I B Person Work Manager Talk Talking Matt

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What ever company you work for, you will have a boss or a manager. If you are a manager, you will have directs reporting to you. And in most cases, you will have to work with co-workers. This lesson will cover the English you need to know to speak to co-workers. I will also have a lesson on talking to the manager and subordinates.

When you talk with a co-worker, most of it is small talk. You can talk about your background, what school you attended, your major, and your previous work experience. So studying the English lessons along side the business section will help you for your daily English needs. However, I'll have some sentences you can use when you are talking with a co-worker.

If you miss a meeting, then you will need to ask a co-worker what happened during the meeting.

I missed the meeting. Can you fill me in?"
I had a doctor's appointment so I missed the meeting. What happened?"
I couldn't make it to the meeting today. Anything interesting I should know about?"
I missed the meeting. Was there anything new?"

Another time you talk with a co-worker is if the boss is mad or you don't like the boss. But whenever you talk about bad things with co-workers, make sure you are talking to a friend. If that person is not a friend, then they might tell your manager what you said.

Matt looks pretty upset right now. Do you know what's going on?"
Did something happen recently? Matt looks pissed off."
I think Matt is mad about something. Do you know what it could be?"

Or if the manager only treats you bad, then you can ask your co-worker/friend if the manager treats them differently or the same.

Matt talks to me like he is mad all the time. Does he do that to you?"
Does Matt talk to you like he is upset? Or is it just me?"
It's not you at all. He talks to me that way too."

Matt is way too moody."
If he knew what he was doing, we wouldn't be in this mess."

What is wrong with Matt these days?"
He is having one of those days again. I think his manager just gave him a hard time."

What do you think about our manager?"
He gets too mad easily and he doesn't really help us out that much. What do you think?"

Asking for help or offering help

When you offer to help someone, you are asking your co-worker if they want to give you some of their work. Here are a couple of ways you can offer some help.

I finished my project already so I have extra bandwidth. Let me know if you need help with anything."

Bandwidth is usually used as a networking terminology. But in this context, it means having extra time.

You're doing the analysis on ABC Company? I did that last year. If you need any help, just let me know."

I'm pretty familiar with your project so if you have any questions, feel free to ask me."

Asking for help is a little more difficult. You will have to see what the work environment is like and what type of relationship you have with your co-workers.

I'm having trouble implementing Plan A on ABC Company. Can you look at my work and see if I am missing a step?"

Can you help me analyze the finance data? This is my first time and I don't want to screw it up."

Do you have a few minutes to help me with the data migration tool? I can't figure it out."

Complaining about another co-worker to a co-worker

I remember in my first job, I had a co-worker I really didn't like. He was a nice guy, but he was a complete idiot. To vent out my frustration, I talked with some closer co-workers about my problems with him. Here are some of the things I said. You might be in a similar situation of dealing with a complete idiot.

Have you worked with Jake yet? He can't do anything right."
The problem with Jake is that he doesn't know that he is an idiot."
I remember helping Jake out so much, and then he stabs my back."
I don't think he does his own work. He goes around asking everyone to do a portion of his work and says he did it all."

If you have to work with Jake, remember the things I told you."
Is management blind or am I being too sensitive about this?"
I think the manager likes him because he kisses her ass all day long."

Kissing ass refers to butt kiss and brown nosing. Basically, a person who butt kisses is a person always saying good things to the manager, giving compliments, showing off in front of the manager, and doing anything possible to look good.

The manager is blind because he is a total brown-noser."

I can't believe this company is paying $75,000 a year for this fool."

Complaining about the company

As I already said previously, make sure you are careful who you talk to when you are complaining about anything such as the company.

This is a dead end job. I don't see much of a future here."
I hate the redundancy. It's so boring."
Work isn't exciting for me anymore. I am doing the same thing over and over again."

This company doesn't care about employees that much. I haven't received a fair raise in 3 years."

I don't know if it is my manager or this company, but I'm really getting sick of my job."

What do you think about all the politics in this company?"
The politics suck here. But it is the same for any large corporation. The best way to deal with it is to take advantage of the rules."

I heard in some countries that switching companies is not common. Once you have a decent job in a decent company, the person usually works there all their life. In the States however, changing jobs and changing companies is very common. That makes it a common discussion to have with friends and co-workers.

I don't know how much longer I can take this job. I've been thinking about applying to a different company."
Have you ever thought about leaving this company?"
What company do you want to switch to?"

I started applying for other jobs. There are a lot of positions open."
I've been looking for jobs on monster.com. They have a lot of positions available."

Talking about work experience

I won't cover topics we have in our regular English lessons, but talking about work experience is not a separate topic I have, so let's spend a few minutes here.

When you are talking to a co-worker, you can talk about many different things. One of the topics might be previous work experience. Whenever you receive this question, the easiest way to answer this is to say where you worked and what you did.

What did you do before working here?"

I worked at ABC Company. I was a market analyst researching what the user wants in portable devices."

I was over in the sales department on the second floor. I was in charge of overseeing the sales made by all the sales associates each month."

I was a software engineer at Sun Microsystems. I created internal tools using Java to help automate the recruiting process."

Talking to CoWorkers - Interactive Practice

Click on Listen All and follow along. After becoming comfortable with the entire conversation, become Person A by clicking on the Person A button. You will hear only Person B through the audio file. There will be a silence for you to repeat the sentences of Person A. Do the same for Person B. The speed of the conversation is native speed. Use the pause button if the pause between each sentence is too fast for you. After practicing several times, you will be able to speak as fast as a native.