So what’s an animated podcast ?
Good question !
It’s a podcast with pictures, learning tips and clues. In short, it’s just a helping hand to help you understand the conversation and the context.
This is Animated Podcast number 6 in a series of 10, in which each one has a specific focus and gets progressively more challenging.
In the sixth one, Why study for an MBA, you can hear students from China, India, France, Mexico, Taiwan and other countries explain what has motivated them to make a career change and study for an MBA in Aerospace. It’s a fascinating insight in the the motivations and challenges they face.
Who is it designed for ?
It’s a perfect opportunity for new learners (pre-intermediate) to hear many different accents and also learn a lot of key words for workplace conversations.
It’s a great way for Intermediate learners to consolidate knowledge.
Enjoy and Welcome to the English Podcasts Youtube Channel !
Click here to access the YouTube Channel
Business process improvement (BPI)
Listen to Omar, from a leading airline based in Abu Dhabi do a presentation about Business Process Improvement in his company, including :
- His roles in Business Process Improvement
- The objectives of BPI in his company
- How they have implemented BPI
- New ideas that they are exploring to improve employee participation in BPI
Until recently, cost-cutting was seen as the biggest benefit – and in some cases the only significant benefit of outsourcing business processes.
Now, as the global economy improves, airlines are far more interested in how outsourcing core services such as revenue accounting, cargo operations, customer relationship management, and loyalty programs can improve efficiencies and open new, sustainable revenue streams.
Business Process Improvement is a systematic approach to help an organization optimize its underlying processes to achieve more efficient results. The methodology was first documented in H. James Harrington’s 1991 book Business Process Improvement.
It is the methodology that both Process Redesign and Business Process Reengineering are based upon. BPI has allegedly been responsible for reducing cost and cycle time by as much as 90% while improving quality by over 60%.
Process improvement is an aspect of organizational development (OD) in which a series of actions are taken by a process owner to identify, analyze and improve existing business processes within an organisation to meet new goals and objectives, such as increasing profits and performance, reducing costs and accelerating schedules.
These actions often follow a specific methodology or strategy to increase the likelihood of successful results.
Process improvement may include the restructuring of company training programs to increase their effectiveness.
Process improvement is also a method to introduce process changes to improve the quality of a product or service, to better match customer and consumer needs.
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Multimedia and IT Technician
In the series « Tell me about your job. » I am joined today at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), the primary airport serving the Greater Los Angeles Area by Jon, a multimedia and IT technician.
Jon has been doing this job for the last three years and appears to like his job immensely due to many aspects, including the chance to travel the world.
I caught Jon between flights from Los Angeles to Singapore during his busy work schedule.
The roles and responsibilities for the job of Multimedia and IT Technician are :
MAIN DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES:
- IT support tasks :
- – Act as a point of contact for fault reporting and diagnose faults where possible;
- – Test and install software providing user training where appropriate;
- – Maintain the hardware and software ledgers; order consumables and other equipment;
- – Arrange routine maintenance to hardware and software;
- – Set up and maintain the computers ;
- Act as a focal point for client needs – Wifi / Server / Printers / Software
- Control room technician – projecting PPT. Presentations, video and audio.
- Password / access control in liaison with the dedicated helpdesk.
- Audio Visual support tasks :
There is also a requirement to liaise closely with local internet providers / points of contacts in situ.
Listen to Jon explaining some of the aspects of his job that he prefers and enjoys and some he doesn’t (maybe).
He also talks about some of the issues that he has had to face, alongside the solutions that he is in charge of on a daily basis.
He also lists some of the qualities required to do his job well and the particular contexts that these qualities come in useful for.
He appears to be in the right job for him though.
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Textile Factory Tour
Listen to Greg give Liz, a visitor from the UK, a textile factory tour in France that makes upholstery for car seats.
Greg greets Liz in reception, before taking her on a tour of the research and development department, the weaving workshop, packing and quality control and finally to the logistics and warehouse department.
This is a live tour, so there is a lot of practice listening to a conversation between two native speakers talking with a lot of background noise from machinery, something which can be very challenging for language learners.
Greg starts off by greeting Liz and offering her refreshments, in this case, coffee after her long journey from the United Kingdom.
At first the greeting is formal, but they quickly slip into first-name terms, which is very typical for British people, who don’t hang too much on ceremony.
If you are from another country, can you see the differences in the formalities, such as using first names to a stranger after a relatively short time.
Meeting new people, customers, clients, suppliers or sub-contractors, can be awkward at times, notice how Greg breaks the ice by offering refreshments and asking about Liz’s voyage from the UK to France.
Greg tries to make the visit as simple and as interesting as possible, as Liz is not a technical person, but he asks her if she has any questions along the way and answers as simply as possible.
Greg asks a final time if Liz has any questions at the end of the visit and suggests that she sends any questions at a later date by email.
It is clear that Greg is used to conducting textile factory tours, both with technical and non-technical visitors and he is very able to pitch the tone of the textile factory tour to each audience.
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Listen to Rebecca, an Australian neonatal nurse, talk about her job caring for premature babies and the impact on parents of having a premature baby.
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Listen to Marie, an environmental consultant, talk about her job.
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