Foreign Language Use Among International Business Graduates

Abstract

American business is constantly being urged to employ more executives who can operate successfully abroad in one or another foreign language. Nonetheless, the employment prospects for Americans with foreign language competences remain relatively low. To both meet and stimulate that limited demand, several business schools have instituted programs that combine general business courses with foreign language training and international studies. This article reports on a survey of 600 graduates of three of the best-known international business programs of this type. The purpose of the survey was to determine the importance of a foreign language competence in the careers of these specially trained business school graduates.

Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice: Language Policy in Multilingual Organisations

“…A number of language policy researchers have discussed language needs of business (Hagen, 1988;Ingram, 1986Ingram, , 1996Lambert, 1990;Phillipson, 2001), but virtually all the literature on what corporate language policy would look like has been conducted by human resource management scholars and published in management journals. Secondly, corporate language policy (presumably) affects either directly or indirectly everyone who works or will work in a corporation.…”

The Economic Utility of Foreign Language Study

“…The heritage language population (NSs of languages other than English) has not been utilized as a resource to the extent that it should be. This pattern of limited development of American second language (L2) proficiency continues to receive criticism in educational, government, and corporate reports (Fixman, 1989;Huber, 1996;Lambert, 1990).…”

“…Several studies have investigated the extent to which FL proficiency affects employment, hiring practices, and promotion (Fixman, 1989;Lambert, 1990). Some have investigated the perceived value of FL study to employers and to graduates of international business programs ( Fixman, 1989;Lambert, 1990;Tung, 1990).…”

“…Some have investigated the perceived value of FL study to employers and to graduates of international business programs ( Fixman, 1989;Lambert, 1990;Tung, 1990). Although no studies to date provide data on the subject, we assume that the selection of a FL often affects the career path of the students, both in terms of employment sought by the student and the type of student hired by the employer.…”

Language and Culture Requirements in International Business Majors at AACSB‐Accredited Business Schools

“…Foreign language training has become a standard component of IB programs (Grosse, 2004;Harris, 1993;Lambert, 1990;Ortiz, 2004;Stone & Rubenfeld, 1989;Vielba & Edelshain, 1995;Walters, 1990). Kedia and Cornwell's (1994) internationalization strategy model proposed three levels of increased commitment for business schools-namely global awareness, global understanding, and global competence.…”