A 72-hour Business English C1 level course is designed for highly proficient users of English who need to operate effectively in demanding international business environments.

The focus shifts from general business communication to mastering nuance, persuasion, strategic dialogue, and dealing with highly complex or sensitive issues.

Students at this level should be able to produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, showing controlled use of organizational patterns, connectors, and cohesive devices.

Course Title: Business English C1: Achieving Expert Professional Communication

Total Hours: 72 hours

Level: CEFR C1 (Advanced)

Course Objectives

By the end of this course, students will be able to:

  • Handle complex and abstract business topics with fluency, flexibility, and precision.
  • Lead and manage challenging meetings, negotiations, and discussions effectively.
  • Deliver compelling, well-structured, and persuasive presentations to diverse audiences.
  • Write sophisticated and nuanced business documents (proposals, reports, contracts, high-stakes emails) with native-like accuracy and appropriate tone.
  • Engage in advanced networking and build strong professional relationships.
  • Mediate and resolve conflicts, offering sophisticated solutions and managing sensitive situations.
  • Understand and use a wide range of advanced academic and business-specific vocabulary, idiomatic expressions, and rhetorical devices.
  • Apply complex C1 grammar structures consistently and accurately, including subtle nuances.
  • Critically evaluate complex authentic business materials (research papers, legal documents, high-level financial reports).

Methodology

  • Case Study Dominant: Extensive use of complex, real-world business case studies requiring in-depth analysis, collaborative problem-solving, and multi-modal communication.

  • Role-Play Simulations: High-fidelity simulations of demanding business scenarios (e.g., crisis management, high-stakes negotiations, investor pitches).

  • Debates & Discussions: Engaging in sophisticated debates on abstract, ethical, and strategic business issues.

  • Critical Analysis: Focus on deconstructing and evaluating authentic, complex business texts and media.

  • Error Analysis & Refinement: Targeted feedback on advanced grammar, vocabulary, and discourse features to achieve near-native accuracy and sophistication.

  • Self-Directed Learning: Encouraging significant out-of-class research, reading, and preparation.

Course Outline (Approximate Hours per Unit)

Unit 1: Global Strategy & Market Entry (10 hours)

  • Business Context: Formulating and evaluating international business strategies, market entry modes, geopolitical influences on business.

  • Vocabulary: Strategic alliances, joint ventures, mergers & acquisitions (M&A), competitive advantage, market penetration, diversification, emerging vs. frontier markets, geopolitical risk, protectionism. Academic vocabulary for analysis.

  • Grammar: Advanced conditional forms (including implied conditionals), perfect modals for speculating on past strategies, complex noun phrases.

  • Skills: Analyzing global market trends, developing market entry strategies for specific products/services, debating the pros and cons of different strategic approaches, writing an executive summary of a market analysis.

  • Activities: Case study: A company’s failed/successful market entry strategy; group project: Develop a market entry strategy for a given product in a new country.

Unit 2: Advanced Leadership & Organizational Behavior (10 hours)

  • Business Context: Exploring complex leadership theories, organizational psychology, change management, corporate governance, and ethical leadership.

  • Vocabulary: Transformational/transactional leadership, corporate governance, stakeholder engagement, employee empowerment, organizational culture, resilience, burnout, ethical dilemmas, whistleblowing. Idiomatic expressions related to power and influence.

  • Grammar: Subjunctive mood for expressing recommendations/necessity in formal contexts (e.g., “It is essential that he be informed”). Advanced use of inversions for emphasis.

  • Skills: Critically evaluating leadership styles, discussing and proposing solutions for organizational challenges, debating ethical considerations in business, conducting a peer appraisal role-play.

  • Activities: Debate: “Is ethical leadership always profitable?”; analysis of articles on corporate scandals or successful leadership, role-play a change management meeting.

Unit 3: High-Stakes Meetings & Persuasion (12 hours)

  • Business Context: Chairing complex meetings, mediating conflicts, advanced persuasive techniques, handling hostile questions, influencing stakeholders.

  • Vocabulary: Consensus building, objection handling, counter-arguments, rebuttal, rhetorical devices (e.g., analogy, rhetorical questions), negotiation tactics (BATNA, ZOPA), deadlock, arbitration, mediation. Sophisticated phrases for persuasion, concession, and firm disagreement.

  • Grammar: Advanced discourse markers and cohesive devices for logical argumentation. Complex sentence structures to present multifaceted arguments.

  • Skills: Leading a multi-party negotiation, mediating a conflict between departments, delivering a persuasive argument, managing difficult questions and interruptions, summarizing complex discussions effectively.

  • Activities: Extended, multi-stage negotiation simulations; crisis management meeting role-play; analyzing speeches for persuasive techniques; mock press conference.

Unit 4: Professional Presentations & Public Speaking (10 hours)

  • Business Context: Delivering impactful presentations to senior management, investors, or large conferences. Mastering storytelling, visual communication, and audience engagement at an advanced level.

  • Vocabulary: Narrative arc, compelling argument, captivating, articulate, articulate, stage presence, gravitas, inflection, cadence, call to action. Phrases for sophisticated introductions, transitions, and conclusions.

  • Grammar: Varied sentence structures for dynamic delivery. Effective use of rhetorical questions and direct address. Advanced use of parallelism and antithesis.

  • Skills: Designing and delivering a highly persuasive investor pitch, presenting complex data clearly and engagingly, handling challenging Q&A sessions with grace and authority, providing advanced peer feedback.

  • Activities: Individual “Shark Tank” style investor pitches; analyzing and critiquing professional business presentations; workshops on visual aids and body language.

Unit 5: Advanced Business Writing & Reporting (10 hours)

  • Business Context: Drafting complex reports (e.g., feasibility studies, market research reports), proposals, white papers, and high-stakes formal correspondence. Mastering tone, register, and precision.

  • Vocabulary: Formal report terminology (e.g., methodology, findings, implications, caveats), proposal-specific language (e.g., deliverables, milestones, scope, budget), nuanced adjectives and adverbs for precise expression.

  • Grammar: Extensive use of nominalization, inversion for formality, complex passive structures, and advanced cohesive devices. Correct use of punctuation for clarity in complex sentences.

  • Skills: Writing a comprehensive market research report, drafting a persuasive business proposal, composing a formal complaint or apology that maintains good relations, refining conciseness and clarity in all written communication.

  • Activities: Collaborative report writing project, analyzing sample professional reports/proposals, peer review and editing sessions focusing on advanced accuracy and style.

Unit 6: Financial English & Investment (8 hours)

  • Business Context: Understanding financial statements, discussing investment opportunities, analyzing market performance, and participating in financial discussions.

  • Vocabulary: P&L (Profit & Loss), balance sheet, cash flow, revenue, expenditure, assets, liabilities, ROI, equity, bonds, stocks, derivatives, volatility, bullish/bearish, audit.

  • Grammar: Accurate use of numerical expressions and percentages. Conditional clauses for discussing investment scenarios.

  • Skills: Interpreting basic financial data, discussing investment strategies, explaining financial concepts clearly, participating in discussions about company performance.

  • Activities: Analyzing simplified company annual reports, role-play investor meetings, discussing current financial news.

Unit 7: Crisis Management & Public Relations (6 hours)

  • Business Context: Handling PR crises, communicating effectively under pressure, media training, reputation management.

  • Vocabulary: Crisis communication, damage control, stakeholder communication, press release, media scrutiny, reputation, transparency, accountability, mea culpa.

  • Grammar: Precise use of past tense forms for recounting events accurately. Careful use of hedging language to mitigate liability.

  • Skills: Drafting a crisis communication statement, participating in a simulated press conference, advising on reputation management strategies.

  • Activities: Case study: A company’s PR crisis; role-play: Responding to a negative news story.

Unit 8: Review & Consolidation (8 hours)

  • Business Context: A comprehensive capstone project integrating all C1-level skills in a demanding, multi-faceted business simulation.

  • Vocabulary: Extensive review and active application of all C1 business and academic vocabulary

  • Grammar: Comprehensive review and sophisticated application of all C1 grammar structures.

  • Skills:
    • Final Simulation: Students work in teams on an extended business challenge (e.g., a take-over bid, a major product recall, entering a highly regulated market) culminating in a final presentation, negotiation, and written report.
    • Listening tasks with very complex authentic business content (e.g., analyst calls, expert panel discussions, legal briefings).
    • Reading comprehension of highly specialized and abstract business texts.
    • C1 Business English Assessment: Comprehensive oral performance (e.g., presentation and debate), complex written report/proposal, listening/reading comprehension tests designed for C1 level.

Materials

  • Advanced Business English C1 textbooks (e.g., “Business Result C1,” “Market Leader Advanced,” “Business English Handbook Advanced”).
  • Extensive authentic materials:
    • Full-length articles and reports from The Economist, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, McKinsey reports, etc.
    • Transcripts and audio/video from business conferences, investor calls, TED Talks (advanced).
    • Sample legal documents, complex contracts, detailed proposals.
    • Case studies requiring multi-level analysis.
  • Business simulations software or comprehensive written case studies.
  • Teacher-created materials focusing on specific grammatical and lexical challenges at C1.
  • Online resources for C1 Business English practice and research (e.g., business schools’ open courses, specific business news sites).

This C1 program will prepare exporters and business managers for the most demanding communication scenarios in the international business arena, enabling them to operate with near-native fluency and strategic effectiveness.