oh hey there i'm emma from m
english i've been getting lots of
requests for lessons that will help you
to expand your vocabulary and help you
to sound
more professional when speaking in
english
so that is exactly what this lesson is
all about today
i'm going to take some very common
everyday english verbs and improve them
a little
or give you some more impressive ones to
use instead
so if you're ready to do that stick
around
i want to jump in with a quick message
from our friends at lingoda to talk
about their
business english course and the fact
that they're offering
english students the chance to try their
classes
for free which i'll tell you about soon
anyone who studied business english will
tell you that it's quite different to
general
conversational english the language that
we use
at work tends to be more formal so for
anyone
studying english to advance their career
being able to communicate professionally
is going to help you to do that
luckily at lingoda not only can you
study french
spanish german and of course english
classes
they also have a specific business
english course
and what i love about this is that
you're studying alongside
other professionals focusing on the
english skills that you need to
communicate effectively
in your workplace like presentation
skills and interview skills
the skills that you need to help you
progress your career
and to succeed in an international
company like all lingoda courses classes
are available
24 7 and in small groups
when i was taking spanish classes with
lingoda we usually had
three or four students in each class
which was
awesome i had lots of speaking practice
business english classes with lingoda
will increase your fluency and your
confidence to use
english at work you can sign up for free
for seven days
and try up to three group classes which
is an
awesome way to see what the classes are
like before you decide to continue
or you can use this code down here and
get a 15
discount on your first month use the
link
down in the description and definitely
go check them out
let's think for a moment about the many
basic
functions that we do when we're at work
we think about things we make things
we change things we guess
we solve problems and we work together
now all of these words are good and they
will definitely help you to communicate
your message
but they're quite basic so if you want
to
sound impressive impress your boss sound
more professional with
colleagues and clients then upgrading
these words will definitely help
so let's start with the verb think
specifically to think of or to think
about
something to think about attending an
event
or asking for a raise now we can
upgrade this phrasal verb to consider
consider so instead of saying
i will think about your suggestion
say i will consider your suggestion
but i need to find some extra budget
before i approve it
we can also upgrade have you thought
about
employing have you
considered employing a marketing
assistant in-house
now if you're thinking about something
and the decision is
difficult for some reason it's also
important then using deliberate
is a much better choice deliberate
so it's also a synonym of think about
but it's used when you're making a
really tough decision and you've got to
take some
extra time to decide carefully
you've been deliberating all week on
this are you
any closer to a decision we also have
this idea of
thinking something is
i think ben is one of the best mentors
in our organization
but we can improve this by using the
verb
believe i believe ben is one of the best
mentors in our organization
so it sounds much surer more confident
and more
assertive we can also use consider
here as well but the structure changes a
little
so i want you to pay close attention to
what changes in this sentence
we can say i think or i believe ben is
but we can also say i consider
ben to be one of the best mentors in our
organization
so when you use this language it helps
you to speak with
authority to be more impressive more
confident
it really sounds like you know what
you're talking about
another really common verb to use at
work is
to make that's what we're there doing
isn't it we're
making stuff and there are lots of
different words that we can use
instead of make but it really does
depend on the context as to which one
you can use or you should use let's take
a look at this sentence and see
how we can improve it our team
made a report or wrote a report
can you think of a more professional
verb that you could use
instead
should we prepare a report for the board
our team has already produced a detailed
report
so these words prepare and produce are
almost synonyms prepare
prepare relates to the process
a little more and produce
produce relates a little more to the
result
so we often see the collocation
produce content prepare a report
these are useful ones to keep in mind to
create
is another verb upgrade on make right
especially when you're talking about
design or creative activities
really when you're making something new
you know
we're creating a new concept for the
client
can you create a new image that we can
share on social media
we created a design that will suit a
range of users
develop is another synonym for make
kind of leans a little more towards the
process
our technical team is developing a plan
to transition to our new platform
by may or even better a strategy
a strategy they're developing a strategy
we also develop ideas and we develop
solutions we're developing an affordable
solution that will make sure
every family can access high-speed
internet
so these are really important
collocations to keep in mind when you're
using these verbs
often the idea of change can be
perceived as
negative people don't usually like
change do they
often we talk about change at work
because we need to
fix something it suggests that there is
something wrong
so in a professional context it's
definitely important to make sure that
you're
polite and that you're using language in
a supportive way
and i've got some alternative words and
some useful expressions that will help
you with that
and modify is a really good alternative
modify modify suggests
minor changes tweaks and adjustments
and things that will improve the result
actually
you could also use the verb adjust
adjust if it's okay with you i'll adjust
this a little before we send it to the
client
now when you're talking about changing
ideas or
human behavior then adapt is a really
good choice
especially when there is a new situation
or
a new set of circumstances that's behind
that change
again nobody really likes change do they
but if you can
use a more positive verb to help talk
about that change then it's much easier
to get other people
on board right the new regulations are
tough
there's not much that we can do about it
we just need to adapt
and keep moving forward the word
transition
is an excellent one to begin using and
to understand
because it helps us to talk about the
need for change
and the process of changing in a
comfortable way
so if we transition from one thing to
another
it suggests that we sort of move
carefully you know it's not
instant change which usually scares
people
if we talk about transition it suggests
that the change is going to be
gradual and carefully considered we want
to make sure that our new team members
transition into their new roles as
seamlessly as possible
although many of us try not to admit it
we all
guess what the heck is going on right
it's part of solving problems
and reducing risk is taking a guess
and there are so many great words that
will help you to sound
more intelligent and more professional
when you have to take a guess
we all do right but sometimes using
guests suggests that you're a little
uncertain you know and in a professional
context it can make you seem
uninformed or unprepared
so using estimate suggests that
you've put some thought into this
prediction or this guess
right estimate estimate
it's difficult to estimate the financial
impact for families
now calculate is a really good option
when you're talking about
specific numbers you calculate
we calculate that this will save three
thousand dollars a month
now we have a slightly different word
form here but you can express the same
idea by saying
by our calculations we will save
three thousand dollars a month when
you're thinking about
why something happened or you're
considering what might happen in the
future
then speculate is a great word
to speculate to speculate
so usually we say speculate on or
speculate about something
i don't want to speculate on why he
resigned so suddenly
and predict is another great synonym
for guests predict
predict so it's used when you're taking
information that you have
and you're making a call or a decision
about the most likely outcome
industry experts are predicting
significant changes to our working
environments
post-pandemic it is
difficult to talk positively about
problems right
when things aren't going so well or
maybe they've been
a little more difficult than you
anticipated
so what words can you use instead of
problem which does kind of have a
negative
feeling about it doesn't it or we can
say
challenge we can say complication
obstacle these are all possible
replacements right
in a professional context we want to
make sure that we
communicate any problems that we have
clearly
but also do it in a way that makes it
sound like you have solutions or you
have a plan to keep things under control
we overcame several obstacles before we
landed on the result
we anticipate some technical challenges
but we're confident that we've got the
right team in place to deal with them
we even talk about problems as
headaches or hiccups these are
a little less formal ways of expressing
it but they definitely help to emphasize
that the problem is not so
serious you know or that they're
problems that can be managed they're
just annoying
i can see how these changes could create
some headaches for the sales team
but we're working on a solution there
were a few hiccups with the new ordering
system on friday
but things have been much smoother this
week
and lastly if you work in an office as
part of a team it's very likely that you
work together with other people to get
things done right
we work together we work as a team
but just to clarify we do not
do a teamwork all right this is a
very common mistake that a lot of my
students make
teamwork is a noun and we never use it
with
do okay we don't do a teamwork and a
much
more professional way to explain that
you're working together
with someone else or with other people
is to say that you
collaborate collaborate
i'm looking forward to collaborating on
projects with you in the future
now if you really want to emphasize that
two people
or maybe two teams with different skill
sets
um or sets of expertise are coming
together
to work together we say that they're
joining
forces they join forces
and this is quite powerful when our
development team joined forces with our
product
team they created something amazing
so there you have it i really hope that
you found a few
new expressions to expand your
vocabulary range a little
make sure that you keep these words
beside you at work during this week
and see if you can apply them you know
if you're writing an email
make sure you stop before you hit send
to try and upgrade some of the language
that you're using to sound more
professional and more helpful
now you know i like to set a little
challenge at the end of my lessons
and that's because just watching my
lessons
isn't really enough is it you've got to
put into practice
what you've been learning and it's only
going to take you a few minutes
so hit the pause button right now and
write a short paragraph using
at least five of the professional words
that i shared
during this lesson i'm really excited to
get down there and
check them out to give you some feedback
make sure you're using them correctly
but in the meantime i've got this lesson
right here ready for you to continue
practicing with me
so i'll see you in there