Professional Business Communications

Watch out for those endings!

Whenever I work with new clients who are from China, Vietnam or Taiwan, the first think I notice is that it is hard to understand them mainly because they leave off the endings of the words, speak in continuous present tense and swallow some of the in-between syllables of words.

1. When you say a word, be conscious that there is a /t/ or an /m/ at the end. Without these consonants, words such as /about/, /time/ will not be understood.

2. When you speak about someone and say, "he needs, she challenges, he compares", if you leave out the /s/, it makes you a really unsophisticated speaker. While people will no doubt understand you, you are not functioning at your [probably high] educational level. Unfortunately, English speakers around you will assume you don't understand [your English is not up to par] either and might not seek you out with new, complicated ideas.

3. You know that you are capable of writing in the past tense, now you have to develop the discipline of speaking in past tense as well.
Is is confusing to listen to someone speak in one tense only - the present tense -, you never really know what has already happened and what is the current situation.

4. Realize that English words are divided into syllables. So, /usually/ is /u/zhu/a/lly/, and you have to say all the syllables and not pull them together.
The same goes for /actually/, it has 4 syllables; if you make it into a 3 syllable word, people won't understand you unless you say it so often, they figure it out.

5. Be conscious of how you speak. If you take one item a day - say, put all the /s/ at the end of the words/ - you listen to how you speak AND correct yourself, you will improve. It takes discipline, but it will make you a better speaker.