Adding pragmatics to training: Example lesson

It's great that the field of pragmatics is getting so much attention in Business English at the moment.  I see the Chua Suan Chong gave a presentation on the topic at IATEFL Manchester. And over the last several years, I have been talking with Ed Pegg from The London School of English about the issue, especially as it pertains to the soft-skills aspects of his training.  We see it as an important aspect of the training and perhaps something which is either misunderstood or under-represented in training.

In fact, I am not completely clear about how to integrate the 'meaning derived from context' into my training.  I am not educated as a linguist and my knowledge in pragmatics is less than expert to say the least.  Luckily, I have access to the Journal of Pragmatics, but my general thinking comes from Steven Pinker.

But I decided to give it a try with a controlled scenario and topic... namely giving tasks to others and politeness.  This is a good situation because the situation is easily identifiable and there are normally only two people involved.  Second, forms of politeness are probably the simplest form of altering language to fit the relationship and situation; it can done at sentence level.

The lesson

Participants:  2-6
Time:  60 minutes
Level:  B1 and above
Training aids:  whiteboard/flipchart

Training objectives:
- be able to give clear tasks and instructions which include task, method and outcome
- be able to encode the imperative based on the relationship/desired relationship with the audience
- understand how language conveys both content and interpersonal information

Method: presentation with open questions/discussion, modelling and practice

Step 1 - The structure of giving tasks

Note: This structure is based on the military standard of task, condition, standard for giving tasks/orders.

With 60 minute lessons, we don't have a bunch of time for all that schema activation rigmarole so I tell them that we are going to look at the language for giving tasks.

I write the three steps on the board with space in between:
1.  Clear task statement
2.  Method (tools, resources, etch.)
3.  Outcome (expected result, timeline)

We talked about the consequences for productivity if one of these items is missing.  We all shared examples where one element was missing and how it could cause confusion or some mismatch between the expected outcome and the actual result.

My example: I work embedded in a team and we have worked out a standard method for giving component status updates during their weekly engineering steering meeting with the full development team.  One week, a peripheral member of the team was asked to give an update on his component.  It was a very nice presentation but it did not fit the group norm.  The standard is 1-2 slides, both of which have agreed upon templates, content and style.  The update should take 5-7 minutes with questions and discussions taking 5-10 minutes longer.  His presentation was well done but didn't follow the template, went into too much detail and took over 20 minutes.  He not only wasted the time of others but also his own by preparing such a long slide deck.  He had been given the task, but not the method (the template) or the outcome (the group expectation).  This caused a slightly embarrassing moment as the manager had to remind him at the end of the presentation to watch the video I created with guidance and ask the others for advice on how we do things.

This is the communication skills section of the lesson.  But as a BE Trainer, my job is also to take it to the next step and break this down to sentence level.

Step 2 - Task and method verbs

The next step is to fill the steps with language.  I focus on the verbs.  I explain that some verbs make good task statements and others don't.  We should use verbs with a clear outcome like present, report, test, make, create, design, etc.  We should not confuse them with method verbs like consider, talk to, contact, think about, discuss, use, compare, etc. which do not have a clear outcome.

This learning point often generates a little discussion because it is common practice in the company for managers to confuse the two, especially the word discuss.  Then they often wonder why there is no tangible outcome.

To close this section, I write a few example task and method sentences on the board for demonstration (in imperative form).

They practice this by giving me/their partner tasks from their work.

Step 3 - The communication model

With these established, I draw a simple sender-receiver model on the board.  I use light bulbs and binary to represent message and encoding/decoding.  I explain that in the best case the receiver's light bulb is the same size and color as the sender's light bulb.  To do that we encode the message, which we have just done by giving it structure and words.

But then I change marker colors and explain that we also encode messages to deal with the relationship with person.  This can be independent of the content.  I draw a second set of binary (encoding/decoding) to show this second layer of communication.

In some groups the discussion moves into eliciting feedback or getting a backbrief from the receiver to ensure the meaning has been transferred accurately.  This is a common question/problem, but it is only a secondary aim of this training session.

Step 4 - Changing politeness

Using the relationship color, we add phrases and formulations to change the imperative task and method sentences.  I add them on a continuum from most polite to more direct.  The usual suspects arrive on the board like "Would you please..." and "We would like you to...".

The board then looks like this:

This is when things get interesting because as we increase in politeness, the formulations move from command form into either requests or suggestions.  It starts the longest part of the lesson as we discuss and debate situations in which to use these different formulations, how they can change even with the same person, etc.

One issue we discussed at length was whether the receiver would understand the request and suggestion forms as an order, or merely an option.  In other words, would they work?  Of course the answer to that depends on the situation and whether the relationship was dominance, reciprocity or communality.

Another that came up is how relationships can shift and change.  For example, sometimes the participants and I have a reciprocal relationship, but that during this lesson, I was in a position of dominance because I was the content holder.  They were the recipients and even the setup of the room gave me the dominant position (at the board, standing, all eyes on me, note taking).  At that moment, it was perfectly acceptable for me to use the raw imperative to give them instructions.

A third issue was to discuss how the encoding is not just a product of the relationship and context, but also helps define the relationship.  We brought out examples in which the relationship is unclear, such as when they communicate with the engineers in China.  By using the imperative (or even the 'please version') we sending interpersonal information.  It seems to create a subordinate role for the Chinese and what happens when we want to change that role?  More importantly, how do they feel about that role?

One discussion went into learning pragmatic understanding.  We all laughed at how children do not understand the request and suggestion forms as a command.  They view it as license to do what they want.  We talked about how we knowingly teach this to our kids.  I used this as an example that we all have the ability to understand pragmatics from our native language.

Another point we discussed is dealing with low-level speakers.  We agreed that in the case of low-levels, we can use a more direct form to assist comprehension, but that we should also plant these sentences in other words/body language to convey the desired relationship information.

A final topic we discussed was how switching occurs within formalized relationships types.  For example, why do some managers encode orders to their assistance as requests even though both sides are fully aware of the dominant relationship?  This corresponds to whether the request and suggestion forms would be understood as the commands they really are.  A second example is what happens when a team member is promoted from within to lead the team.  In that case, the new leader has to 'work down the ladder' because an immediate use of the straight imperative can cause awkwardness and animosity.

Throughout the lesson, whenever there was uncertainty or a debatable issue, we acted out the situation at hand and gathered group feedback on how it felt and whether it was appropriate.  The task structure is very simple and requires little prep.

So as you can see, there is a lot to discuss here.  I reminded every group that the best communicators are the ones who can adeptly switch encoding depending on the situation and the audience.  Furthermore, learning these concepts helps open the door to future training in more complex situations.  I can now link this with formality, genre and tone.

So far, I have used this lesson five times.  Each one was slightly different, but I am extremely happy with the results.  The participants were fully engaged, they included repetitive practice of the learning points and I believe they now have a basic understanding of how language affects relationships.  Perhaps I have stumbled upon a nice method for bringing pragmatics into the classroom.

Linguistics Theory and Real World Training

I am not a linguist.  Most of what I have learned about the field comes from the Wikipedia Linguistics section and observation both in class and in the real world.  I'm always impressed by trainers and academics who work in the various subfields like Pragmatics or Phonology.  Without question, I owe much to their research and effort.  The depth of their analysis is simply breathtaking.

Nor am I an expert in Second Language Acquisition.  My initial education in SLA was simply by critically reading course books and asking, "Why did they write it this way?"  Now, I rely on Scott Thornbury for this, as I suspect many front-line teachers do.  My initial goal was to simply understand what he was talking about.  The real gold mine of knowledge is not his A-Z blog, but rather his list of written works.

All too often, it takes considerable trailblazing to link these theories to the reality of my learners.  The enhanced analysis produced by academia is often so detailed we can miss the forest for the trees.  We are now mapping collocations across two centuries (BYU/Google Books) and assessing the pragmatic meaning of utterances with conceptual nouns at such a minute level it leaves the trainer lost for clear guidance.  We are even left trying to define methodologies across a spectrum of distant names like Krashen and Lozanov.  Lives are spent specializing in these fields.

But as Business English trainers we cannot turn our backs on this range of knowledge.  The other extreme is just as fruitless.  There is a pull on our community to become experts in the "skills" such as negotiations, intercultural communication, and presentations.  This is a louder and more public group of experts.  There is a shine to these practitioners and perhaps more money.  But this is not my role either.  I believe our purpose is to link these two fields.

Furthermore, our knowledge base needs to be broad enough in both areas to identify the correct communication tool.  Sometimes it is skills, sometimes it is linguistic.  One thing is for sure, we cannot expect linguistic experts (e.g. published course books) to give us everything we need to know about skills and we should not trust skills experts to provide linguistic expertise.

Here are two examples of how this works...

Skills Problem

A participant in one of my courses recently asked me to help him with a problem with an American colleague.  He wanted a sentence he could say to show that he was offering help.  The colleague in the US always reacted unexpectedly.  Defensive would be too strong of a word, but he always seemed uncomfortable with the offer and rejected it immediately.  The learner here in Germany thought he had said something wrong and he had somehow offended his colleague.  The American would never accept his assistance and he wanted me to give him a sentence to make it better.

But this was not a linguistic problem.  The problem was instead with the team dynamic and the difference in organizational culture between the German and US departments (notice here it was not national culture). I sent the following email and we had a meeting to discuss the issue.  By the end of the meeting we had worked down to sentence level.

Unfortunately, there is no ‘silver bullet’ for this type of reaction.  Instead, it appears that the relationship is not the best.  His response to offering help is only a symptom of the real problem.  The question is then... what is the real problem?

To start, I would need more information to help define the issue.  Then we can formulate a strategy for dealing with this person and identify language which would resonate with him.

So here are some questions and feedback:

Trust is built on character and competence.  Do you believe he is competent?  If not, why?  What do you think about his character?  What does he think about his own competence?  Is he new in his position or field?  Is he stressed from the expectations of the job?  What does he think of your competence and character?  How can you tell that he feels that way?  Do you trust him?  Does he know you trust him?

Team building is not easy and goes through phases.  How long have you worked together?  Do the team members really know each other?  Does the team have a common purpose and result?  Does everyone know it?  Are the members committed to the team or are there other priorities?  What are they?  What is the definition for success for your team?  Does your team have a track record of successes?  Is there a reward for success?  Does your team accept and use conflict as creative/critical thinking?  How do you and your colleague fit into this team?  Do you have roles?  Did the boss give you those roles or did they evolve?

Everyone has goals and motivation.  What are his goals?  (e.g. Is he trying to prove himself to the team?  Does he want a promotion?)  What does he think your goals are?  Why?

Everyone has assumptions.  What does he think about the department in Germany?  What does he think about working with Germans?  Why?  Based on those assumptions, is he positive, negative, or neutral about working with your team?  What are his assumptions about you?  Why?  What are your assumptions about him?  Does he feel them?

Everyone has pride.  Clearly, you are proud of your children.  You talked about them on the first day we met.  You are also proud of your intelligence (and you should be).  You seem to enjoy the mentor role.  Do you want to mentor him?  What is he proud of?  Why?

You don’t have to answer these questions in an email, we can discuss it.  But I would like you to think about these questions.  When we have an answer to these questions then we can work down to sentence level.

So, I hope we can work together on this and develop a solution.

By the end of the meeting we had identified several team and trust issues and dealt with ways to handle them.  We also discussed the word "just" with the continuous form to show intent.  To give this type of training we need to know about trust, team building, working in virtual teams, and the effect of personal goals on communication.

Linguistic Problem

Most of my learners are using English in virtual meetings with native speakers, India, and China.  Their biggest concern is comprehension.  In this case the problem has less to do with the set phrases in the meeting or even running effective meetings.  The answer here is in pronunciation and phonology.  To help ease the communication problem I laid out a plan to tackle accents and connected speech.  The group is B1 and they are within a comfortable discourse community and lexical set.

Step one was to introduce sentence stress and reduction in connected speech among native speakers.  Then I could approach syllable-timed and stress-timed languages.  Additionally, I could dive into Learner English to identify certain phonemes which might be causing problems.  Mixed with a healthy dose of authentic listening, we might just be able to crack this nut.

The plan got off to a rocky start.  I started with reviewing the pronunciation of weak auxiliaries and short forms.  This was okay, but when I took it a step further and showed them "h" dropping, they were resistant.  In fact, there was nearly outright revolt in the class as suddenly they believed that I was teaching them some laughable dialect of American English.  One woman went so far to say, "No, no... this is not right.  My British supplier speaks a very good English.  He does not do this."  But I know this exists!  Mark Hancock and Sylvie Donna said so!  And I have heard it often first hand.

Clearly more research on my part was necessary.  In the end I found the answer by digging deep into the linguistic research world.  It turns out that the answer is in German, not English.  In Modern German Pronunciation, Christoper Hall points out that reduction and assimilation is common in everyday German (which I knew from my own problems in my second language) but that it is also rarely used in formal contexts.  He states,

"English weak forms are dictated entirely by the stress and rhythm of the sentence and are completely unconnected with differences in style, in other words, weak forms in English are used even in very formal speech. ... The use of German weak forms, on the other hand, depends decisively on the pronunciation style... The general rule is that in formal pronunciation weak forms are less frequent..." (p 154)

So, here was the key to unlocking the comprehension issues in the virtual meetings.  First, I had to show them that weak forms do not affect image as in German.  Then we could deal with sentence stress.  Then the plan could continue.

These two examples show how our profession is not a one-or-the-other field.  Instead it is a balance between the two.  To fulfill our role and expectations, we must be able to balance these two influences.  If we feel ourselves uncomfortable within the skills area or relying too heavily on course book 'expertise' we need to improve our business communication competence and relevance.  On the other hand, if we find ourselves drifting too far into the flashy world of TED talks and intercultural negotiations, we need to pull back and rediscover our linguistic roots.  Striking the right balance is not easy for me, but my learners benefit greatly when I get it right.