Why Language Training?
As every Finn who has ever crossed the border knows, you cannot get very far speaking just Finnish. Outside Finland, Finnish is useful primarily as a secret language. You can communicate with other Finns and, not only will other people not understand you, they will not even have any idea what language you are speaking. Secret languages, however, do not help you much to do business.
The Finnish education system, contrary to the opinions of some, is actually quite good at teaching languages. In contrast to most English speakers who may graduate from secondary school knowing a few French or Spanish phrases, most hard-working Finnish students come out with a good basic knowledge of two or even more foreign languages. Unfortunately schools still focus more on accuracy and preparing to pass examinations than they do on actual communication, so many young graduates are not quite yet ready to step off into the deep end of doing business in a foreign language.
Within the lifetime of most of us, in the past 30-50 years, Finland has gone from being a primarily agricultural society to a forest industry society and is now in the upper-ranks of being a high technology society. The rate of this transformation has been incredible, and the transformation is still occurring and the rate is still increasing. Finnish companies today are buying foreign companies and being bought like never before in history. Finnish companies are looking for more efficient, higher quality and less expensive suppliers abroad and expanding their markets. Finland is riding high on the wave of globalization.
Language training is essential. More and more companies require their employees to have regular contacts by e-mail, telephone and in face-to-face situations in other languages. Employees and employers are required to negotiate, give presentations, handle tough technical details, write reports and to socialize in other languages. More and more workers are spending several weeks abroad each year, helping their companies to grow and expand.
Companies are trying to handle this new demand for language skills partially by hiring workers who already speak the needed languages. However, it is not easy to find someone who both speaks the languages needed and has the correct skills, knowledge and experience to actually do the other aspects of his job. And as markets change and expand, the workers' linguistic needs also change.
The solution is language training. Through language training your existing workers who already have the skills and experience they need for their jobs also increase their ability to communicate to your customers and suppliers. Through language training and the investment their employer is making in them, these same workers also become more motivated and recognize themselves as being important team members. Language training can be given to meet immediate needs - helping workers deal with current cross-cultural communication situations.
It can also be given to prepare for the future. Maybe your workers do not currently need other languages. But what about the future? The successful employer is always looking 5 or 10 years into the future and preparing his company to excel. New markets, as globalization affects larger and larger parts of the world, may require you and your employees to work not only on improving English and Swedish, but other languages such as Spanish, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, etc. Cutting edge technology companies like Nokia are already beginning to train their employees in languages such as Arabic, Polish and Greek. What do they know that you do not?