Learning BRIC languages for Professional Development

Are any of you doing intensive language programs in order to get into the job market of any of the BRIC countries? - or any other countries for that matter. Is English all you need? This article from BusinessBecause explores that concept: http://www.businessbecause.com/commentary/to-bric…

Personally, I'm can't decide if learning Mandarin is worth the time and effort for the benefits.

 

I think trying to learn mandarin through night classes is honestly a pretty big waste of time. Chinese is definitely not a language that one can pick up without many, many years of substantive, perpetual learning. The entire language is based on a completely different system than the romance languages.

 
Best Response

I cant quite say much about this, but I asked a similar question once to a London banker. He said that unless you're really,really good at the language (as in you could fully comprehend a meeting in the native language and write a full high-grade professional report on it), there is no point in learning it for professional development. I think M&I had a post about languages.

Curious...do you think taking a specific language for all 4 years of University helps? I mean would you actually know how to speak, read and write in Russian,for example??

I don't know, but russian fascinates me more than chinese or hindi...Russians are fun to do business with :P

Greed is Good.
 
konig:
I cant quite say much about this, but I asked a similar question once to a London banker. He said that unless you're really,really good at the language (as in you could fully comprehend a meeting in the native language and write a full high-grade professional report on it), there is no point in learning it for professional development. I think M&I had a post about languages.

Curious...do you think taking a specific language for all 4 years of University helps? I mean would you actually know how to speak, read and write in Russian,for example??

I don't know, but russian fascinates me more than chinese or hindi...Russians are fun to do business with :P

I agree with the Banker, however there is a big twist in learning a different language: if you can speak 1,2 or 3 other languages, your capacity to learn other cultures, show empathy to another person in general and to inspire trust greatly improves. There is a ton of research about it. Learning a language is not only about getting the grammar right, it is about molding into that culture, to write speak differently, to understand differently.

I would always suggest to learn another language, it will help in the long run

 

I've been living in China for three months now, studying the language part time, and its a bitch. The only way you can master this language is years of dedicated study. If you happen to work in bonds there will be a huge opportunity here for you in a few years, as China is working to get their internal bond market on line and then open it up to the world.

"In Chinese, the pitch of each word affects its meaning. Mai, for instance, with the falling tone, means 'to sell.' But mai with first a low falling and then a rising tone means precisely the opposite, 'to buy.' Even Chinese people find it confusing. At the Shanghai Stock Exchange the brokers use slang to make sure they don't mix up buy and sell orders." -Tim Clissold

If you're only working on it part time, go with a romance language.

 

Hindi is a waste of time to learn. I've worked in India and while being fluent in it while help you bullshit with your coworkers, if you speak in English, people will know what you're saying. If you're going to India for the long haul, I'd still recommend being intermediate to advanced in it so you can gain favor with your bosses and whatnot more easily, but if you're just there for a few summers/to get experience and coming back to the states, then don't bother IMO.

Pretty women make us BUY beer. Ugly women make us DRINK beer.
 
Jeffrey Immelt:
Hindi is a waste of time to learn. I've worked in India and while being fluent in it while help you bullshit with your coworkers, if you speak in English, people will know what you're saying. If you're going to India for the long haul, I'd still recommend being intermediate to advanced in it so you can gain favor with your bosses and whatnot more easily, but if you're just there for a few summers/to get experience and coming back to the states, then don't bother IMO.

Yeah, I lived in India (Mumbai) for two years. You really don't need to know Hindi whatsoever - the person cleaning your windows who just came from their village 3 hours away will likely know English.

 

what do you guys think about Spanish, or Japanese? I'm not particularly interested in working in South America but the language is easier than Chinese. Japanese, I have no clue how much demand is out there.

 

Japanese, from what students here tell me, is harder than Mandarin. If you are going for an Asian language go with Mandarin...

Where in S. America have you considered? Remember that the language in Brazil is Portuguese

 
SeanKOConnor:
Japanese, from what students here tell me, is harder than Mandarin. If you are going for an Asian language go with Mandarin...

Where in S. America have you considered? Remember that the language in Brazil is Portuguese

I've been told the opposite, that Japanese is much easier because they actually have somewhat of an alphabet system where characters actually represent sounds and no tone marks, where as Mandarin has 4 different tone marks and characters represent words not sounds. Japanese does however have different levels of politeness which may be hard for some people to grasp.

"Do whatever it takes to keep the legend of Wall Street as it was truly intended live on. When you think back on investment banking of the early 21st century, remember the heat—remember the passion. But mostly, remember the titans. " - LSO
 

If you can speak Portugese fluently, Brazilian panties will drop much faster than the New Year's Eve Ball in Times Square. I had some good experiences there because I happened to be from a part of India which until recently was a part of Portugal. There is deep suspicion towards anyone who cannot speak Brazilian (Portugese), but if you speak Brazilian (Portugese) fluently, you will love the beaches of Rio.

 
TraderJoe1976:
If you can speak Portugese fluently, Brazilian panties will drop much faster than the New Year's Eve Ball in Times Square. I had some good experiences there because I happened to be from a part of India which until recently was a part of Portugal. There is deep suspicion towards anyone who cannot speak Brazilian (Portugese), but if you speak Brazilian (Portugese) fluently, you will love the beaches of Rio.

I don't speak Portuguese and I already love the beaches of Rio. lol

Really want to learn it though, with it making Brazilian vagina panties drop faster a huge plus.

People like Coldplay and voted for the Nazis, you can't trust people Jeremy
 

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