Episode 0188
Summary
An employee, Bill, asks his boss for a raise, citing his decade-long loyalty, hard work, and offers from other companies. Initially, the boss is hesitant due to an economic downturn, but considering the employee's value and not wanting to lose him, he offers a 10% raise and five additional vacation days. The employee accepts happily. In a humorous reveal, the employee clarifies that the 'companies' interested in him were the electric, gas, and water companies, implying he was referring to his bills.
Transcript (Click timestamp to jump)
Excuse me, sir, may I talk to you?
Bill, sure, come on in. What can I do for you?
Well, sir, as you know, I have been an employee of this prestigious firm for over 10 years.
Yes.
I won't beat around the bush. Sir, I would like a raise.
I currently have three companies after me, and so I decided to talk to you first.
A raise? Son, I would love to give you a raise, but this is just not the right time.
I understand your position and I know that the current economic downturn has had a negative impact on sales.
But you must also take into consideration my hard work, proactiveness and loyalty to this company for over a decade.
Taking into account these factors and considering I don't want to start a brain drain. I'm willing to offer you a 10% raise and an extra five days of vacation time.
How does that sound?
Great! It's a deal. Thank you, sir.
Before you go, just out of curiosity, what companies were after you?
Oh, the electric company, the gas company, and the water company.
Summary
This audio is from an English language learning podcast focusing on workplace communication. The hosts, Marco and Catherine, introduce a dialogue where an employee asks his boss for a raise. They then break down key vocabulary and phrases from the dialogue, including "prestigious," "economic downturn," "negative impact," "brain drain," "beat around the bush," "take into consideration," and "just out of curiosity." The episode concludes with a humorous revelation from the employee about why he needed the raise, followed by advice on negotiating a raise and an invitation for listener engagement.
Transcript (Click timestamp to jump)
Hello everyone and welcome back to English Pod. My name is Marco.
My name is Catherine and today we're talking about things at the office.
That's right. We are at the office, but this time we are going to ask our boss or manager for a raise.
All right, so what is this word raise? Let's take a look at it in today's vocabulary preview.
All right, so we're going to ask for a raise. So if you are at your office and you talk to your boss and you say, I want to a raise. What does that mean?
That means I want more money.
Okay, so I want a raise or increase in my salary.
That's right. So a raise is a thing that you ask for. And in this case, a raise means that you already work at the company, you already have a salary and you want some more money each month.
Okay. So that's what we're going to be talking about today. Let's listen to this dialogue.
Excuse me, sir. May I talk to you?
Bill, sure, come on in. What can I do for you?
Well, sir, as you know, I have been an employee of this prestigious firm for over 10 years.
Yes.
I won't beat around the bush. Sir, I would like a raise. I currently have three companies after me and so I decided to talk to you first.
A raise? Son, I would love to give you a raise, but this is just not the right time.
I understand your position and I know that the current economic downturn has had a negative impact on sales. But you must also take into consideration my hard work, proactiveness and loyalty to this company for over a decade.
Taking into account these factors and considering I don't want to start a brain drain. I'm willing to offer you a 10% raise and an extra five days of vacation time. How does that sound?
Great, it's a deal. Thank you, sir.
Before you go, just out of curiosity, what companies were after you?
Oh, uh, the electric company, the gas company and the water company.
All right, we're back. So now, why don't we take a look at language takeaway.
So the conversation we just heard is a conversation between a manager or a boss and the employee. And the employee says, listen, I need to talk to you about something. I have been an employee of this prestigious firm for over 10 years. So prestigious is our first word.
Okay. Prestigious is an adjective, right?
That's right. And it means very respected, very well known.
Esteemed. That's right. So something that is prestigious has a good reputation.
Like, for example, some universities, like you hear all the time about American universities like Harvard or Yale, which are considered to be prestigious universities.
Or the Nobel Peace Prize is a very prestigious award.
Okay. So it's an adjective to describe something that's respectable, well known or esteemed, as you said.
Exactly. All right. And what's our next word?
Our next one is not so happy. This is what we've been experiencing in the global economy this last year or two is called an economic downturn.
All right. So an economic downturn is something negative as you said. So it means that the economy is not doing very well.
Right. So economy, economic, you know what this means, but in this case, downturn is the key part of this phrase to slow down or to decrease. So a downturn is a time when less people are making money and less money overall is being earned.
Okay, so an economic downturn. Very good. Why don't we move on to our next word, which is negative impact.
So the thing working here is the economic downturn and it has had a negative impact on our sales, on this company's sales. So a negative impact, as you know from the first word, is not a good thing.
Right. It's an effect, right? An effect, but that's negative. So it's not a good effect.
So I could say that Marco, being late has had a negative impact on your work lately.
Okay. Or uh the opposite now, what if something is a good effect on something?
So Marco, your hard work has had a really positive impact on this company lately.
All right. Good. So you can use it negative impact or a positive impact. All right.
Right. So impact again, is just the effect that something has on something else.
And well the boss said that he agrees to give him a raise because in part he didn't want to start a brain drain. What's that?
Oh, this is a very common phrase you hear about countries. They have a brain drain or they want to avoid a brain drain.
A drain is the part of a sink or a bathtub where the water goes down. Okay, goes away. And so brain drain means all the brains or intelligent people or educated people leave a country and go to another country, or in this case, leave a company and go to another company.
All right. So for example, if all the employees at Apple, maybe they start to quit or they are they start to move jobs and start to work for maybe Microsoft or Google, that's a brain drain, right?
That's right, because you're talking about a large number of people. Maybe they're all unhappy because they say that working at Apple's not very nice. So they all leave and go to this other company. Uh the same is true with countries. You can have very, very well educated people who when they stop studying, they want jobs, they all look somewhere else. They go to America or Mexico or England. And so that's called a brain drain because they all go away.
Okay. So five great phrases right there and words for you. Let's listen to this dialogue again and we'll be back to take a look at fluency builder.
Excuse me, sir. May I talk to you?
Bill, sure, come on in. What can I do for you?
Well, sir, as you know, I have been an employee of this prestigious firm for over 10 years.
Yes.
I won't beat around the bush. Sir, I would like a raise.
I currently have three companies after me and so I decided to talk to you first.
A raise? Son, I would love to give you a raise, but this is just not the right time.
I understand your position and I know that the current economic downturn has had a negative impact on sales. But you must also take into consideration my hard work, proactiveness and loyalty to this company for over a decade.
Taking into account these factors and considering I don't want to start a brain drain. I'm willing to offer you a 10% raise and an extra five days of vacation time. How does that sound?
Great, it's a deal. Thank you, sir.
Before you go, just out of curiosity, what companies were after you?
Oh, uh, the electric company, the gas company and the water company.
This first phrase in today's fluency builder is one of my favorites. It's something that we say often when we're having a conversation and we want the other person to just tell us what they're talking about.
All right. So the guy said, you know what? I'm not going to beat around the bush.
Or you could also say, please don't beat around the bush.
So, I'm not sure where this phrase comes from, but it means please be direct or I'm going to be direct. I will not wait any longer to tell you what I'm talking about.
So if somebody is beating around the bush, that means they are not being direct. They're not telling you something immediately.
It's you know, like when a person is trying to think, but you know, has a hard time and they're really trying to explain something, but you know, it's just, well, you know what I'm talking about. It's like that time with that thing where he did that. Okay. This is really annoying. I know. It's called beating around the bush because you just don't say what you're thinking.
Right. Exactly. So you don't say something directly.
Now, our next phrase is to take into consideration, take something into consideration.
Well, this is something that the young man brings up when he's asking for a raise. He says, you should take into consideration all of these great things I do. This means, when you make your decision, I want you to think about these things. So consideration means you're thinking when you're trying to make a decision.
To consider.
Mhm.
All right. So to take something into consideration or you can just say to consider.
So I'm interested in buying a new TV, but I have to take into consideration the fact that I don't have a lot of money.
That means I probably won't get a new TV. I have to think about these things when I'm making my decision.
Right. Okay, very good.
And our last phrase for today, towards the end, the boss was a little bit interested in knowing what happened or which companies were interested in him. So he said, just out of curiosity.
So, this is something we say when we don't need to know something. It means that, um, we would like to know because we're curious, we're interested, but not because I need to know right away what companies offer you jobs. So this is a polite way to ask why someone did something. So for example,
So just out of curiosity, Marco, what kind of shampoo do you use?
That is very, uh, interesting knowledge that you want there.
Well, obviously, I don't need to know what kind of shampoo Marco uses, but I'm curious because maybe I'm going to buy a new kind of shampoo.
So you can start your sentence by using this phrase, just out of curiosity.
Just out of curiosity. It's a great one. Listen for that again as we listen to today's dialogue one more time and we'll be back in a moment to talk about getting a raise.
Excuse me, sir. May I talk to you?
Bill, sure, come on in. What can I do for you?
Well, sir, as you know, I have been an employee of this prestigious firm for over 10 years.
Yes.
I won't beat around the bush. Sir, I would like a raise.
I currently have three companies after me and so I decided to talk to you first.
A raise? Son, I would love to give you a raise, but this is just not the right time.
I understand your position and I know that the current economic downturn has had a negative impact on sales. But you must also take into consideration my hard work, proactiveness and loyalty to this company for over a decade.
Taking into account these factors and considering I don't want to start a brain drain. I'm willing to offer you a 10% raise and an extra five days of vacation time. How does that sound?
Great, it's a deal. Thank you, sir.
Before you go, just out of curiosity, what companies were after you?
Oh, uh, the electric company, the gas company and the water company.
All right, we're back. So interesting enough, he was, he needed a raise not because three companies wanted to hire him, but because he needed to pay his bills.
Well, this is funny because he's not talking about companies that's right, who are offering him jobs. He's talking about the gas, the water, the electrical company.
It's a very funny dialogue, but uh I think asking for a raise is very hard to do because you know that your boss is worried about money or it's a bad time to ask, but you want to ask because it's important that you get the right compensation for your work.
Right. And actually it's important to have a clear objective when you want to ask for a raise. So more or less what you want to earn and but plausible within the company, so you're not going to ask for a 100% raise, right? You can maybe aim for a five or 10% and uh most likely you'll get it if you negotiate properly.
That's right. And sometimes a raise isn't just about money. You can also like he did ask for some time off. So he gets some vacation days or perhaps some training or bonuses or a bonus. So this all depends on the kind of negotiations that you make, but but it's worth it to ask. So please let us know if you've ever had a good time or a bad time asking for a raise. It can be a very nerve wracking experience. I know personally, I'm very uncomfortable with it. But uh, we're excited to hear what you have to say and if you have any questions or comments, leave them for us on our website englishpod.com.
All right, we'll see you guys there.
Bye everyone. Bye.
Summary
This audio is an English vocabulary lesson, titled "The English part audio review." It features a male speaker providing introductory remarks and prompts, and a female speaker who defines vocabulary words, repeats them, and provides illustrative sentences. Key vocabulary covered includes "beat around the bush," "raise," "take into consideration," "offer," and "loyalty." The lesson focuses on understanding and contextual usage of these terms, with some sentences conveying emotions such as happiness, sadness, or concern.
Transcript (Click timestamp to jump)
The English part audio review.
Listen to the meaning, then say the vocabulary word.
Avoid the subject by talking about something else.
Beat around the bush.
Increase in salary.
Raise.
To think about something before making a decision.
Take into consideration.
Give with the choice of accepting or rejecting.
Offer.
The quality of being loyal.
Loyalty.
Let's try that faster.
The quality of being loyal.
Loyalty.
Avoid the subject by talking about something else.
Beat around the bush.
Increase in salary.
Raise.
To think about something before making a decision.
Take into consideration.
Give with the choice of accepting or rejecting.
Offer.
Now say the word and hear it in a sentence.
Beat around the bush.
Stop beating around the bush and tell me what you came here to say.
Beat around the bush.
We can't keep beating around the bush like this because sooner or later they are going to find out.
Beat around the bush.
He tried to beat around the bush, but his father knew better and forced the truth from him.
Raise.
He was so happy when he got the raise that he didn't stop smiling for a week.
Raise.
My boss just gave me a raise.
Raise.
Do you think we can afford to give a raise to all of our employees?
Take into consideration.
Can you please take our families' needs and wants into consideration before you decide to spend the rest of our money gambling?
Take into consideration.
Before you decide which employee to promote, you should also take into consideration whether their skills would be better used at their current position or in their new position.
Take into consideration.
We need to take into consideration how offering our employees a 15% raise will affect our finances.
Loyalty.
Many businesses rely on customer loyalty to survive, which means that they have to make sure they treat their customers well.
Loyalty.
My loyalty is to my country.
Loyalty.
His loyalty to the company is unshakeable, so we can count on his vote.
Offer.
I am willing to offer you a salary 10% higher than what they are offering you.
Offer.
She offered her help to her sister, but her sister didn't take it.
Offer.
I would offer you something to eat, but I have nothing in my cupboards.