's / let's go.
When we reject a suggestion, we normally give a reason.	Mm, I'm not so sure about that... …It might make things worse. ... I think people would prefer a bonus to a night out.

Listening

Look at the extracts from the conversations. Complete them with the useful phrases for reacting to suggestions.

1. No, _______________________ do that. It would be really embarrassing.

2. No, I'm ___________________________that's such a good idea.

She is the boss ______________________!

3. OK, that ___________________, I suppose.

4. What _____________________! I'll do that next time he calls.

Speaking

Imagine you have to deal with the following situations, in which you have to give feedback.

Plan what you will say.

a) you share an office with a colleague who often goes out, without telling you for how long. When clients phone, you are unable to tell them when to call back. What suggestions can you give your colleague?

b) one of your staff, who often visits clients, insists on wearing jeans at work, despite the office dress code which states “no jeans”. You feel it is necessary to discuss it formally with the staff member.

Writing

Read the following email and suggest ways the supervisor could deal with the problems in the department. Role-play a conversation to follow the email, with you as Charlie and your partner as Sam. Reply to the email with your own ideas.

Lesson 4. Praise

Warm up

I. In what circumstances do you praise colleagues at work?

II. Do you find giving praise or receiving praise more difficult? Why?

III. What is your approach for giving negative feedback to colleagues?

Listening

I. Listen to three situations where someone is giving praise. In each dialogue 1-3, what did someone do well? What has happened as a result?

What did they do well?	Result
1)
2)
3)

II. Look at the extracts from the conversations. Complete them with the useful phrases for giving praise from listening the script. Then listen again and check your answers.

1. I'd just like to say I'm ___________________________how successful our stand was...

2. Jane, you ___________________get such a good location.

3. Well ___________________, Jane.

4. I want to tell you ___your presentation yesterday. You did a ________________________ .

5. I really ______________________________included the customer stories.

6. Anyway, they love it - you_____________________ very well.

Speaking

Role-play the following situations to practice giving praise. Before you begin, decide how you will introduce the topic, and what specific aspect(s) you will praise.

1 Boss to employee - praise for a report.

2 Boss to employee - praise on winning a large new contract.

3 Colleague to colleague - praise for the new company website.

Writing

1) One of your colleagues has just returned from an international conference, where they represented your company. You hear that their presentation went very well. As you are working from home, you decide to drop them an email to congratulate them.

2) You are the boss of a small retail store. A new member of staff noticed that somebody was regularly stealing from you, and by reporting it to you has saved you a lot of money. Write a letter to the member of staff, praising them and telling them the results of their action.

Lesson 5. Compromise

Warm up

Compromise/komprsmaiz/ when people are arguing, they make an agreement called a compromise by giving up part of what they want

· Do you often have to reach compromise in your job, studying?

· Think of an occasion when you solved a disagreement or problem by compromising.

Active Vocabulary

When trying to reach a compromise, we often discuss the effects of possible actions or events on the situation. In order to do this, conditional sentences are often used:

If I had the chance.

If we bought 10,000 of them,...

I would make a lot of changes if I had the chance.

If we bought 10,000 of them, we'd have storage problems.

If I were you, I wouldn't accept that offer.

If I agreed to those conditions, would it affect my pension?

Would it affect my pension if I agreed to those conditions?

Lexical exercises

Match the two halves of the sentences:

Would they accept the offer	we'd leave the company.
Our rent would be lower	would you agree to pay sooner?
If I were you,	I'd apologize for my mistake.
If we gave you a 10% discount,	if we included transport costs?
If our boss expected us to work overtime,	if we employed more staff?
Would people start leaving	if we moved out of the centre.

Listening

I. Derek is the owner of a chain of Turkish restaurants in Ireland. The manager of one of the restaurants is a Turkish woman called Ayse. She wants to talk to Derek about something important. Read this summary of the first part of the dialogue. Then listen to the dialogue and correct the text where it is wrong.

Ayse wants to talk to Derek, her boss, because today she's received a letter from her family in Turkey, saying there's a problem at home and they need her to come home for three or four days. Derek seems to understand her problem and it's a busy week.