Feature Article
Workplace English Language Needs ofJapanese Business Undergraduates
Janice Nakamura
International Christian University
A needs assessment on business undergraduates at a Japanese university was performed
to determine their Business English needs and if the existing language program meetsthese needs. Results analyzed from questionnaires completed by employers and subject
lecturers revealed that, while English was perceived to be only somewhat important in theorganizations that graduates usually work for, employers and subject lecturers placed greater
importance on the study of Business English at university and identified key tasks to be
included in a Business English course. The tasks identified by employers are mainly oral innature, suggesting the importance of oral communication in business contexts. These results
indicate that an English for Business Purposes (EBP) course which focuses on the key tasks
identified in the needs assessment should be introduced to replace the two elective Business
English courses which are currently offered to students.
本研究では、商学部の大学生の将来の仕事場における英語ニーズを分析し、現在の語学プログラムの中の選択科目である二つのビジネス英語コースが、学生のニーズを満たしているかどうかを検証することを目的とする。雇用者
や専門教師から得たアンケートのデーターに基づく分析の結果、英語はあまり必要ではないことが明確になった。しかし、雇用者や専門教師も大学でビ
ジネス英語を勉強する必要性を認識し、ビジネス英語コースに導入すべきキー・タスクを特定した。雇用者が特定したキー・タスクは主に口頭タスクであり、ビジネスの場における口頭コミュニケーションの重要性を示す。この結果に基づいて、現在のビジネス英語コースに代えてニーズ分析で特定した
キー・タスクを用いるEnglish for Business Purposes(EBP)を導入することを提案する。

With the exigencies of globalization, English in the workplace is given more151

Nakamuraattention than ever in Japanese companies that are expanding overseas. The fastgrowing online retailer, Rakuten Inc., made all documents, meetings and internal
communications be in English starting from 2012 (Wakabayashi, 2012). In
addition, Fast-Retailing Co., which markets clothing under the popular Uniqlo
brand, started carrying out its internal business meetings in English from thesame year (Maeda, 2010). English has also been adopted as the official languageof Bridgestone Corp., the world’s leading tire maker (Mukai, 2013). Moreover, as
part of its global expansion plans, the world’s largest pharmaceutical firm, Takeda
Pharmaceutical Co., is recruiting only new college graduates with a score of 730
or more on the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) from2013 onwards (“Takeda to require 730 TOEIC”, 2011).
It is yet uncertain whether these dramatic reforms will spur similar changes
in other Japanese companies or are merely transitory. While a lackluster economy
has forced Japanese companies to expand overseas and thus to recruit more
English-proficient staff up to 2011, a survey by the employment agency, Doda
(2013), shows that an upturn in domestic economy from thereon and employers’
shifting focus to skills other than English are causing demand for English skills
to weaken.
While this is an indication that the demand for English-proficient employees
in Japan in the future is as uncertain as the state of its economy, as Japanese
corporations continue to tap into international markets, English will have toplay an important role. A major concern regarding the move towards using
English in professional contexts is the ability of Japanese employees to cope with
the new language demands. While they can seek language lessons privately ortake those offered by their employers, as English is given greater prominencein the workplace, there will be increasing pressure for universities in Japan toproduce graduates who can communicate in English-medium work settings. If
the universities consider English proficiency in the workplace to be necessary,
English for Specific Purposes (ESP) courses will have to be an important featureof their English language program, along with general English courses.
ESP has a short history in Japan. Morizumi (1994) estimated that fewer
than 2% of university-level English language textbooks in Japan were ESP152

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167

based ones. However, Moriguchi’s (2010) survey shows that, while there is stilla limited number, ESP textbooks had grown to 34% of all university textbooks
available in Japan. Likewise, Terauchi, Yamauchi, Noguchi and Sasajima (2010)
presented case studies of 19 ESP courses implemented in Japan, of which 16 wereat the undergraduate level. They also introduced an ESP database created by theJapanese Association of College English Teachers ( JACET) which contains
more than 1,000 entries related to ESP research papers, presentations, textbook
materials and books. Similarly, Terauchi (2005) gives a detailed account of theimplementation of an English for Business Purposes (EBP) course at Takachiho
University. While the availability of ESP materials and case studies is only apartial indicator of its popularity, ESP has ostensibly generated more interest
among Japanese universities since the 1990s.
What sets an ESP course apart from a general English course is that it is driven
by specific needs. Hutchinson and Waters (1987) consider a needs analysis to be
the “irreducible minimum of an ESP approach to course design”(p. 54) Long
(2005) adds that, “Just as no medical intervention would be prescribed before
a thorough diagnosis of what ails the patient, so no language teaching program
should be designed without a thorough needs analysis”(p. 1). The concept of
a formal analysis of needs was first established in the 1970s as a result of theCouncil of Europe’s language projects and was taken up most vigorously in thefield of ESP (West, 1994). Munby (1978), who introduced the first systematicand structured approach to analyzing target situation needs, has been highly
influential in making needs analysis a central feature of ESP course design. Early
needs analysis mainly focused on the target situation but, from the 1980s, it
expanded to include deficiency analysis, strategy analysis, and means analysis. At
a larger scale, language audits for a company, country, or professional sector wereused in both ESP and general language teaching (West, 1994).
Needs analysis is an information-gathering method that is not only limited tocourses for in-service language learners but also one that is increasingly common
among universities offering ESP courses. Since Coleman’s (1988) report of anearly needs assessment on an Indonesian university, there have been not only
assessments of academic language needs such as on writing (Bacha & Bahous,
153

Nakamura2008) and business studies ( Jackson, 2005), but also on specific fields of study
such as engineering (Kaewpet, 2009; Kassim & Ali, 2010), pharmacology(Holme & Chalauisaeng, 2006) and textile and clothing merchandising (Li &Mead, 2000).
While an assessment of the needs of students from broader majors may be
more difficult due to their different careers paths, Crosling and Ward’s (2002)
study on Monash University’s business students shows how this can be done. They
conducted a survey in the workplace to determine the importance and frequency
of oral communication, the people with whom employees communicate
orally and the forms of oral communication. Their results revealed that oral
communication in the workplace was frequent and important with most of it
occurring within a company’s own department (e.g., work-related discussions
with peers and supervisors). These results led them to suggest that the teachingof presentation skills in the university curriculum did not adequately equip thestudents for the oral communicative demands of the workplace.
Likewise, Taillefer (2007) investigated the professional needs of Frencheconomics students planning to pursue diverse careers in banking and insurance,
civil service and media communication as advisors, consultants, analysts, auditors,
project leaders and customer relations managers upon graduation. Responses
from past graduates to a broad skills-based questionnaire revealed that, despite
their different career routes, an overall high level of competency was required,
particularly in oral communication.
Lambert (2010) is arguably the most detailed work done to date on the needsof students from a broader major with varied career tracks. In his needs assessmentof English majors at a Japanese university, data was collected from past graduates
based on a multi-tiered approach by using interview data to design a preliminary
open-item questionnaire. This was followed by an email questionnaire toselected participants. The data were subsequently used to build a final closeditem questionnaire sent out to 2,603 past graduates, of which 198 were returned.
The user-focused and consensus-based assessment helped identify five common
key tasks for graduates who embark on careers in business and education. While
72% of the English major graduates advanced to careers in 11 different industries
154

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167

and 21% started careers in education, he demonstrated how, despite such varied
career tracks, key tasks can be defined with reasonable precision for inclusion ina university ESP program.
While Cowling (2007) has assessed the Business English needs of new
employees in a Japanese corporation, as far as the researcher is aware, there is no
study yet reported on the needs of business undergraduates in Japan. Moreover,while there is arguably more focus nowadays on Business English and TOEIC
at Japanese universities due partly perhaps to the recent emphasis on English bysome major Japanese corporations, Business English courses currently offered to
students may have not been implemented based on a needs assessment. Thus,
they may not reflect actual workplace needs. The gap between the teaching ofBusiness English and the actual communicative needs can be considerable. For
instance, Bremner’s (2010) examination of business communication textbooks
revealed that they do not adequately provide students with activities to acquaintthemselves with collaborative writing tasks in real business contexts.
In light of the potential relevance of EBP courses at the tertiary level inJapan, this study assesses the language needs of students majoring in businessadministration at a large private university in Tokyo. One objective is to determine
if an EBP course is necessary because, at the time this study commenced, outof the 82 compulsory and elective English courses offered to business majors,
36 (69%) were general English, 14 (27%) were TOEIC-related, and only twoelective courses (4%) are Business English ones. Another aim of this research is
to identify the key tasks to be taught by means of a needs assessment if an EBP
course is introduced.

MethodQuestionnaires were used as the data-gathering method for this study. A
4-point Likert-type questionnaire was designed with reference to previous
studies including Reeves and Wright (1996), Chia, Johnson, Chia and Olive(1999) and Abdul Aziz (2004) and Business English textbooks and materials.
The questionnaire was translated into Japanese and began with two generalquestions to determine the importance of Business English studies for business155

Nakamura

undergraduates. The first question was “How important is Business English in theworkplace?” and the second question was “How important is Business English aspart of the university’s language program?” to which respondents were asked torate as Very Important, Important, Somewhat Important and Not Important. Thiswas followed by 38 specific tasks grouped according to the four language skills
to which respondents rated in the same way. An empty column was created at
the end of each section for respondents to write down additional tasks that they
considered important.
The questionnaire was mailed to major employers of the university’s business
graduates. The university’s job placement database was used to derive a sample
of companies for questionnaire distribution as it contained information on eachcompany’s line of business, the number of employees and the number of past
graduates employed. Twenty companies were chosen from the top four industries
where the university’s business graduates usually found employment, that is,wholesale/retail (35%), service (24%), transportation (12%) and manufacturing(9%). The companies selected were large organizations with more than 500
employees and have hired at least four of the university’s graduates in the past
15 years. Overall, they have employed 270 of the university’s graduates, of which
110 were business majors.
The questionnaires were addressed to the companies’ human resource
department with a cover letter and self-addressed envelope because thatdepartment can make an overall assessment of the organization’s Business English
needs and the language skills it expects graduates to bring into the workplace.
The questionnaire response rate was 35% with seven questionnaires returned.
Although the response rate is low, unlike individual questionnaires, the data fromthe employers reflected the Business English needs of the organization as a whole
and therefore, were considered worthy as a basis for analysis. To triangulate theresults from the survey, semi-structured interviews were also carried out with six
full-time subject lecturers of the undergraduate business program who taught
six different business disciplines: taxation, management, economics, logistics,
information technology and accounting. The same language needs questionnaire
was first completed in the interview sessions and followed by open-ended156

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167

questions asked by the researcher.

Results
At the beginning of the questionnaire, the employers and subject lecturers
were asked to evaluate the importance of Business English in the workplace andas part of the university’s language program. Responses to the questionnaire werescored as 4 for Very Important, 3 for Important, 2 for Somewhat Important and 1
for Not Important. Means scores were computed and, as shown in Figure 1, both
employers (M = 2.17) and subject lecturers (M = 2.50) considered English as only
somewhat important. It is interesting to note that despite this, both employers(M = 2.83) and subject lecturers (M = 3.17) attached higher importance to thelearning of Business English in university.
Employers’ rating of specific language tasks allowed us to identify five keytasks which have the highest mean scores (M = 2.50 and above) as shown in
Table 1. The key tasks, introducing the company and its products (M = 2.86),
making telephone calls (M = 2.71), answering telephone calls (M = 2.71),
answering complaints (M = 2.67), and rejecting a proposal or suggestion (M =2.50), are mainly speaking tasks. These findings concur with Dudley-Evans andJohn (1996) observations that the most common tasks in business are perceived
as spoken.
Introducing the company and its products, which was rated the highest in

Figure 1. The perceived importance of Business English

157

Nakamuraterms of importance, is an oral task prioritized by employers potentially because
an inability to perform the task well will reflect negatively on the company’s image.
Making and answering business telephone calls in English were also regarded
as important tasks in the workplace probably because they are more difficult
than face-to-face communication. Japanese employees find telephone tasks in
English challenging because they cannot rely on gestures and facial expressions
to understand what was being communicated (Naitou, 2008). Moreover, thelack of body language signals in telephone communication is replaced by agreater usage of paraverbal signals (Halbe, 2012) which may pose a challenge toJapanese employees. Answering complaints is also a key task presumably because
companies need to maintain good customer relations. Finally, the importanceof the task of rejecting a proposal or suggestion reflects the difficulty it poses toJapanese speakers whose indirect “roundabout” communication style contrasts
starkly against a Western style where expressions that are to the point are
preferred (Kameda, 2001). These results do not appear to reflect the importanceof the tasks in terms of frequency of occurrence, but on the negative impact on
corporate image when such tasks are not performed well.
Table 1 also shows that other than the five key tasks, 11 intermediate tasks
all with the same mean scores of 2.43 have been identified. Seven of these areproductive tasks, indicating that an EBP course has to focus on speaking andwriting tasks and not on receptive ones. Five of the intermediate tasks are writing
ones, such as filling out forms, writing emails and translating documents. While
writing tasks are less important than key speaking and listening tasks, they are stillvalued. It is interesting to note that, although translation is not typically featured
in a communicative English course, it has been identified as an intermediatetask required in the workplace, presumably because in-house translation services
may not be readily available, particularly at smaller organizations, and are too
expensive to contract out. The remaining 22 tasks in the questionnaire had meanscores between 2.00 and 2.33 and are low priority tasks probably because they are
generally performed in Japanese.
Results from the semi-structured interviews revealed that, in contrast to theemployers, the subject lecturers attached a higher level of importance to all of158

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167
Table 1
Key and Intermediate Tasks Identified by Employers
Skill Type

Task

Mean Score (n = 7)

Key Tasks (5)Speaking

Introducing the company and its products

2.86

Speaking

Making telephone calls

2.71

Listening

Answering telephone calls

2.71

Speaking

Answering complaints

2.67

Speaking

Rejecting a proposal or suggestion

2.50

Intermediate Tasks (11)Speaking

Entertaining overseas guests

2.43

Listening

Understanding presentations, suggestions and proposals

2.43

Listening

Understanding questions about the company and its
products

2.43

Reading

Understanding emails and business letters

2.43

Reading

Obtaining information from the Internet

2.43

Reading

Reading and translating office documents from English
to Japanese

2.43

Writing

Filling up business forms

2.43

Writing

Writing emails

2.43

Writing

Translating office documents from Japanese to English

2.43

Writing

Preparing presentation materials

2.43

Writing

Preparing simple agreements and contracts

2.43

the tasks listed in the questionnaire. As shown in Table 2, by ranking the tasks
according to their mean scores, it was possible to identify six key tasks withmean scores of 3.33 or more and eight intermediate ones with mean scores of atleast 3.00. In contrast to the employers’ emphasis on speaking tasks, the subject
lecturers placed more importance on reading tasks, as four out of the six key tasks
are reading ones. They only identified one key task that is the same as that of
the employers, that is, answering telephone calls. Overall, there were six key and159

Nakamuraintermediate tasks which were identified by both parties.
These results demonstrate how different parties can have a different
perception of needs. Subject lecturers attached higher importance to the use of
Business English in the workplace than employers (M = 2.83 vs. M = 2.17). Whilesubject lecturers have knowledge in a specific business-related field, they may not
be able to provide a clear perspective of graduates’ English needs in the workplace
as well as employers. Being teachers, some of them may not also be up-to-datewith changes in the work environment. Likewise, in answering the question on
the importance of studying Business English as part of a university’s language
program for business majors, subject lecturers attached higher importance than
Table 2
Key and Intermediate Tasks Identified by Subject Lecturers
Skill Type

Task

Mean Score (n = 6)

Key Tasks (6)Reading

Obtaining information from the Internet

3.67

Listening

Answering telephone calls

3.50

Listening

Listening and understanding native English

3.33

Reading

Understanding business documents

3.33

Reading

Understanding emails and business letters

3.33

Reading

Understanding manuals

3.33Intermediate Tasks (8)Writing

Filling up business forms

3.17

Writing

Writing emails

3.17

Listening

Listening and understanding other varieties of English

3.17

Speaking

Making telephone calls

3.00

Listening

Understanding presentations, suggestions and proposals

3.00

Listening

Understanding instructions and explanations inbriefings and training sessions

3.00

Reading

Reading minutes of meetings

3.00

Reading

Reading and understanding proposals

3.00

160

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167

employers (M = 3.17 vs. M = 2.5). Both parties’ perceptions were also divergent
as to some of the key tasks in the workplace.
A comprehensive needs analysis involving external parties such as employers
is a time-consuming task. It may be easier for ESP course designers to seek theadvice of colleagues who are subject specialists about the students’ English
language needs in their future workplace. However, as these findings demonstrate,that information from subject lecturers alone is not sufficient, and additional
information from employers is necessary to gain a better picture of English
language needs in the workplace.

Discussion
This needs assessment revealed that English is only somewhat important in
the business students’ future workplace because, as a subject lecturer explainedin the interview, the university’s graduates do not usually proceed to careers inJapanese multinational companies where English plays a bigger role. They usually
secure employment with smaller companies in the wholesale/retail, service,transportation and manufacturing sectors that generally do business within Japan
so English is not frequently encountered. Nevertheless, employers and subject
lecturers placed greater importance on the study of Business English as part of
the university’s language program than on the use of Business English in theworkplace.
The lower importance attached to Business English in the workplace andthe higher importance attached to the study of Business English as part of theuniversity’s program suggest that the need for business undergraduates to learn
Business English is a perceived rather than an actual need. While Business
English is only somewhat important in the workplace, suggesting perhaps that it
is used in limited contexts and by selected employees, employers may prefer theiremployees to be equipped with some ability to perform certain tasks in English(e.g., answering telephone calls) regardless of whether they actually have toperform them or not. This might also reflect their opinion that students majoringin Business Administration should, to a certain extent, study the English that is
related to their major.
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Nakamura

Subject lecturers also placed higher importance than employers on reading
and writing tasks in Business English partly because they may help students tounderstand better the content of business-related courses taught in Japanese. A
taxation lecturer who participated in the semi-structured interviews commented
that Business English courses can help students to grasp the technical English
terms that they encounter in his classes. However, these are not workplace needs
but academic ones because the language skills learnt complement students’business-related studies.
Hutchinson and Waters (1987) acknowledged that “target needs” is anumbrella term and further analyzed it as necessities, lacks and wants. Necessities are
the needs determined by the target situation whereas lacks are the gap between
target and existing proficiency. Wants are the perceived subjective needs of thelearner. We can perhaps think about the greater importance employers and subject
lecturers place on the study of Business English as their wants for the business major
students. While these wants are the employers’ and subject lecturers’ perceptionof the students’ need to learn Business English, they should not be ignored, as
meeting them may improve the employability of the university’s graduates andthe competitiveness of the university’s business program. Consideration of thesubject lecturers’ wants in relation to the study of Business English also helps
students in their business-related studies.
Based on the results which showed that Business English is perceived as only
somewhat important in the workplace, Business English skills are not a necessity
for students to function competently in their future workplace. However, because
employers and subject lecturers’ perception of the importance of Business English
as part of the university’s language program were higher than their perception of
the importance of Business English use in the workplace, an EBP course should
be introduced to replace the existing two elective Business English courses in theexisting language program, that is, Business Writing and Commercial English.
The Business Writing course currently teaches writing emails, faxes andletters, whereas one of the skills taught in the Commercial English course is thewriting of resumes, an activity which students will find little practical use given
the local nature of their employment. The EBP course could teach the key and162

Workplace English Language Needs, OnCUE Journal, 7(3), pages 151-167

intermediate tasks identified from the needs assessment, particularly oral ones.
In designing an EBP syllabus, it is proposed that the key and intermediate tasks
identified by the employers are prioritized, followed by those identified by subject
lecturers. Given the mostly oral nature of business communication identified inthis study, it is important that these tasks are taught in an EBP course because
they are not likely to be covered in general English courses or TOEIC preparatory
ones which emphasize listening and reading tasks for examination purposes. To
address the wants of the subject lecturers for students to learn aspects of thelanguage related to business studies, the EBP syllabus can also include elementsof Business English for Academic Purposes (BEAP) so that students can learn
business terminology and concepts in English which can facilitate learning in thecourses that the subject lecturers teach in Japanese.
The present study is a small-scale needs assessment performed on a limited
number of respondents. Nevertheless, it has shown how the future workplace
English needs of business undergraduates who will seek employment in diverse
organizations and industries can be identified. While some universities in Japanmay implement a full ESP program to equip all of their students with academic
and professional English skills (e.g., Shi, 2014), the lack of a strong case for ESP
for the business undergraduates in this needs assessment demonstrates that the
introduction of an EBP course to replace the current two elective Business English
courses adequately addresses the students’ needs as perceived by employers andsubject lecturers.

Acknowledgments
The author wishes to thank Dr. Suzanne Quay for her helpful comments on an
earlier version of this paper, Yaoko Matsuoka for her gracious help in editing theJapanese abstract, the editor and anonymous reviewers of OnCUE Journal for
their invaluable advice, and all of the teachers and students who have participatedin this study.

163

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Author’s bio
Janice Nakamura is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Education Research andService, International Christian University, Tokyo. She holds a Ph.D. in Educationand is interested in research in the fields of English for Specific Purposes and earlybilingual acquisition. janice-n@sky.sannet.ne.jp.
Received: November 21, 2013
Accepted: June 20, 2014167