Ukrainian academy of banking of the NBU, Ukraine
O.M. Medvid
Sumy state university, Ukraine
Business
English Course Design: How to Meet Employers’ Expectations
Recent achievements in the process of unification of Europe have made
the conditions for social and human growth an increasingly concrete and
relevant reality not only for the Union and its citizens, but also for all
European countries. The creation of the European higher education area , where national identities and common
interests can interact and strengthen each other for the benefit of Europe ,
its citizens has led to an urgent need to develop new policies concerning
language teaching/learning and to
improve students language competences. The Commission of the European
Community( (Brussels,2013) has defined key areas for action : improving
and extending lifelong language learning; making foreign language teaching more
effective; creating a more language friendly environment.
Ukraine can not neglect the political and cultural importance of these
developments or stand aside from the general interactive tendencies in European
education. Recognition of the merits of integration into European education
structures, and of making our education standards correspond to the European
ones, facilitates Ukrainian and European cultural integration, and open broader
professional and academic career horizons for university graduates.
The
development of an ESP Curriculum (2005) with the approval of the Ministry of
Education and Science was a response to these international developments with
an aim to provide benchmarks for teachers and learners in line with the levels
identified in the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) and to provide
a standardised basis for course and syllabus design by teachers of English at
the faculty level in universities throughout Ukraine.
The National ESP Curriculum states, that the overall aim of an ESP
course is to develop learners’ professional language competences, enabling them
to function effectively in culturally diverse academic and professional
environments (1, 33). As our students are majoring in Banking and Finance we
tried to analyse these markets with an aim to identify employers expectations
in this sector and to tailor Business English course we run to meet them. Thus, the article
will focus firstly, on job requirements in this sector and, secondly, on the
approaches which can be applied to design an ESP course.
The financial world in Ukraine is going through a period of profound
change: banking institutions are restructuring; recruiting and training
policies are being modified in view of the need to reduce the size of the
workforce; new technologies are affecting working methods; competition between
sectors is increasing. This has made it difficult for universities to react
rapidly to these changes and to incorporate them in teaching/learning process.
When you say the words ‘banking and finance’ to students, few of them
have any notion of what it really means. More over, many of bank employees whom
I spoke to about their profession said ” I’d no idea what would be involved ’’,
”I’d seldom given banking or finance a thought”, “ I was never any good at
maths”. But here they are , people from different backgrounds, all coping with
and enjoying the work. Some had been drawn to it because it seemed to promise
security and attractive fringe benefits, others liked the team work and
customer contact, and those in career posts welcomed the intellectual
challenge, the responsibility they shouldered, the opportunities for promotion
on merit, not on length of service. A lesson should be learnt from this
situation by University teachers to equip students with
competencies and strategies needed to succeed in their job and as a result to
facilitate their mobility and competitiveness in this particular area in the
job market. To this end a close cooperation between educational and financial
institutions seem to be very useful.
The analysis of the job market shows that the employers seek a range of
skills and qualities from graduate applicants, which are often referred to as
transferable or core skills. A recent survey into skills sought by graduate
recruiters listed the top of these as:
·
willingness to learn(commitment to life-long
learning);
·
dependability/reliability;
·
team work/co-operation;
·
communication skills (oral and written);
·
drive/energy;
·
self-management;
·
desire to achieve/motivation;
·
problem-solving ability;
·
adaptability and flexibility.
The work in finance also calls for a methodical
approach, accuracy and attention to detail. Intense competition in the
financial sector is leading individual banks to look for marketing and sales
staff who have commercial awareness and who are able to think creatively. All
staff, whether or not they deal directly with the public, are expected to
identify opportunities to sell products and services, and those who are in the
front line will find that selling is an integral part of their job.
Most important of all are the character traits
needed for specialists in Banking and Finance. They will be handling peoples
money and be privy to a lot of confidential information. All staff have to be
honest, trustworthy and discreet and to demonstrate a sense of responsibility-
in other words, possess complete professional integrity.(3,p.11-12; 2)
Graduates are given responsibility early in their careers and must, therefore,
be equal to tough negotiating, high-level client contact, and contact with
other professionals such as lawyers and accountants. Some branches of the work,
eg. corporate finance, generate a lot
of paperwork and call for the ability to grasp essentials and get the details
right. Imagination, diligence and flexibility are important quality in any
candidate, and fluency in foreign languages is an asset.
Thus, the courses which universities provide,
should give students an opportunity to develop qualities
and competencies needed to be effective in their job, to facilitate their individual adaptability and competitiveness in the job
market. As English language proficiency is viewed to be one of the essential
ingredients of professional competence for students majoring in Business,
before designing our own Business English course, we carried out a thorough
needs analysis to be sure that the requirements and characteristics of a
particular specialism were met.
The objectives of the Curriculum acted as a resource for us, they are
compatible with those of the Common European Framework of Reference and those
determined by Ukrainian National Education Qualification Standards. Assessment of the end-of-course learning
outcomes were based on the same Curriculum objectives, after having been
adapted to the specific academic and/or professional environments in the
university to meet our learners’ specific needs and employers expectations. Let
us have a closer look at the ESP Syllabus which is designed for students of
Economics and Business with B1+ proficiency level on entry. Taking into account
international practices in language education at tertiary level, and the number
of hours allotted to an ESP course, the syllabus states that the minimal
acceptable English proficiency level to qualify for a Bachelor’s degree is B2
(Independent User).
The ‘benchmarks’ for this ESP syllabus level are based on the
descriptors, introduced by the Common European Framework of Reference for
Languages (2001); requirements of the educational and qualification
characteristics of graduates adopted by the Ministry of Education and Science
of Ukraine; specific job descriptors developed and validated by businesses, and
organisations and findings of the National ESP Curriculum for Universities
(2005).
The aims of the syllabus are derived from the ESP Core
Curriculum and adjusted to the needs of the
specialism. The Syllabus may be realized through the following set of aims:
• Practical: to develop students'
general and professionally - oriented communicative language competences (linguistic, sociolinguistic,
and pragmatic) in Business English to enable them to communicate effectively in
their academic and
professional environment.
•
Cognitive: to expose students to academic activities
that draw on and further develop the full range of their cognitive abilities.
•
Educational:
to foster the ability to self-evaluate and a capacity for autonomous learning
which will enable students
to continue to learn in academic and professional situations before and beyond
graduation.
•
Developmental:
to help students form general competences to develop their personal motivation
(values, ideals, etc.); to foster students'
confidence as users of the language and their positive attitudes and feelings towards learning the target language for
professional communication.
•
Social:
to facilitate and develop students' critical self-awareness and interpersonal
skills and to contribute meaningfully to the changing international environment.
• Socio-cultural: to develop a
broad understanding of important and different international socio-cultural issues in order to operate
appropriately in culturally diverse professional and academic environment.
Objectives for the development of students language skills (listening, speaking, reading,
writing), study skills, socio-linguistic and pragmatic competence were
also formulated in compliance with the ESP Curriculum.
As can be seen from the above specified objectives, language policy of
the Ukrainian Academy of Banking of the
NBU is in line with the European one. The compulsory syllabuses include
a two-year course of Business English, German or French
with 5 credits of general duration of study and
cover the main generic job-related skills .They are followed by elective courses covering different modules based
on students’ needs and preferences in particular areas. The order and balance of modules in the course is arranged according to
the students’ needs and can be the following:
·
Establishing Business Contacts
·
Telephoning
·
Effective Presentations
·
Reading for Professional/Academic
Purposes
·
Written Communication for Business
·
Effective Meetings
·
Effective Negotiations
·
Career in Business, etc.
We hope that this approach to course organization can increase
students’ motivation and facilitate their mobility and competitiveness in the
job market.
This ESP syllabus encourages life-long
learning and autonomy. It is obvious that learning a foreign language,
especially in the European context, reaches far beyond compulsory education.
The active use of procedural knowledge (‘learning to learn’) is the basis for
efficient and autonomous life-long learning of languages after academy. So the
development of this procedural knowledge is an essential objective of the
developers of this syllabus. We intend to work with the European Language
Portfolio for economists (3) within the framework of hours allotted to
individual work. The Portfolio has
been successfully piloted by some teachers of our department and its practical
effectiveness was demonstrated. The pedagogic function of it is to make the
language learning process more transparent for students to help them develop
their capacity for reflection and self-assessment, and thus enable them
gradually to assume more responsibility for their own learning.
The
European Language Portfolio for economists has been developed according to the
recommendations of
the Education Committee of the Council of Europe on modern language learning, teaching and assessment, the requirements of
educational and qualification characteristics of economists adopted by Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and
on the basis of a survey carried out
among professional economists, teachers of higher educational institutions and
students of economic departments. It is a set of documents which assists
students (the owners of the
Portfolio) to collect, systematize their own achievements and present their own
target language proficiency. It contains examples of completed tasks and
certificates awarded.
Information in the
European Language Portfolio for economists is intended not only for the owner of the Portfolio and
teachers, as it shows students progress in language learning, but also for employers, if the owner of the
Portfolio is being considered for a job.
To sum up, the above mentioned approaches to the ESR
course design demonstrate the responsiveness of higher education institutions
to changing job market and environment. Initiatives are largely based on strong
perceptions of the need for professionals, who are able to work in a
co-operative context with people from different national and cultural
backgrounds, be effective in their job and competitive in the job market.To this end a close cooperation between educational and financial institutions
seem to be very useful.
Literature
1. English for Specific Purposes (ESP) National Curriculum for Universities.
Êîëåêòèâ àâòîð³â: Ã. ª. Áàêàºâà, Î.À.Áîðèñåíêî, ².². Çóºíîê, Â.Î. ²âàí³ùåâà,
Ë.É. Êëèìåíêî, Ò.². Êîçèìèðñüêà, Ñ.². Êîñòðèöüêà, Ò.². Ñêðèïíèê, Í.Þ. Òîäîðîâà,
À.Î. Õîäöåâà. – Ê.: Ëåíâ³ò, 2005 – 119 ñ.
2. The University of Nottingham Business School: MBA Programmes, Course
Guide-2013. - 219 p.
3.
Snelgar, David. Careers in Banking
and Finance. -Kogan Page: Careers series,1995 -112p.
4. ªâðîïåéñüêèé Ìîâíèé Ïîðòôåëü äëÿ åêîíîì³ñò³â. Óêëàäà÷
Í.Â.
ßãåëüñüêà. -Ê.: Ëåíâ³ò, 2004.-56ñ.
5. Brieger N. and J. Comfort. Developing Business Contacts.- Prentice Hall
International English Language Teaching, 1993-185p.
6. Comfort, Jeremy (1997) Effective Presentations. Oxford: Oxford
University Press,1997-213p.