English for the Workplace

The HKU SPACE English Language Subject Group renders support to business organisations that employ staff whose first language is not English, but who must use English in their work.

We base our development of teaching-learning materials on tasks and topics that course participants would expect to encounter in their daily working lives and give them training in specific skills in English language. Each of the courses aims at developing participants’ confidence to make them more effective communicators at their own workplace.

Course Structure

With course participants’ specific language learning needs in mind, the English for the Workplace programme covers two domains, namely, Writing Skills and Oral Skills. Under these two domains, a series of short courses are available for selection, allowing flexibility to meet course participants’ needs. Interested participants are able to choose from a number of short courses each of 6, 9 or 12 hours’ duration.

The following courses are on offer periodically:

1 Grammar for Business

4 x 3-hour sessions

This is a 12-hour short ‘must-have’ course for business professionals who use English in their workplace. This emphasises a corpus of real written and spoken business English to ensure course participants learn language accurately and concisely in business contexts.

2 Tone and Style

3 x 3-hour sessions

Appropriate style and tone are the basics of communication effectiveness. This short course presents participants opportunities to explore the root cause of the problems in 21st century communication. At the end of the course, participants should be able to demonstrate flexibility of style and tone to meet varying business situations.

More Business English Programmes: https://hkuspace.hku.hk/interest/languages/english/business-english