Business Etiquette

The turn of the 20th century saw great interest in business etiquette in the USA. It can be surprising, but in this era of take-out foods and dress-down Fridays, etiquette is becoming very important. There are lots of signs of it. First of all, the bookstores are filled with different books on multicultural ways of doing business, on e-mail manners, table manners and more. Colleges and universities are giving their graduates a competitive edge in the job market, offering special courses. Businesses are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars for seminars and workshops with such names as "Customs and Protocol for Doing Business in the Global Market Place", "Business Basics for Professional Polish".

An etiquette expert Dorothea Johnson told the story of the businessman who came to her for help after he was not employed by a big corporation. At a lunch meeting with a senior executive in the company, he sat down and immediately started eating the salad in front of him. He looked up to see his boss, who hadn't picked up his fork yet, and was staring at him. "I knew right then they were going to send me out,» he said. If he knew the manners, he would have known to wait until his host started eating.

The recruiters do not offer jobs to candidates who salt their food before tasting, because it shows a tendency toward hasty decision making, or to those who order very expensive food at the restaurants.

Today's parents are realizing that while good manners will help their children get along in life, they can't teach them. Etiquette hasn't been a priority during the last two decades. Even if parents feel competent to teach manners, they may not have time. If family mealtimes are a thing of the past, when are children going to learn not to butter all their bread at once, or, more important, how to hold

polite dinner-table conversation? Top corporations hire specialists to teach "client development skills", not manners, which could include anything from how to place a napkin, how to present a business card to a Japanese businessman.

The important thing to remember, though, is that good manners are more than a code of behavior. They can make life easier. It's methodology by which people can get along with each other.

Задание 2. Ответьте письменно на вопросы.

1) Did the turn of the 20^th century see great interest in business etiquette in the USA?

2) Where do people buy books on multicultural ways of doing business, on e-mail manners, table manners and more?

3) Who told the story of the businessman?

4) What happened at a lunch meeting?

5) What was incorrect?

6) What do parents think about good manners of their children?

7) Do top corporations hire specialists to teach "client development skills", not manners?

8) What is the important thing to remember about good manners?

Задание 3. Найдите в тексте соответствующие английские слова или словосочетания, которые имеют следующие значения:

• person or group in a business or commercial organization with administrative or managerial powers;

• prices that are as good as those of other firms;

• person who accepts the guests;

• person who is employed;

• person who employs other people;

• to give work to people.