Introduction

Although English is not the language spoken by most people in the world, it is the most spoken international lingua franca. However, departing from the original meaning of lingua franca—a language used by people with mother tongues other than itself—English as a lingua franca, or ELF , encompasses not only non-native speakers, but also native speakers. Nevertheless, non-native ELF users outnumber native speaker users by some margin, and there are now something close to two billion ELF users worldwide (Jenkins, 2015).

The international workplace is an ELF context, where, more often than not, non-native English users dominate, and where communication often takes place without the presence of any native speaker (Cogo, 2012; Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2010). It has therefore been argued that, in teaching those who are or who will become ELF users in international professional settings, the traditional view of teaching which promotes native speaker competence is not relevant (Hult, 2017; Kankaanranta, Louhiala-Salminen, & Karhunen, 2015). Nevertheless, as many scholars have pointed out (e.g., Galloway, 2017; Kankaanranta et al., 2015), in a majority of settings, policy makers and educators alike maintain traditional views as regards the instruction of English learners.

I, too, share the concerns about teaching that uses native speaker models. When I think of my own students taking basic-level university English courses in Sweden, many of them start these courses with strong convictions about ‘correct’ forms of English and with a traditionalist mindset. The reason for this, they have told me, is that, throughout their experience of learning English formally or informally, the traditional view has been largely the only perspective on the English language learning that they have encountered. While working with these students, I try to raise awareness as to how most of them are already—or are about to become—ELF users, and I encourage them to think about the language skills and competence they will need when they use English in their future workplaces. Usually it does not take too long for them to begin to change their attitudes and perspectives about learning English. Often, they can readily see the discrepancies between traditionalist norms, and how they themselves actually use English.

According to the traditional view of English language teaching, successful interactions in English require native speaker language skills. This means that non-native speakers need to ‘emulate [native speaker] discourse’ as their ‘inadequate language skills’ can become ‘sources of trouble’ in communication (Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2013, p. 29). These views also suggest that native speakers own ‘their’ language and that culture included in language learning relates to the ‘national cultures of [native speakers]’ (p. 29). From this perspective, learning English means learning the language used by native speakers, and learning about their cultural norms and conventions.

Of course, the prestige of the English language, and the predominance of traditional views may still work for some, not least migrants to countries where English is the national language. However, such approaches are far less relevant in the teaching of global professionals, particularly in relation to how and with whom they use English (see Kankaanranta et al., 2015; Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2010, 2013; Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010; Planken, 2005; Rogerson-Revell, 2007). For example, the traditional view states that being able to use native speaking culturally based idiomatic expressions is a sign of mastering English. Yet in workplaces where a majority of employees are non-native speakers, using idiomatically ‘correct’ expressions can often be a source of communication breakdown, and can hinder rather than facilitate understanding (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010). The traditional view also suggests that learners acquire native speaker pronunciation, including features like weak forms or fast speech, in order to sound ‘natural’. However, in globalized professional communication, some native speakers’ unarticulated rapid speech can be one of the major factors hampering communication efficiency (Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2010). Moreover, communication success in international workplaces is not conditioned by native-like fluency or accuracy, but rather the ability to adapt to interlocutors from different cultural and language backgrounds, and the development of strategies for achieving clarity in content and intent (Angouri, 2012; Kankaanranta et al., 2015; Pitzl, 2015; Planken, 2005).

The exploration of successful workplace ELF users in this chapter is rooted in my attempts to help students to find their own answers to questions such as why they need to learn English and what it means to be a competent user of the language. It also aims to reach out to other English teachers working in contexts where students will become globalized professionals. It is with these readers in mind that the chapter explores the skills and strategies that are deployed by successful international English users in workplace settings. In carrying out this task, the chapter introduces the notion of Workplace English as a Lingua Franca (WELF) as a means of conceptualizing lingua franca English which is used in international workplace settings.

The organizational contexts of WELF can be diverse. They can include international companies with branches in different countries, intranational companies with foreign or international employees, and mergers between companies from different countries. Situationally, WELF settings can also vary widely. They can be office spaces, where ELF mediates job-related discussions and email correspondences, as well as more personal, informal conversations among colleagues. They can include business meetings, where international partners negotiate trading and financial transactions, and professional conferences where people speak to international audiences. A similar concept, ‘English as a Business Lingua Franca’ (BELF) has also been developed (Gerritsen & Nickerson, 2009). However, compared to BELF, WELF could better represent the workplace ELF since, as illustrated above, a ‘workplace’ constitutes a much broader and socially diverse setting than the types of transactional situation encapsulated in the BELF concept.

In the following sections I consider the people who are successful users of English in international communication and present three different models of English language use from which conceptual understandings of what it means to be a successful WELF user are developed. Thereafter, and with reference to recent research, I look into successful WELF users’ competence in different areas. Finally, the chapter concludes with suggestions for teaching English and future directions for research on WELF.

Who Are Successful Users of English in International Contexts?

In discussing the idea of successful users of ELF in workplaces, I introduced the concept of WELF—Workplace English as a Lingua Franca. The central argument speaking for the need of a concept broader than BELF is that the latter is narrowly defined and does not encompass everyday social interactions. Like BELF, WELF cannot be identified with native speaker competence and differs from native speaker competence in workplace contexts.

In anchoring these ideas, I now consider three models which capture the use of English in global contexts, and which illuminate the ways in which ELF competence differs from native speaker competence. The first two models, Three Circles of World Englishes (Kachru, 1992) and English as an International Language (Modiano, 1999) , help in moving beyond the idea that English is merely the national language of a few Anglo-Western countries, and beyond a dichotomous understanding of users of English as native and non-native speakers. The third model, Successful Users of English as a Lingua Franca (Prodromou, 2008, p. 259), maps the characteristics of successful ELF users, as distinguished from native speaker competence. Then, having reviewed these models, I develop a conceptual understanding of the characteristics of successful WELF users and use this as a framework for exploring the skills and strategies that successful WELF users make use of in utilizing their linguistic/pragmatic resources in international work communication.

In the first model, the Three Circles of World Englishes by Kachru (1992), different varieties of English around the globe are classified into three circles, namely the Inner, Outer, and Expanding Circles. The Inner Circle comprises speakers from the U.K., where English was first established, and from the countries to which English was initially dispersed, such as Canada, the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand. The Outer Circle users are those from the countries that were once colonized by Britain or America, and where as a consequence English has become one of their national official languages. These countries include, for example, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the Philippines. Meanwhile, Expanding Circle users are from countries in the rest of the world, where English is mainly used for international communication. Here countries as diverse as Korea, Sweden, and Russia would be included. The model defines the speakers of Inner Circle Englishes as native speakers, but it argues against the traditional view that the native speaker norm needs to be aspired to by all English users in the other two circles. Kachru (1992) discusses that not just one, but plural Englishes exist; ‘wherever there is an English-using community sufficiently large and sufficiently stable as a community, there may arise a localized form of English’ (p. 34). American and British English are just two of many English dialects and, according to Kachru, other dialects in the Inner Circle and Outer Circle have their own distinct linguistic norms. When the model was initially introduced, it seemed to imply that Expanding Circle speakers are solely dependent on the norms of the Inner Circle Englishes, especially the norms of American and British English (Jenkins, 2015). However, in contemporary interpretations of the model, it is recognized that English is increasingly used ‘for a wide range of purposes’ in Expanding Circle countries (Jenkins, 2015, p. 32) and that the Englishes of these users do not always involve a replication of Inner Circle Englishes (e.g., Björkman, 2008; Galloway, 2017; Mauranen, 2012; Mesthrie, 2008).

Kachru’s three-circle model helps problematize the traditional view that conceives of native speakers as people whom non-native speakers may wish (or need) to emulate. It helps to cast light on the legitimacy of the Englishes found in diverse countries and territories, and in refuting the idea that conforming to the norm of British or American English is a condition for using English successfully. However, the model is not capable of informing us about how the users of diverse Englishes can be as successful in international communication as they are in their own national or regional contexts.

The second model, English as an International Language, was developed by Modiano (1999). This model embraces Kachru’s notion of the existence of different Englishes, but it complements Kachru’s model with the additional concept of the Common Core of international English. Modiano problematizes the use of American or British English as ‘the’ Standard English for international communication and, in view of the existence of world Englishes, suggests a ‘neutral’ common core of English which refers to linguistic features—for example, grammar, vocabulary, or pronunciation—that ‘are used and comprehensible to the majority of native and competent non-native speakers of English’ (Modiano, 1999, p. 10).

Modiano’s model helps us see that all varieties of English have distinct local/regional features and that these might not be easily understood in international communication. It also shows that ELF communicative competence is not variety-based. That is, speaking a certain variety of English—for example, British or American English—does not automatically allow a person to be successful in international communication. Rather, what is important for successful ELF communication is overcoming locality, and discerning which language features work locally, and which work internationally. However, despite raising awareness that communicative competence in international contexts differs from native competence, the model evokes the question of whether it is actually possible to identify a common core that fits all ELF contexts. ELF, by nature, is ‘a variety in constant flux, involving different constellations of speakers of diverse individual Englishes in every single interaction’ (Meierkord, 2004, p. 115). Thus, there can be certain language features that are mutually shared by particular ELF speakers, say, Korean and Chinese ELF speakers, which enable smooth communication. At the same time, however, these features might be hard to process for speakers from other language backgrounds. It would then be difficult to see whether such features can be included in a ‘common core’. In addition, the Englishes in different professional and academic fields can be very different from one another, and it can be that the English of a specific field is actually a ‘code’ for the people within the field, and is not shared with outsiders (Dacia, 2008). Even if it were possible to establish a common core for all, it would risk becoming a vehicle to ‘demoralize, oppress, and disenfranchise nonstandard or nonproficient users of ELF’ (Elder & Davies, 2006, p. 296).

The third model, Successful Users of English as a Lingua Franca, has been developed by Prodromou (2008). This model refutes the idea that success in international communication is derived from knowing and using certain language features in a decontextualized way. Rather, the model emphasizes the user’s capability to understand and to adapt to the dynamics of international communication. In differentiating between users and learners, Prodromou’s model indicates that having a good command of English is a necessary condition for being a successful user. It also asserts that both first and second language users can be successful or unsuccessful in international communication and advances the idea of ‘negative and positive capabilities’ as the key traits of successful users (Prodromou, 2008, p. 251). Positive capability refers to having a good command of grammar, a rich vocabulary, and intelligible pronunciation. Negative capability involves a sensitivity ‘both to their interlocutor and their own intuitive competence’ (p. 251). The latter—the user’s intuitive competence—involves knowing ‘what not to say’ (and thus knowing ‘what to say’) when communicating with specific interlocutors in specific situations (p. 251). Additionally, it involves consideration of one’s own proficiency in handling communication. The capability of successful ELF users contrasts with unilateral idiomaticity , a term originally coined by Seidlhofer (2001), which refers to inflexible language use, and insensitive use of expressions ‘which the other participant does not understand’ in attempts to conform to the norm of native speaker communities (Prodromou, 2008, p. 36). Therefore, for Prodromou, a successful ELF user is not one with a fixed language repertoire, but a person who is flexible, accommodating, and sensitive to others’ needs in specific communication situations, and who is ‘striving for rapport and co-operative construction of dialogue’ with interlocutors (p. 251).

As demonstrated by the three models, the context of ELF differs from local English-speaking communities, and the competence of successful ELF users is distinguished from the competence of the native speaker of a certain speech community. Here, I seek to conceptualize ‘successful WELF users’, on the basis of these three models, primarily with a focus on Prodromou’s ‘successful users’ model. The reason for this is that, although WELF embraces BELF—the ‘B’ in the acronym standing for ‘business’ and relating to ELF in transactional contexts—it extends the BELF conceptualization by embracing localized ELF use in workplaces. Put another way, the context of WELF is broader than purely business situations, and it encompasses professional as well as social milieus in the workplace. In establishing a theoretical concept of the successful user of WELF, it can become possible to explore the language use of competent ELF users in workplace contexts and to highlight the skills of people who are ‘successful WELF users’ (and who otherwise might be positioned in less positive ways). From the generic concept of successful ELF users developed by Prodromou, successful users of Workplace English as a Lingua Franca (WELF) can be conceptualized as follows:

Successful users of workplace English as a lingua franca (WELF) are those who have linguistic resources such as a good command of grammar, a rich vocabulary that is appropriate for their work, and intelligible pronunciation. Utilization of linguistic resources is characterized by flexibility, sensitivity and accommodability. They are able to gauge what to say and what not to say when communicating with specific interlocutors in work contexts. Successful WELF users strive to create rapport with interlocutors, rather than conforming to certain native speaker norms.

In the following section, I will explore the characteristics of successful WELF users.

Successful WELF Users

Examining the body of research reporting on ELF in work contexts, the deployment of linguistic resources can be seen as involving flexibility, sensitivity, and accommodability—the qualities conceptualized to be characteristic of people who are ‘successful WELF users’. For example, instead of merely aiming to achieve textbook correctness in speaking, people who are successful in WELF communication are able to formulate their speech to be comprehensible to their conversation partners. For such people, pragmatics is not just about emulating the manners of English native speaker cultures; rather, it involves encoding the pragmatics of diverse cultures in English so as to be connected to and establish rapport with their business partners and co-workers. In addition to these qualities, explicitness and clarity also emerge from research findings as qualities commonly possessed by people who can be understood as ‘successful WELF users’ (see, e.g., Garrison, Wakefield, Xu, & Kim, 2010). In the following sections, I will illustrate and discuss successful WELF users’ competence in the areas of pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, pragmatics, and multilingualism.

Having Both Speaker and Listener Intelligibility in Pronunciation

In international communication, interlocutors do not always have the shared cultural and contextual knowledge necessary to ‘fill in’ unarticulated parts of an utterance so as to be able to understand each other’s messages. Thus, in WELF communication, pronunciation can be of greater importance (Gerritsen & Nickerson, 2009).

On a simple level, the concept ‘intelligibility in pronunciation’ can be associated with the speaker’s ability to produce understandable utterances. However, as communication is always reciprocal between speaker and listener, intelligibility in pronunciation might be better understood as the mutual ability of both the parties to understand and to be understood by each other. In ELF contexts, Jenkins (2000, 2015) introduces a list of phonetic features for achieving intelligibility as a speaker. Rather than strict rules to be followed, they function as guidelines that need to be flexibly considered as part of the endeavour to adapt to the listener’s needs. She also discusses the intelligibility of the listener in terms of having the listening skills necessary to be able to understand diverse non-native and native accents. Jenkins’ ELF pronunciation list includes proposals such as clearly pronouncing most of the consonants, preserving vowel length (i.e., pronouncing short vowels short and long vowels long), and changing nuclear stress to mean different things (e.g., saying ‘I came by TAXI’ and ‘I CAME by taxi’ to intend different meanings).

Jenkins’ suggestions have been applied to understanding the impact of pronunciation on professional communication. For example, Kim and Billington (2018) investigated the role of pronunciation in international aviation traffic control, a type of WELF context, where it is not possible to complement utterances with other means, such as facial expressions or gestures. They found that miscommunication arose when phonetic features were not clearly realized. They also found that even some other features, not specifically highlighted by Jenkins, such as vowel realizations or pitch movement, could also be important for intelligibility. Importantly, this study also points to the need to be able to understand pronunciational characters of different first language speakers in work contexts where non-native speakers are prominently represented.

However, few studies provide phonetic details of the pronunciation of people who could be regarded as WELF users, and therefore identifying specific pronunciation skills connected with successful WELF use lies beyond the scope of this chapter. Nevertheless, some points can be made in relation to how pronunciation is relevant to being a successful WELF user. First, listening skills that enable the person to understand a wide range of accents emerge as a key quality of successful WELF use. That is, the competence to be an effective WELF communicator involves the ability to understand not only ‘easy’ but also ‘difficult’ accents and to utilize this knowledge in shared work contexts (Ehrenreich, 2010; Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2010; Kim & Billington, 2018). Second, it emerges across a number of studies that there is no correlation between having a native or native-like accent and being someone who could be understood to be an effective WELF user. At the same time, some regional native accents and fast speech by internationally inexperienced native speakers are regarded as difficult to understand in a WELF context (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010; Kim & Billington, 2018; Rogerson-Revell, 2007). Third, since there are reported cases in which unintelligible pronunciation compromises communication efficiency (e.g., Rogerson-Revell, 2007), intelligible pronunciation may therefore be a condition for being a competent WELF user. This last point calls for empirical research to determine speaker intelligibility in ELF pronunciation in workplaces where other factors, such as pragmatic strategies, also impact on effective communication.

Deploying Grammar for Clarity and Accuracy in Content

Grammatical competence is essential for expressing intended meanings effectively and clearly, and for understanding others’ messages accurately. However, in WELF communication, the implications are different from those traditionally associated with grammar. For example, as stated in the English teaching manual for international aviation staff published by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO, 2009, p. 39), ‘grammar book correctness’ is not the grammaticality necessary for being easily and clearly understood. Research found that there are some syntactic and morphological patterns found in ELF corpora that deviate from Inner Circle Standard English rules (Seidlhofer, 2004). Some of the regularities and recurring patterns found in ELF corpora are: third person singular zero (e.g., He like the project); zero article for some idiomatic article use (e.g., I have headache); invariant question tags (e.g., You like the project, isn’t it?); shift in patterns of preposition use (e.g., we have to discuss about it); and increased explicitness (e.g., how long time) (Cogo & Dewey, 2006, p. 75). Researchers such as Cogo and Dewey (2006) argue that the ELF grammar patterns do not need to be regarded as errors. This is because they do not affect intelligibility and can instead increase clarity of meaning.

Certainly, such ELF grammar features are not obligatory rules to be followed by all WELF users (although they are commonly observed in some Outer Circle Englishes). Some speakers may happen to use them due to a less developed command of the Inner Circle grammar, even though they wish to conform to it. Native speaker ELF users probably feel more comfortable using Inner Circle English grammar, while many non-native ELF users have mastery of Standard English grammar rules.

While grammar choices among ELF users vary, English users who are successful in international communication sometimes utilize ELF grammar patterns as an ‘active choice’ for the purpose of clarity and accuracy in content, particularly, when the interlocutor has low proficiency (Cogo & Dewey, 2006, p. 75). For example, many of the participants in Kankaanranta and Planken’s (2010) study remarked that they use simpler structures to accommodate the proficiency level of certain colleagues or business partners. In a similar vein, a native speaker in Haegeman’s (2002) study described how, during a series of business phone conversations, articles could be skipped and subject-verb-object constructions for WH questions could be used. This took place in order to accommodate an interlocutor with low proficiency. Flexibility in grammar also indicates being willing to create alignment with the grammar of the interlocutor’s first language as a means of achieving communication clarity. One user of English in the workplace suggested that, ‘particularly in China and the UK’, I have to consider ‘what does “yes” mean? So I always check and double-check’ (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010, p. 397). This accommodating approach in grammar use by people who successfully use ELF in international workplaces clearly contrasts with unilaterally seeking conformity to NS norms or doing so with little or no consideration of the interlocutor’s understanding (Prodromou, 2008).

Although differences in the grammar patterns of ELF speakers and those with first language backgrounds can sometimes cause misunderstandings and communication breakdown (Gerritsen & Nickerson, 2009), not having a full command of Standard English grammar hardly keeps people from being clear and accurate in expressing intended messages (even in very formal, professional settings) (Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2013). Through interviewing twenty-seven professionals working in five Finland-based international companies, Kankaanranta and Planken (2010) found that ‘grammatical inaccuracies in [international workplaces] were reported by the majority of interviewees to be commonplace, but generally of little consequence’ (p. 392). Therefore, overall, conforming to native speaker grammar rules is usually not a condition for being a successful user of ELF in the workplace. On the contrary, people whom we can understand as successful WELF speakers know how to deploy grammar to communicate their messages clearly and accurately (e.g., Kankaanranta & Louhiala-Salminen, 2010; Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010).

Having Mastery of Work-Specific Vocabulary

When it comes to pronunciation and grammar, functionality and intelligibility are sufficient for being a competent user of ELF in workplace settings. However, in contrast, having mastery of, or a developed knowledge of work-related vocabulary emerges as an essential quality of those who could be conceived of as ‘competent WELF users’. First, knowledge of work-specific vocabulary or terminology is what demonstrates one’s expertise in a field which is not ‘easily assessable to nonexperts’ or outsiders beyond the field (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010, p. 392). Moreover, acquiring such a level of competence requires years of education and professional experience within the field (Rajprasit & Hemchua, 2015). In addition, mastering vocabulary shared by people in the same area of operation is what enables people to carry out work efficiently: ‘Jargon, content, and vocabulary is where you get the differences between disciplines … what’s important for effectiveness is sharing the jargon and content’ (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010, p. 394). The importance of knowing job-specific vocabulary for being a ‘successful WELF user’ can be understood from reading the following email written by a person working at an international company and with requisite communication skills. As we can see, this communication contains abbreviations and business terminology which, without expert knowledge, would make the message incomprehensible:

Subject: FW RN4 vs ABChall.

Hej Seppo,

As you can see XX (client) is now getting info from the market about the new product quality from CN 5. Do you have any comments to Philipp’s mail? I have all the time told them that the investment is of course aimed at increasing product-quality to at least the LN8 level, but we should wait see the actual outturn before discussing any real consequences for XX compared to their competitors. As you know XX is getting zz grade for their most demanding jobs and we are charging a premium for these products.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards. (Source: Louhiala-Salminen, Charles, & Kankaanranta, 2005, p. 73)

Having mastery of work-specific vocabulary appears to involve at least three different skills. First, as mentioned above, it means being able to use professional concepts and field-specific jargon for efficient communication and for getting things done efficiently within given timeframes (Louhiala-Salminen & Kankaanranta, 2012). Second, competence in utilizing a rich, professional vocabulary also means being able to unpack loaded information and to explain it comprehensively to an interlocutor who cannot manage specialized terms. Often, this is achieved by ‘[slowing] down or [simplifying] for clients who don’t know about the technical stuff, [checking] for understanding and [taking] more time to explain things, if necessary’ (Louhiala-Salminen & Kankaanranta, 2012, p. 392). This second capability resonates with ‘negative and positive capability’: not only having good vocabulary knowledge, but also being able to discern when to use, and when not to use it (Prodromou, 2008, p. 251). Third, people with mastery of professional vocabulary strategically favour simplicity in sentence structure. This is to alleviate the cognitive burden of processing communication involving complex concepts (Fujio, 2014).

Deploying Pragmatic Strategies for Creating Rapport and Achieving Clarity in Communication

Pragmatics in English has long been understood as the pragmatics of native speaker communities, which the second language learner needs to acquire (e.g., Kasper & Rose, 2002; Takahashi & Beebe, 1987). Since many of the people whom I have conceptualized as ‘WELF users’ are native English speakers, it is hard to say that their pragmatic skills are irrelevant in international workplaces. In fact, expressions for English native speaker pragmatics are also used by people whom we can understand as WELF users, as an example provided by Kankaanranta (2006) nicely illustrates: ‘Dear ____ (name)’ and ‘Best (Kind) regards’ for opening and closing email messages, and ‘Could you please…?’ for a request. However, different international interlocutors bring in their own cultural pragmatics to workplaces, which is often manifest in their English. For example, Louhiala-Salminen et al. (2005, pp. 415–417) show how the choices for sentence forms by Finnish and Swedish staff in an organizational merger tended to be different, due to their own cultural pragmatic attitudes. Finnish speakers, with their goal-oriented, straightforward attitude, were inclined to use the imperative (e.g., ‘Please check it.’) and the direct interrogative (e.g., ‘What was the outcome of your discussion with Henrik Lindfors?’). In contrast, Swedish speakers preferred modals for indirectness (e.g., ‘Could we get approx. 2000 mt 265 gsm trimming machine for feb production?’) and declarative sentences (e.g., ‘I would appreciate your comments to a few questions’), thus reflecting their relation-oriented approach.

Therefore, sensitizing oneself to the pragmatics of different cultures is seen as a central ability for a ‘successful WELF user’. Indeed, inflexible applications of the pragmatics of native speaker communities to ELF communication does not usually work well in international workplaces (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000). Understanding cultural diversity in pragmatics seems, therefore, to be important for ‘making the recipient feel good’ and establishing rapport with international colleagues or business partners, which in turn helps joint endeavours to be carried out more efficiently (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010, p. 395; Komori-Glatz, 2017).

Further, as Komori-Glatz (2017) reports, for non-native speakers of English in workplace contexts, acknowledging linguistic inability and vulnerability through casual conversation often works positively for creating rapport and establishing emotional solidarity with other non-native interlocutors. That is, honesty in recognizing weaknesses in linguistic competence can be an effective pragmatic strategy for gaining mutual understanding for each other’s challenges in communicating in a lingua franca, and in creating a mutually accommodating tolerance. On the other hand, a non-accommodating attitude, or using native or native-like competence ‘as an instrument of power’ can be understood as pragmatic incompetence (Ehrenreich, 2010, p. 4229).

Moreover, people who are ‘competent WELF users’ deploy pragmatic strategies for achieving clarity in communication. This pragmatic competence is important in international communication since communication breakdown is potentially high when interlocutors have different cultural and linguistic backgrounds (Gerritsen & Nickerson, 2009; Rogerson-Revell, 2007). In an early study, Firth (1996), who analyzed ELF conversation in a business context, concluded that non-native speakers tend not to seek clarification when miscommunication arose and named this tendency as a ‘let-it-pass’ approach. However, more recent studies have offered another perspective, arguing that when it is crucial for getting the job done, professional ELF users have pragmatic strategies for seeking clarity and accuracy in content (Kankaanranta & Planken, 2010; Planken, 2005; Stahl, Maznevski, Voigt, & Jonsen, 2010; Tsuchiya & Handford, 2014). In a study by Tsuchiya and Handford (2014), for example, in a professional meeting, experienced users of ELF from seven different countries utilized a number of repair and reformulation strategies for clarification, which these researchers termed a ‘not-let-it pass practice’. In the conversation provided below, three people whom we might identify as ‘successful WELF users’—P1, P2, and P3—instantiate one of the ‘not-let-it-pass’ strategies, namely ‘other-initiated other-repair’. First, P1’s pronunciation of ‘Yokohama’ was not clear to P2, who therefore initiates repair process by saying what was heard/guessed. Then P3 first repairs the miscommunication, and P1 confirms that P3’s repair was correct. Through this turn-taking, the three speakers were able to avoid miscommunication:

P1::

So and moreover this er you have er considered Yokohama bridges. You consider this er er...

P2::

Oklahoma?

P3::

Yokohama (laugh).

P1::

Yokohama bay. Okay. (Source: Tsuchiya & Handford, 2014, p. 124)

Utilizing Multilingual Resources for Work Efficiency

Being an unprecedentedly dominant global language (de Swaan, 2001), English has been framed by some as a killer language (Price, 2000) or Tyrannosaurus Rex (Swales, 1997), that is, a language which drives other languages to extinction through spread, and the ‘linguistic imperialism’ of the U.S. and U.K. (Phillipson, 1992). Although such worries may have some grounds, research also informs us that other languages besides English are very much present in professional ELF contexts, where rapidly shuttling or switching back and forth between several languages is very common (e.g., Cogo, 2012; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Franceschi, 2017; Louhiala-Salminen et al., 2005).

People who are competent in what I term WELF are not usually in fact English monolinguals, but bi/multilinguals. Thus, multilinguality would appear to be an important sub-competence within the notion of being ‘a successful speaker of WELF’. While use of a mother tongue, English, or both can be merely a personal preference (Louhiala-Salminen et al., 2005), people who are experienced in using WELF can benefit from the strategic operationalization of plural linguistic resources (Cogo, 2012; Ehrenreich, 2010; Franceschi, 2017). For example, Cogo’s study (2012) shows how international staff at an IT company in London exploited their multilingual resources for work, even though English was the common lingua franca among them. Together with English, people in the studied company actively used Italian, Arabic, Swedish, Spanish, and German. By using a particular language, they tried to include people knowing the language in communication. For example, sometimes they switched to the mother tongue of the person whom they wanted to address. When they did not want to distract a person who did not need to join a discussion, they switched to a language that the person did not know. Summarizing what had been discussed in English or confirming the precise meaning of particular concepts or topics, was also part of the strategic use of plural language resources.

Likewise, in her corpus-based study using the professional business subset (203,413 words) of the Vienna-Oxford International Corpus of English, Franceschi (2017) found that multilinguality contributed to communication success at various international workplaces. In many of the successful cases that are highlighted, the reasons for using other languages besides English were found to be interlocutor-oriented, to create rapport, to get to know the other person, to create a relaxed atmosphere, and to reduce tension. In a more formal setting, multilingual competence was an enabler of delivering a more precise nuance of a concept or idea. It could also facilitate the flow of communication, particularly when using English only was impossible due to an interlocutor’s English proficiency level. Overall, as Franceschi (2017) argues, using other languages in international work contexts is not necessarily a sign of lacking English competence. Rather, it demonstrates the intention of achieving communication success and accommodating the language behaviours of successful international professionals.

WELF Competence as an Alternative to Native Speaker Competence

As Hult (2017) notes, ELF is not a neutral international communication tool, but will always have situated functions in specific social contexts. This chapter has introduced the concept of workplace English as a lingua franca (WELF), a particular type of ELF functioning in the professional and social context of international workplaces. It has also introduced the idea of successful WELF users to denote people who are competent communicators in international workplaces where English is used. Having introduced these terms, I have sought to explore successful WELF users’ skills and strategies, the rationale being that knowledge of these skills and practices can benefit English teachers in preparing their students for using the language in the workplace. The ‘WELF competences’ that I have identified are not analogous with native speaker competences, and successful WELF users do not merely try to simulate the forms and functions of native speaker English. Rather, they focus on working efficiently and successfully with people from diverse language and cultural backgrounds. In workplace communication, they strategically deploy their language resources. In fact, being a native or a non-native speaker does not make any special contribution to being a ‘competent WELF user’.

The competence of WELF users is characterized by flexibility, sensitivity, accommodability, and explicitness. First, in relation to pronunciation, competent WELF users will have reasonably intelligible pronunciation and, more essentially, will be capable of understanding a wide range of English accents. Second, successful WELF users possess functional grammaticality for achieving clarity and accuracy in content and intent. They are also willing to simplify their speech and writing when it is necessary to accommodate the needs of international interlocutors, as opposed to merely caring about correctness in grammar. Third, developed knowledge of work-related vocabulary is an essential quality of successful WELF users. Expertise in work-specific vocabulary enables them to work efficiently with other insiders and to translate such vocabulary into comprehensible language for outsiders. Fourth, being sensitive and responding appropriately to the pragmatic expectations of people from diverse cultures also emerges as a part of WELF competence, alongside other forms of pragmatic competence. Fifth, successful WELF users utilize their multilingual skills for various professional purposes.

Recognizing the existence of particular ‘WELF competences’ would have significance for English learners and for their teachers—for example, in specific vocational programmes or business schools—who prepare them for a future in a global workplace. Integrating reflections on successful WELF user skills and strategies into the language classroom would require teachers to critically examine and develop their own curricula, lesson plans, teaching materials, and assessment methods and criteria. Although this may be a major undertaking, one good way to start can be by introducing learners to shifting views in the teaching and learning of English—from defining English merely as the language of certain native speaking countries, to looking at it as a language situated in and aligned with a globalized professional world. Raising awareness of professional use of English in international settings could help in shifting students’ attitudes towards the learning of English (Kankaanranta et al., 2015). On a practical level, teachers could introduce students to the types of English accents common among their future co-workers or business partners. This would help them to develop listening skills, while simultaneously raising awareness of pronunciation features important for international intelligibility (Jeong, Thorén, & Othman, 2018; Rahimi & Ruzrokh, 2016). Equally, if there have been native speaker idiomatic phrases in the textbook-provided vocabulary lists, these could be replaced or supplemented with words more frequently found in communication corpora from international workplaces. Another idea for promoting WELF competence in the classroom can be collecting samples of ELF use in workplace contexts. These could include, for example, email exchanges, workplace small talk, or presentations at meetings and conferences. This can be done as a class project, or as an individual research assignment. In this way, students can gain the opportunity to explore and analyze samples of collected data and identify language features or pragmatic strategies that enable (or prevent) people from having successful WELF communication (e.g., Pullin, 2015). Importantly, encouraging the use of plural languages in the classroom would create ‘a potential opportunity to engage students with how English is related to the ecology of other languages’ (Hult, 2017, p. 277). Finally, teachers might also wish to consider shifting the focus of assessment, from measuring grammatical correctness or conformity to the native speaker norm, to evaluating effectiveness and clarity in presentation and communication (Elder & Davies, 2006).

To conclude, a focus on WELF could become an important part of a pedagogy for English language teaching in a globalized age. In bringing about such a shift, an important direction for future research would be to carry out linguistic analyses of WELF competence and to more clearly identify the characteristics of successful WELF use. Such research could help in developing a concrete picture of ‘how [professional ELF] functions, how it is perceived, and what makes it succeed’ (Kankaanranta et al., 2015, p. 29). This would be of great benefit for users of global English in the diverse and multicultural workplaces of the twenty-first century, and in university education would benefit students by focusing on skills that can enhance employability.