Businesses covet a wide range of skills. From numeracy proficiency to your ability to communicate, the most effective, well-rounded businesses hire and develop employees with the ability to excel in a variety of different areas.
Certain skills, however, are more sought after than others. In an increasingly globalized marketplace, businesses value language skills more highly than ever before – with the ability to speak specific languages especially important.
Having employees that can speak a different language fluently is a beneficial asset for any business to have.
In this post, we’ve explained some of the reasons why.
Win new clients and expand your business’s target market
Ultimately, running a business is all about growth. To maximize revenues, you have to maximize our pursuit of clients and/or customers.
Whether you’re a recruitment agency hoping to tap into a foreign market that is currently outside of your primary focus or a drinks manufacturer hoping to find a new export market, the maxim is the same: expand your customer base and increase profit.
By seeking out and recruiting people who have the skill and ability to converse in different languages confidently, you can open up as yet unrealized sources of potential revenue.
Improving your business’ standing in different regions is a simple way to bolster your customer base or grow your list of clientele. All ambitious organizations should be looking to do so.
Broadens cultural awareness
When you have an array of staff from different backgrounds, it can only benefit company culture. They will benefit from wildly disparate experiences and upbringings can help improve everyone’s cultural awareness and accelerate your staff’s ability to connect with others regardless of any perceived differences.
This kind of earned understanding can only improve your company’s fortunes moving forward. When your staff can find common ground with customers, clients, and key stakeholders and empathize with their situations, you’re more likely to elicit positive outcomes for your business moving forward.
By exposing yourself to a new culture, learning a language can catalyse this process of learning about other cultures.
Increase creativity and productivity
There is a considerable body of scientific research that boasts about the manifold benefits of learning another language.
Because it forces you into using areas of your brain you wouldn’t otherwise access, it can
Numerous studies have found a compelling link between speaking more than one language and creativity, productivity, and memory.
If these are abilities your business craves, it should be a no-brainer to invest in your staff’s language skills.
There has also been scientific evidence that has suggested that speaking another language can delay the onset of degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s.
In summary
Having team members that are proficient in another language can benefit your business in a multitude of ways. From expanding your business in areas you otherwise wouldn’t be able to improve your team’s interpersonal skills, creativity, productivity, and memory, there is an abundance of reasons to make learning another language an integral part of your business’ operations.
