Who are we?
We are native English speakers and have spent many years doing business in Europe, Asia and Africa.
Robert has spent over 25 years in international business and has run companies in the UK, Ireland and mainland Europe, prior to which he worked in the USA, Singapore, India and Australia. Helen was a teacher in a secondary school in England, they met in 2012 and married two years later. After taking their honeymoon in Africa and deciding to invest in Portuguese speaking Cape Verde, they were struck by how difficult it was to learn and do business in a foreign language. The idioms, the accent, the slang, the fast speech….. and the most important thing of all, being relaxed enough to be authentic and create sufficient trust to do business effectively.
Whilst Robert was working with international investors he realised that the biggest problem with business English education is that it is taught by English teachers and not business people. They can’t teach business English because they don’t use it in business.
They decided to combine Robert's business experience and Helen's teaching expertise to create Business English training that would be more effective in the real world, and in 2017 they formed Oxford Business English Executive Coaching before also launching more general Cambridge Business English TEFL courses and training. In late 2024 they combined both brands and the Oxford & Cambridge Business English Institute was born.
Language is how we communicate, without communication there is no trust… and trust is the basis for all business deals.
English courses teach you grammar etc, but if you don’t learn in a business context you might as well not bother… unless you just want to learn English to watch movies, listen to music and chat in bars, in which case general English is just fine. But if learning English for work is what you need then you need to be smart about how you learn.
Technology is also making everything change faster. Did you know that more new English verbs have been created in the last 10 years than in the previous 100 years COMBINED! So how should we learn?
Human brains are principally survival machines. You remember (and learn) at your best when your brain thinks information is important. That’s why learning English when you were at school was so hard, as a child it isn’t important for your life so you forget. As an adult you need a career, and English is essential for it. So you go and learn English, then you learn about business. But if you combine the two your brain sees this as doubly important and you will learn faster.
What if we could take the latest business research from the top companies and universities in the world and re-write them into English classes? How useful would it be if you could improve your English comprehension, speaking skills and grammar, whilst also learning about things like personal branding, digital marketing or artificial intelligence at the same time?
That is what we do!
Let’s say we are studying marketing. We study the grammar of how the language is used, we do reading and writing work to expand vocabulary, we will also do listening exercises at different speeds and with different accents, then we do speaking workshops to make your pronunciation clearer, and we do all this with materials that teach you about modern marketing at the same time. We do the same with other subjects such as economics, technology or personal development. Our courses are aimed at everyone from elementary to advanced level and are updated regularly with the latest materials and learning techniques. (and you don’t have to be a business specialist either, we’re here to teach you that too).
Our students are fast tracking their careers. But don’t take my word for it, take a look at the testimonials from our students on our website, and all our courses come with a 100% money back guarantee!
The global economy is worth almost $100 trillion per year, and the majority of international trade is in English. How you speak English is critical to your success. Whether you want career promotion, business investment, higher sales or a new job, the bottom line is that we will help you get there quicker than anyone else.
So why not take a look at our courses on the ‘learn with us’ page and see what we can do for you…..