Internationals: Check this out

If an international student is looking for a job in USA, he/she must be well-versed in English. That is a basic, and a well-justified, requirement (a visa is perhaps not).

On the second note, what has 'language' got to do with 'management/business skills'? A company may prefer an international with a remarkable business acumen and poor English/social-skills to a US national with a poor business acumen and remarkable English/social-skills.

Jose Mourinho managed Chelsea in England. Have you ever heard Jose Mourinho speak English?

A visa perhaps is a valid requirement. Getting in details, a student visa to U.S. is always given as a visa with no dual intent allowed. That means you are expected to go back after studies.



Nothing. But an MBA school in U.S. or in India is not going to recruit , nor any company is going to hire the 30 year old "Head of the village" of my village in India if he does not speak English, even though he is a great leader (few hundred thousand people trust in him), has done great social work and is well educated in Hindi upto undergraduate level.

What if a company in US has to execute a project of immense strategic importance in your village and the company comes to know that it can not be done without the services/skills of that same poor, old, non-English speaking 'Head of the village'?

In my opinion, management-skills of an MBA grad (US national or international) must be the primary sought after quality by a recruiter rather than linguistic abilities. Of course, having an excellent communication skill (especially in English) is always an asset for anyone. (even for your 'Head of the village')

I don't care what language you speak: communication skills are key. I've heard several people say something along these lines (recruiters, trainers and professors): I don't care how good your analysis is, how well you forecast. If you can't persuade people that your ideas are the best, I have four words for you: Welcome to middle management.

Hate to break it to you but in the US your management skills will be useless if you do not have excellent communication skills. Your subordinates will undermine your management if they cant understand you, I have seen it before. No matter your talent you will only be taken seriously if you can speak the language of where you are working. Per Rhymes example, if you cannot communicate effectively in English then you have no chance of even getting into the interview room let alone land a job. Recruiters will not even think of hiring someone they have difficulty understanding.

Even if you manage to land a job, unless it is something that requires limited interactions you aren't going to appear to be a superstar manager without strong verbal communication skills. It is unPC but coworkers and subordinates can at times mock people accent, and the more white collar blue blood it is the worse it can be because their standards are higher. During one school visit I actually heard a pair of students complaining that they were paying 45K a year to sit in a class with a professor who they couldn't understand...now these two students will eventually be peoples co-workers, so imagine them in an office with the head of a village no matter his talent if he can speak near flawless english.

A company with overseas interests will definitely consider people who are native to those locations. I am sure a lot of companies love Indian and Chinese MBA students just for that reason.

TRUE! But poor 'English skills' should not be taken as poor 'communication skills'.

But communication skills depend on where you are. You want a fancy-name MBA from the US and then go back to your company in non-english-speaking country X? Then I don't care if you can't tie two sentences together in a conversation. But if you want a job in the US working in a country where people speak English, then you better speak English. Not flawlessly. Not without accent. But clearly. Persuasively. Efficiently. I know one guy here - great guy. Like him a lot. Very giving. However, his language skills aren't improving. His spouse doesn't speak English, and he spends a lot of time with her. And on campus, he tends to run with his compatriots. He never talks in class. He's not practicing, so he's not improving. I have worked on several projects with him, and i can tell you he'd have a hard time convincing a recruiter that he's got the goods.

Now, I've seen this guy's resume - it's great. I've seen him rock out some tough assignments - he's the reason my accounting grade was as good as it was. And I'm not getting down on him for the choices he's making. He already knows he's going back to country X, so whatever. Could I get a job with his company? hells no. I wouldn't be effective because I can't communicate. All this is to make two points:

If you want to be hired in language X, then speak language X. If you don't speak language X, expect to have a hard time landing the job. It just makes sense. I couldn't get hired at McDonald's in Shanghai. And believe me, I'm awesome at customer service and restaurant work. But there's no way I can convince someone of this in Mandarin.

Being at school is not equatable with speaking the language well. This is fine - lord knows my french was semi-crappy when i arrived in France. But it's up to the student to decide whether to make the effort to really learn the language, or not.

Well said river, this holds true not only for the US but also Australia and all other english speaking countries...

Its intriguing and mildly irritating to hear people referring only to Indian and Chinese internationals when talking about poor communication skills or bad English. May be it is because these countries account for most of the international applications.

Whatever the reason, this is like watching National Geographic, which shows the remotest parts of India and paint the picture that Indians in general live in disgustingly horrible conditions. From my experience, Indians & Chinese generally speak better/equal English than most other international students.

But yes, I agree that communication skills count more than talent. I also think Visa is a larger issue that might even affect which candidates schools ultimately admit.

I think it's weird that people comment on Indian language skills so much. It's my understanding that most Indians are exposed to lots of English in India. And I think that regular exposure is the main reason people do well in a given language. Obviously I'm just musing here.

I pointed out europeans and south americans but Lepium pointed out I didnt refer to africans and central americans. I also forgot Icelandic people and French Canadians.

I think part of the problem for some Indians is they speak Queens (British) English not Americanized (bastardized) English. So you are combining two different accents which some people can find difficult to understand. I think that accents are more difficult depending on the original language and the sounds they contain. Different people have a hard time pronouncing certain sounds and it takes a lot more practice because their native language does not have those sounds in it.

Accents are something you will never get rid of, you can minimize it but its still there. Someone who knows a Boston accent will pick me out in 2 minutes after I say something like its wicked dahk out tonight. As long as people can understand you an accent isnt going to cause a problem. Heck in NY my Boston accent may be a bigger issue than someone from India because of the Boston vs NY sports fan conflicts (go Red Sox).

Course, even if you speak perfect english, sometimes your point doesnt get across very well anyway: https://www.coo-whip.net/play.php?vid=852

he he he! Funny.

I think you need to start by actually having a point. Oh! The FRONT fell off! GOT it. Totally got it now.

but see an American would hear that accent and would think that guy had to be super smart. Plus every guy wants that cool accent because the chicks dig.

It's funny you mention that, since I recently went for a diversity training where this specific point was brought up in a mock job situation to trigger a discussion:

If you have a British accent, people'll love your accent. If you have a(n) Indian / Asian / Latin / basically everywhere else's accent, they might say you are not suitable for X job because of your accent. It's not about the Queen's (by the way, it's "the Queen's" not "the Queens", as in the NYC borough*) language, but about something else which I won't specifically mention since I don't think it would be appropriate given this forum's easy-going vibe.

Try the following experiment if you can (or at least think about it): send a Londoner with his own accent and otherwise flawless command of British English into an interview. Now send an Indian with the same command of the same language and the same qualifications into the same interview. Would the interviewer be neutral to accent?

Thanks. L.

* I know it's probably against netiquette to correct spelling or punctuation in a forum, but I thought the differences in meaning were substantial so I made the clarification.

Ok, so I've been reading about specific examples of students whose command of the English language is arguably sub-par. While important findings may be usually made from anecdotal evidence, I think it'd be useful to transition into a more structured analysis.

Do the international students mentioned in everyone's examples represent a vast majority of the overall international population?

Or are they just the exception?

Either way, what do you think of your schools' quality in terms of attracting and selecting international students with appropriate language skills?

I only know about 40% of people in my class, and while examples do exist of internationals with sub-par fluency, I'd say they do represent no more than 1 - 2% of the overall student population, if that. Is it similar elsewhere? Or are other schools more relaxed about language skills?

Thanks. L.