Okay, so you’re understanding and speaking pretty well but you still feel your level is not where you want it to be. How do you keep working and making progress on your English?

This is a situation I encounter a lot particularly with business people who have a good level but still find themselves feeling uncomfortable about their English in pressured discussions, often when they are dealing with native speakers.

It can be a speed thing where the native speaker starts speaking faster when something important is being debated. Or it can be a cultural thing if there are several native speakers from the same country speaking at the same time. These two factors are probably the hardest to prepare someone for.

Perhaps it will give you some reassurance to know that even native speakers can feel a bit lost at times if they are mixing with native speakers from another country. There are just so many subtleties in conversation styles, sporting and cultural references that it’s impossible to always be following what’s being said 100% of the time. I think the best strategy is if you feel you missed something important say something like: “Sorry, you lost me there, what were you saying?” or “Sorry, could you repeat that”. The reaction will always be to then repeat the idea in a more straight forward way.

The key is to know when and how often to interrupt with a request to repeat information but you shouldn’t feel hesitant to do it a few times to remind the meeting participants that they need to be more considerate in their communication style.

Next blog: Phrasal verbs to help brush up your English