It’s no secret there is a tacit prejudice against nonnative speakers of English. With all prejudices aside, how much of this issue is in the hands of nonnative English speakers, and should the responsibility of accent reduction and practicing pronunciation fall to them?
According to Wharton School of Business, there is definitely a glass ceiling for foreigners who opt out of improving their spoken English and fluency, regardless of how well they are educated or how much of an asset they are within their fields of expertise.
In an Inc. Magazine article, CEO Paul Graham explains that communication—which is obviously the core of any business success—can be deflated by the constant and intense difficulty when it comes to wading through a boss’ or employee’s foreign accent. Graham suggests that without English fluency, those with strong foreign accents won’t be heard because their superiors can’t or won’t tune in—they assume more nuanced communications may not be understood by nonnative speakers. Graham goes on to flatly imply those who have not yet tried to reduce a foreign accent or make an effort to practice and engage in learning idiomatic English simply don’t understand the importance of doing so, or the urgency with which they ought to begin the practice.
The real issue is that there are actually more nonnative speakers of English than there are native speakers due to the massive influx of professionals learning to speak English for the purposes of the now nearly entirely global business practice and open markets. With that said, it’s people like Graham who take issue with nonnatives making the effort to learn English, but not taking the time to understand the importance of English language idioms, subcultural contexts, and other linguistic distinctions. While his demeanor may be harsh, his points are valid, and learning to speak English clearly is every bit as important as learning to read or write English. With heavily accented speech, nonnative speakers find themselves constantly being asked to repeat themselves, and in general, this causes great frustration for both the speaker and the listener.
The devil’s advocate question, based on the stigmatizing of those with foreign accents should be: If the business world is so flustered by foreign accents when approximately one billion people are nonnative speakers of English, shouldn’t there be pronunciation programs online that corporations are willing to pay for? After all, the cost of such programs is a drop in the bucket compared to the potential losses caused by unintelligible English speakers.
In short, it is clearly important for nonnative speakers to learn how to speak English without an accent. There are accent reduction programs and online English fluency courses for business professionals to benefit from and break through their personal glass ceilings.
Not speaking clearly affects confidence, and so taking the challenge into your own hands may be the best way to go, especially when there are so many affordable online English pronunciation classes available to nonnative speakers today.
