COMMUNICATION COMPETENCIES
Leadership and Influence
High-stakes communication, where the cost of misunderstanding is greatest.
17 Competencies
01
Effective Communication Fundamentals
Be yourself in your second language. Communicate with clarity and nuance whatever
the listener or situation.
Effective Communication Fundamentals
This core program is often the first step after a diagnostic. It develops the language and strategies you need to respond with intention rather than simply translate your thoughts.
You’ll learn to adapt to your listener, share your perspective, navigate agreement and disagreement, and resolve misunderstandings while maintaining confidence and authenticity.
In this program, help you develop the words, phrases and communication strategies you need.
In this program, help you develop the words, phrases and communication strategies you need.
We work with you on:
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Choose the right tone, level of detail and degree of directness
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Structure your message for impact and clarity
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Express and support your opinions
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Agree and disagree with tact
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Soften requests, feedback and difficult messages
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Ask for clarification and confirm meaning
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Move naturally between casual and formal communication
02
Presenting with Impact
Deliver presentations that land, with confidence at every turn.
Presenting with Impact
From a five-minute team update to a conference keynote. Structure, signposting, data description and vocal delivery.
We work with you on:
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Signposting language and structure cues
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Describing data, trends and comparisons
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Handling unexpected questions without losing composure
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Vocal delivery: pacing, stress and pausing
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Rehearsing your actual upcoming presentation
03
Negotiation & Sales Communication
Steer the deal with clarity and conviction, at every stage.
Negotiation & Sales Communication
For sales teams, buyers and anyone whose second language sits between them and a signature. Discovery, value framing, objection handling and the closing language that asks for the decision without pushing for it.
We work with you on:
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Framing value before price
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Hedging and softening language for counter-offers
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Reading and responding to hesitation
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Closing language that doesn't sound pushy
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Holding your position when the pressure rises
04
Business Storytelling & Persuasion
Make the case stick, long after the slide is gone.
Business Storytelling & Persuasion
For anyone who has to move a decision, not just deliver information. Structuring a narrative, using evidence and example, and building an argument in your second language that survives the room's skepticism, where instinct is harder to rely on.
We work with you on:
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Structuring a narrative that leads to a decision
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Estructurar un relato que conduzca a una decisión
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Usar los datos como evidencia, no como adorno
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Usar los datos como evidencia, no como adorno
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Opening and closing lines that land
05
Language for Business & Personal Travel
Travel with confidence for work or pleasure—from airport check-in to client dinners and local experiences.
Language for Business & Personal Travel
For professionals travelling internationally for business or in their personal time. Communicate the entire journey with confidence—from airports, hotels and transportation to restaurants, business events and unexpected situations.
We work with you on the words, phrases and communication strategies you need.
We work with you on the words, phrases and communication strategies you need.
We work with you on:
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Navigate airports, hotels and local transportation
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Make requests and resolve problems while travelling
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Connect at client dinners and business events
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Manage restaurants, shopping and sightseeing
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Ask for directions and seek local recommendations
06
Leadership Communication
Lead your team with clarity, calm and authority in any language.
Leadership Communication
For managers, directors and executives who set direction in a second language. We work on the register that carries authority without harshness —
delegating, explaining decisions, motivating, and sharing critical feedback.
We work with you on:
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Delegating without a micromanaging tone
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Framing decisions and rationale transparently
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Motivational and vision-setting language
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Communicating difficult news (restructuring, setbacks)
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Holding authority in a language that isn't your first
07
Executive Presence & Stakeholder Communication
Command the room you're in and the ones you report into.
Executive Presence & Stakeholder Communication
For senior professionals who are competent in their file but lose ground in the room. Presence, concision and composure under scrutiny — briefing boards, executive committees, investors and regulators when every word is weighed.
We work with you on:
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Briefing a board or executive committee
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Answering hard questions without over-explaining
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Concision: making the point in ninety seconds
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Projecting composure under scrutiny
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Managing up to leaders and stakeholders
08
Change & Crisis Communication
Say the difficult thing early, clearly, and only once.
Change & Crisis Communication
For leaders and HR teams communicating restructuring, mergers, AI-driven change or an incident in progress. Language that reduces rumour rather than feeding it, holds up when repeated, and stays consistent across languages.
We work with you on:
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Announcing change before the rumour does
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Holding a consistent message across audiences
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Bilingual messaging that says the same thing twice
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Answering the questions people are afraid to ask
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Communicating during an incident in real time
09
Cross-Cultural Influence
Influence with instinct, across every culture in the room.
Cross-Cultural Influence
For teams working across borders and head offices.Persuasion styles differ by culture: what reads as confident in New York reads as aggressive in Tokyo and as vague in Paris. We calibrate directness, pacing and credibility signals to the audience in front of you.
We work with you on:
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Direct and indirect persuasion styles
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Building credibility through language choices
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Reading unspoken cues in multicultural meetings
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Adapting pitch and pacing to the audience
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Working with head office in another country
10
Customer Service & De-escalation
Turn a tough call into a five-star review
Customer Service & De-escalation
For frontline and customer-facing teams serving clients in their second language. Handling complaints, refusals and escalations without stiffening into script and knowing the exact phrases that lower the temperature instead of raising it.
We work with you on:
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De-escalation phrases and tone control
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Saying no while keeping the relationship
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Explaining a policy without hiding behind it
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Handling complaints in the client's language
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Knowing when to escalate, and how to hand off
11
Client Relationships & Networking
Turn small talk into accounts that renew.
Client Relationships & Networking
For account managers, consultants and business developers whose relationships are built in a second language. The unscripted part of the job —
conferences, coffees, follow-ups and the check-in that keeps a client warm between contracts.
We work with you on:
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Small talk that doesn't feel forced
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Finding common ground and follow-up questions
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Following up after an event or introduction
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Maintaining the relationship between contracts
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Hosting clients and industry events
12
Leading & Facilitating Meetings
Lead meetings with confidence and control in your second language , from open to close.
Leading & Facilitating Meetings
The highest-frequency communication task in any
organization, and the one where a second language costs the most time. Framing, redirecting, summarizing and closing — including the diplomatic work of managing the person who won't stop talking.
We work with you on:
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Framing an agenda and setting expectations
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Language for redirecting and keeping to time
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Summarizing decisions and assigning next steps
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Managing dominant or silent participants
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Interrupting and holding the floor politely
13
Virtual & Hybrid Collaboration
Command the call, even without the room.
Virtual & Hybrid Collaboration
Most second-language work now happens on a screen, where the cues that helped you are gone. Turn-taking without body language, tone when your voice is the only signal, and including the people who dialled in from somewhere else.
We work with you on:
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Managing turn-taking without visual cues
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Tone control when your voice is the only signal
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Handling audio problems and interruptions gracefully
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Including remote participants in a hybrid room
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Structuring calls: agenda, recap, next steps
14
Giving & Receiving Feedback
Deliver feedback that lands, and receive it with grace.
Giving & Receiving Feedback
For managers and team members in bilingual workplaces, where feedback softened by a second language often stops registering as feedback at all. Structure, calibrated softening, and the cultural norms that decide how direct is too direct.
We work with you on:
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Structuring constructive feedback (situation, impact, ask)
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Softening critique without diluting the message
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Receiving feedback and asking clarifying questions
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Cultural calibration: direct versus indirect norms
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Performance conversations and reviews
15
Business Writing in the AI Era
Write with judgment, not just with AI.
Business Writing in the AI Era
Your team already writes with AI. The risk has moved from bad grammar to fluent text that is subtly wrong in tone, too formal, too blunt, or culturally off — and to the writer who can no longer tell. We train the editing judgment, and the
unassisted writing that real-time work still demands.
We work with you on:
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Prompting AI for tone, formality and audience
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Editing AI drafts that are too formal or too blunt
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Knowing when a message needs your own voice
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Writing unassisted in real time (chat, quick replies)
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Emails, reports and documentation that hold up
16
Interviewing & Hiring
Run the interview, or win it, in your second language.
Interviewing & Hiring
Two audiences, one skill set. For hiring managers and HR: structured interviewing, probing questions and assessing a candidate fairly across a language gap. For professionals: answering behavioural questions and framing achievements without sounding boastful or too modest.
We work with you on:
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Structured interviewing and probing follow-up questions
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Assessing competencies fairly across a language gap
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Answering behavioural questions (STAR vocabulary)
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Framing achievements without sounding boastful
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Extending an offer and negotiating final terms
17
Pronunciation & Intelligibility
Be understood without repeating yourself.
Pronunciation & Intelligibility
Not accent elimination — intelligibility. We target the specific sounds, stress patterns and rhythms that make listeners ask you to repeat, and the
comprehension side too: fast speech, unfamiliar accents and idioms on a client call. Your accent stays; the friction goes.
We work with you on:
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Word stress, sentence rhythm and intonation
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The sounds that actually cause misunderstanding
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Understanding fast speech and unfamiliar accents
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Diagnostic recording and a targeted sound inventory
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Idioms and colloquialisms in real time