Monthly Archives: July 2008

BEP 113 ADV (Study Notes) – Second Round Job Interviews

Continuing our series on job interviews, this podcast focuses on what happens when you made a good impression in the first round and get asked back for a second interview.

We’ll study how to demonstrate that we are a good match with an organization. In addition, we’ll review some other useful second round interview skills, such as summarizing the previous discussion and referring to something you forgot to mention earlier.

We’ll listen to Sherry’s second interview with a big international accounting firm, Grimshaw and Keene (commonly referred to as GK.) The interviewer is George Tan, an Asia-Pacific key account manager.
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BEP 112 ADV (Study Notes) – Negotiations: Getting Started

In this Business English Podcast episode, we’ll study how to open a traditional commercial negotiation between buyer and seller. We’ll focus on creating goodwill, starting off, setting ground rules, suggesting an agenda and exploring possibilities.

We’ll be listening to a telephone conversation between Tony, a supplier of building materials, and Paul, a purchasing manager for a large construction company in Canada. Paul is buying materials for a harbor project. A harbor is a protected area of water where boats dock, or park. For this project, Paul needs to buy anchor bolts. These bolts are the thick steel screws that are embedded or buried in concrete to support or anchor structural steel columns. Structural columns refer to the steel frameworks that hold buildings up.
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BEP 111 ADV (Study Notes) – Negotiations: Building Relationships

This podcast is part of an ongoing series on negotiation skills for ESL. Throughout the series we’ll follow two scenarios: The first will look at a more strategic style of negotiation involving a proposed merger between two telecoms providers and the second will focus on a simpler, bargaining style negotiation between a purchasing agent and an industrial supplier.

In this episode, based on the first scenario, we’re going to look at the importance of building relationships between both parties. In negotiation, establishing a good relationship based on trust makes it possible to jointly search for creative solutions, to overcome blockage and even to turn conflict into a productive force.
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