An eclectic IT career: Mayo Takeuchi

Thank you for your patience, dear readers: here's the awaited English interpretation of the Hiberno-English example I gave in my earlier post , for those who didn't try going to places like the Irish slang dictionary site to look things up: " Oh be the hokie : my laptop was banjaxed . I felt so knackered after trying to fix it that when I met yer wan on the footpath by Mssrs ., I could barely say  how'ya ." " For goodness' sake : my laptop was severely damaged . I felt so exhausted after trying to fix it that when I met that human female (of any age) whose name I've forgotten on the sidewalk by my local pub (you know where it is) , I could barely greet her ."  Actually, the interjection  (which could also be interpreted as "for crying out loud" etc.) wasn't something heard frequently, and is from a prior generation. As well, footpath is arguably UK in origin. I noticed also from the dictionary site I found, that UK Eng...

数年前に、NLP関係の研究チームに加わって間もなく言われた言葉でした。たしかに日本語が通じるという事を履歴書に示してきたおかげで、幾度も仕事のチャンスが与えられてきた。その「ほとんど」が微妙だけど、まあたしかに完璧な語学力とはほど遠いのは痛いほどわかってもいる。 私はカナダで生まれ育ったので、日本での滞在歴はなんと数週間のみ（ちなみに二週間以上いた期間は３歳になる直前だった）。土曜の午前中に行われる日本語学校へ十年ほど通い、せいぜい中学生レベルくらいの国語を身につけたのだが、主に多量のフィクション（漫画も含む）を読み続ける事、日本にいる親戚との文通、そして父母とは日本語のみで対話していた事があったおかげで今にいたる。 とにかく、「使わなければ無くす」ため、（英語だと"use it or lose it"ですね）定期的に日本語でツィッターやブログを書いて行こうと心がけしてますが、どうぞよろしくお願いします。コメントもいつでも日本語でお気軽に書き込んでください。

I'd alluded to the fact that I'm an ex-pat. Astute readers of prior posts would have noticed that I wrote "flavour" with the u included. This correctly indicates that my English retains UK influences - and indeed, I was born and raised in Canada, a Commonwealth member (although I understand that environmentalists asked the country to be suspended in status in 2009 ) . However, I do work for an American multinational . And my undergraduate studies were also undertaken near Boston , where I vividly recall being penalized (not "penalised") for any slip-ups I made for non-American spelling. For those asking "but is there such a thing as "Canadian" spelling?", my good friend Rosemary has this example: "Canadian Tire Centre". In UK spelling it would be Tyre, and in the US, it would be Center: in Canada, the full example is the only correct way to write it. So, dear readers, please expect - and hopefully respect - my ...

A US-based colleague of mine whom I'd had the recent pleasure to meet, spoke to my immediate team about working effectively across various cultures. The basketball expression "it's a slam dunk!" was, in his experience, as bewildering to his overseas colleagues as what we might consider to be less esoteric expressions, like "no kidding". This prompted me to consider what lessons I'd learned in my position as a thrice ex-patriated person with a working knowledge of Japanese and French (and now challenged with Austrian German). In Ireland, it took me a surprisingly long time to truly understand Hiberno-English. Never mind the phonetic shifts (aka "accent"); even transcribed, common interjections and vocabulary can quickly mystify the non-initiated. Take this example sentence which artificially conflates a lot of native (Dublin centric) expressions: "Oh be the hokie: my laptop was banjaxed. I felt so knackered after trying...

I, like many others in the globalized business world, spend much of my time on the phone. In particular, chairing and minuting teleconferences, often with a mixture of native and non-native English speakers. Here are my top 5 tips for effective telephone-based communication: Summarize discussions succinctly and simply at the end of every topic and confirm that key participants understand the agreement(s). Be conscious of posture and speak from the diaphragm. Standing up also helps with voice projection: a thespian approach to enunciating assists with getting your message across. Smile as you speak! A friendly tone of voice puts everyone at ease, and we can discern when someone is smiling even without any visual cues. Further to point 2, speak more slowly and clearly than in a face to face situation. This allows for noise and lag from VOIP connections and transatlantic (or further!) distances. Don't be afraid to confirm what you understand by paraphrasing someone else...