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Brits missing out on employment opportunities

Learning a language is one of the most common New Year’s resolutions and opens doors to a wide range of careers, but just one quarter of Brits can speak a second language, new research from Rosetta Stone reveals.

This is a general issue across the UK, as CBI claimed that the UK has the “worst language proficiency in Europe”. However, businesses and employees should be acutely aware of this, as becoming multilingual can have very positive effects on an individual’s employability, and the skills incorporated in language learning makes them a very valuable commodity to a business.

This can severely hinder a business’ attempts to move into markets outside of the British Isles, as modern technology brings foreign lands closer and closer to home. Without sufficient foreign language skills in an organisation, operating abroad or with foreign investors/customers can become almost impossible – and this shows the obvious need for businesses to work with its employees to improve their language skills.

And this is not just out of self-interest. Offering employee language learning is a great employee benefit, and not one that is widely seen. The Rosetta Stone research found that three-quarters of employees feel their employer hasn’t made them aware of the career benefits associated with becoming multilingual. There is a big gap in this market for businesses to offer this as a benefit to their employees. The Guardian found that 70% of young people they asked would be interested in learning a new language, so there is clearly a demand to be met by business owners.

From an employee’s point of view, the Guardian survey found that the main attraction to learning a language would be the opportunity to work abroad (43%) and a further 13% also chose “high salary in my career”. This is a clear indication that if a business was to offer language courses as a benefit, they would be seen as a more desirable employer.

The UK have lagged behind the continent in this respect for a long time, and it’s time UK businesses worked to improve this situation – both for themselves and the employees.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Jordan Peck .