Cómo Se Dice? Break down the language barrier between you and your employees.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
After 30 years in the roofing business, Bruce Fryer foundhimself going back to school to learn how to run his companybetter. This time, the owner of Fryer Roofing Co. Inc. in Fresno,California, was learning a new language so he could communicatewith his largely non-English-speaking, 50-person work force."I went through a Spanish class to try to at least familiarizemyself with key words, especially safety-related words," saysFryer, 49.
No one knows precisely how many U.S. workers have limited ornon-existent English skills, says Bob Losyk, Greensboro, NorthCarolina, author of Managing A Changing Workforce. But withestimates of the number of illegal immigrants alone ranging northof 10 million, the numbers are probably significant."You've got a whole work force there that doesn'tspeak the language," says Losyk.
Non-English-speaking workers may have difficulty understandingsafety warnings, company policies, product specifications and otherimportant communications. That, in turn, can raise safety concernsand insurance costs, lead to run-ins with regulators, promote poorquality, and generally make an owner or a manager's job moredifficult. "It can contribute to workers' compensationcosts and a wide variety of issues," says Virda Rhem, a memberof the national workplace diversity panel of the Society for HumanResource Management in Washington, DC.
On the plus side, employees who don't speak English can beas skillful as any when it comes to other aspects of the job, saysFryer. And employers who make an effort to solve the languageproblem often get loyalty and appreciation in return, he adds.
Training supervisors in a second language is one way to go. Youcan also offer English as a Second Language-or ESL-classes toemployees. The best way to do this, Losyk says, is to offer theclasses on-site during, just after or just before working hours,and to pay the workers to attend.
One benefit of teaching workers English is that it can reducethe need for translation. Fryer has to have safety and companypolicy documents translated into Spanish. This can get expensive,because when safety and other important matters are involved,translations must be high quality.
Fryer must also hold dual meetings on safety topics, one inEnglish and one in Spanish. "We're required by theCalifornia [OSHA] to train our employees in safety," he says."And it's got to be done in a language they canunderstand."
Entrepreneurs like Fryer may find costs for hiring employeetrainers are doubled, since they need one trainer for each meeting.One way to get around this is to hire bilingual trainers andmanagers as often as possible. "Searching for bilingualsupervisors is critical," says Losyk.
No matter how hard they try, entrepreneurs will bump up againstlimits with non-English-speaking workers. For instance, if acompany's customers speak only English, workers who dealdirectly with customers must have significant skills in thatlanguage.
Hiring non-English speakers also poses risks. If, for example, apoorly translated safety warning leads to a worker injury, acompany could be held liable for the imperfect wording. Andemployers who encourage workers to learn English need to be carefulabout banning speech in another language, Rhem adds. That could beviewed as workplace discrimination.
Non-English-speaking workers appear in all American industriesat all levels, and they speak virtually every known language. Andthanks to the globalization of business, they're becoming morecommon and widespread. "It's going up," says Losyk."There's no uestion."
