Business English

Karriere
REDEWENDUNG
Redewendung des Monats:
“to fill the bill” (AE)
Angelina plant ein Sommer-Fest. Sie lädt
dazu alle ihre Freunde und Bekannten
ein. In zwei Tagen soll gefeiert werden
und Angelina hat mit der Organisation
alle Hände voll zu tun. Die Bewirtung der
Gäste bereitet ihr noch Kopfzerbrechen.
Schließlich engagiert sie einen Partyservice. Erleichtert erzählt sie ihrem Mann:
“I was afraid there wasn‘t enough to eat for
everyone, but the buffet will fill the bill.“
Business
English
Knigge für heiße Tage
What to wear on hot days
Wie kleidet man sich im Büro am besten? Wie kurz darf ein Rock
Do you know what it means?
to be adequate
to fill orders
to sign a bill
sein? Sind Strümpfe selbst an den heißesten Tagen ein Muss?
Die Wahl der richtigen Kleidung ist nicht immer leicht. Männer
haben es da mitunter einfacher. Aber auch bei der klassischen
Kombination aus Anzug und Krawatte gibt es unzählige Variationen. Für alle gilt dabei: Je höher das Thermometer klettert, desto
schwerer fällt die Kleiderwahl – vor allem wenn das Outfit sowohl
also say: to come up to the requisite standard.
“to fall short of one‘s expectations“. Synonym: You could
sen sein. Gegenteil: The opposite of “to fill the bill“ is
Übersetzung: den Erwartungen entsprechen, angemesAuflösung: to be adequate
der Klimaanlage im Büro als auch dem heißen Wetter draußen
standhalten soll.
Stay cool!
Making the correct choices to remain
looking cool and professional at all times
will certainly make you the envy of your
colleagues, and will give your image at
work a boost too. Deciding on the correct
choice is the tricky part, but there are a
few rules you can adhere to which will
make things easier if you need to present
a professional image. These guidelines
will help if you are unsure of what to wear
in a business situation.
Foto: fotolia/Pavel Losevsky.
V O C A B U L A RY
to make sth. the
envy of
etw. zum Gegenstand jmds.
Bewunderung
werden lassen
to adhere to
befolgen
bare
nackt
halternecks
Neckholder
accent
Betonung
fabric
Stoff
layering
(mehrere) Lagen
closed-toe
geschlossen
(Schuhe)
16
tempra365 4 / 09
1. Less is not more: too much bare skin
does not look professional. Low necklines,
sleeveless outfits, shorts or mini-skirts are
out.
2. Avoid “holiday” styles: these include
loud prints, Hawaiian shirts, flip-flops,
halternecks: all these should be kept for
vacation and not seen in the office. Colours
are also important: it may be tempting to
wear bright colours but consider your overall image and think about restricting these
to accents rather than an entire outfit.
3. Fabric is the key: the correct fabric
choice will allow you to remain covered
up yet cool; layering will make things even
easier, so that for example a cotton or
linen short-sleeved shirt with a lightweight
jacket will do for indoors and the jacket
can be removed when going outside.
4. Footwear: in more conservative companies you are probably best sticking to
closed-toe shoes or sandals rather than
open-toed sandals; sneakers are also
generally not formal enough even for
“business casual” wear.
5. Socks or tights: for men, socks should
always be worn with shoes but not with
sandals – which are generally not worn
in the workplace. Women will not need
socks for work unless they are wearing
more masculine-style shoes. Tights or
stockings should be worn if the weather
permits, ie: if it is under about 25° C outside, or if working for a very conservative
company.
Karriere
G R A M M AT I K
LINK
Satzteile geschickt umstellen
Elegant inversion
Ihre erste Frage ist wahrscheinlich: Was sind Inversionen? Sie haben
sie mit Sicherheit schon verwendet! Das Oxford Wörterbuch für
Fortgeschrittene definiert sie als Änderung der Wortreihenfolge im
Satz. Im täglichen Sprachgebrauch nutzen Sie dieses Phänomen
Das
kostenlose
Trainingsportal
www.business-english.de bietet Ihnen die
ideale Kombination aus Informationen, englischen Mustervorlagen, Experten-Tipps im
Forum und täglichem Lernspaß (Quizzes,
Cartoons und Exercises) für ein fehlerfreies
Englisch. Mit der „daily mail“ bekommen
Sie täglich eine englische Redewendung
per E-Mail. So frischen Sie unkompliziert
und ganz nebenbei Ihr Englisch auf.
Wir freuen uns auf Ihren Besuch!
also zum Beispiel, um Fragen zu formulieren. Allerdings schleichen
sich dabei auch gerne Fehler ein. Dieser Beitrag gibt Ihnen ein
paar Richtlinien an die Hand, wie Sie Sätze geschickt umstellen.
Asking a question
In the example above, rather than starting
an explanation:
Inversion is ...
Not only are their prices higher,
but their quality is lower!
Seldom have I seen a worse
presentation.
Describing a succession
the question juxtaposes the verb and
subject after the question word “What”.
This can be clearly seen in the following
examples too:
Inversion is also used when describing a
succession of events in the past with the
help of words like “hardly“, “scarcely“ or
“no sooner”:
Have you finished the report yet?
Are they waiting downstairs?
What exactly is it that he wants to talk
about?
Hardly had we walked in the door when
the phone started ringing.
Scarcely had he uttered his final words
when they left the room.
No sooner had she mentioned his
name when through the door walked
Jim!
Giving short answers
Apart, however, from this fairly common
use of inversion, it can also be used to
great effect in other ways. Most commonly,
it is used in short answers, for example:
I love Chinese food. - So do I!
It’s rather cold out today. - It is, isn’t it.
They don’t get a travel allowance. Neither do we!
The final example can also be written as
one longer sentence spoken by a single
speaker to show how inversion is common
after negative words or expressions such
as “neither”, “not only” or “seldom”, particularly when these involve a comparison:
They don’t get a travel allowance
and neither do we!
The final example above uses two examples
of inversion – as you see, it can also be
used to great effect after expressions of
place.
Avoiding the repeated use of “if“
Conditional sentences can be constructed
with inversion as an alternative to repeated
use of the word “if” by starting a clause
with “would”, “should”, “were” or “had”:
Should the glass break, it will be replaced free of charge.
There was an extra charge for dessert;
had we known we would have refused it.
Were he to tell his boss about the accident, he would probably lose his job.
V O C A B U L A RY
to juxtapose
nebeneinander stellen
seldom
selten
comparison
Vergleich
succession
Reihe
hardly
kaum
scarcely
kaum
to utter
äußern
dessert
Nachspeise
to astonish
verwundern
to amaze
erstaunen
to astound
verblüffen
Giving exclamatory emphasis
Sentences that you would like to give more
emphasis to can be inverted. This makes
them look like a question, perhaps a
rhetorical question, but in fact they are not
questions at all as shown by the use of a
falling rather than a rising tone at the end
of the sentence. For example:
Isn‘t it warm in here!
Wasn‘t it amazing that she was able to
wrap up the deal in no time at all!
Particularly in formal English, inversion
often produces an elegant turn of phrase,
so keep your eyes open and:
So astonishing will be your command
of the English language that not only
will you amaze your colleagues in
Germany, you will also astound native
speakers!
Autorin: Anita Duncan.
tempra365 4 / 09
17