When Cindy Hauert teaches business English in Swiss companies, she often tries to persuade her learners to work towards a qualification. "It's good for companies, because they can see where their training money is going," she explains. "It's good for the students, because they have something in their hand after putting in class and private time. And it's good for me, because I can show return on investment to the companies."

Many learners agree with Hauert and see a business English qualification as an important step on the path to an international career. A qualification — whether a certificate or a high score on an assessment test (see the table on page 14) — is proof that you can understand, speak, read and write business-related English. Choosing a route through the labyrinth of certificates and assessments is not as complex as it may seem, and depends mainly on the goals you would like to reach.

Employers increasingly want to know whether employees can use English in practical business situations rather than whether they can produce mistake-free sentences. "Tests of English proficiency used to focus on the niceties of grammar, which in modern business communication don't matter at all," says Andy Hewitson, head of English-language training at Siemens in Munich. "Nowadays, companies emphasize fluency rather than accuracy, and the ability to perform well in English at work" (see "Going global", Business Spotlight 2/2007).

Page 1: Return on investment
Page 2: FAQ
Page 3: What is CEF?
Page 4: Links