How do you talk money without losing trust—or your audience? From quarterly earnings calls to investor pitches, the world of financial communication is a tightrope walk of clarity, persuasion, and credibility. What makes numbers sound good? When does transparent/positive become too transparent/positive? And why does jargon sometimes feel like the best financial armour? Tune in for a lively dive into the art (?) of financial storytelling—with three experts sharing plenty of insights, red flags, l...
Dec 17, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Season 5Ep. 30
Wait a minute. Why does ‘corporate consultant’ sound more prestigious than ‘business consultant’? Or does it? Do they mean the same thing? How does organizational communication differ from corporate or business communication? And what topics, genres and text types should textbooks on communication in these settings tackle when the genres themselves are blended? Welcome to the challenges of three authors revising a textbook on the power of language in business(?), now turned into a podcast episod...
Feb 05, 2024•51 min•Season 4Ep. 29
Raves, poker nights and Marvel movies – no costs or effort were spared in this final episode on CSR to raise awareness about one of the most pervasive manifestations of discrimination: accentism. In the presence of experts, we uncover what is hidden beneath the surface, and just when we thought we would never judge someone based on the sound waves they produce, we dare(d) ourselves and you to eat the pudding… Long Notes: More information, a full transcript and academic references on wordsandacti...
Apr 28, 2023•53 min•Season 4Ep. 28
ChatGPT & company are here to stay. And so are linguists. Find out why in our exploration of the capabilities and shortcomings of generative AI and how it will affect the competences of lecturers, students and practitioners in business communication and beyond. Via tricks and tips on how to integrate these powerful text production tools in and outside the classroom, W&A once again underscores the crucial importance of language awareness and the human touch in the digital era. The discuss...
Mar 10, 2023•49 min
Prepare to meet some ignorant pigs and silly cows in our second episode on CSR... Together with an expert in ecolinguistics, we will explore the discursive construction of our ideology-laden relationship to nature (and animals in particular!) via the analysis of presuppositions and metaphors, going from tepid COP27 implementation plans on global heating to Chinese self-serving CSR reporting. It will become painfully clear how and why language matters and you'll find out more about your ecosomati...
Jan 13, 2023•59 min•Season 4Ep. 26
All good things come in threes. Or more. Add a Chief Sustainability Officer, a body positive Barbie doll, a purple inclusive M&M and an actual expert in applied ethics and you get a lively discussion on true colours, washings and genuine CSR efforts in the first episode of our new mini-series (it comes in threes) on corporate social responsibility. Have a listen and find out more, including how energy companies account for their profits and your bills via legitimisation strategies. More info...
Nov 11, 2022•45 min•Season 4Ep. 25
Are you one of those people who is always tricked into doing or buying things you don’t want? Do you want to find out how they do it or how to do it yourself? You’re in luck! If you listen to this episode, you will find out all about it! You will even get free access to all the other W&A episodes on language in business, politics and beyond and you’ll discover that your current annoyance and reluctance by reading this is caused by genre awareness. Do it now or regret it later! #hardselltacti...
Aug 12, 2022•52 min•Season 3Ep. 24
Your identity is a right old mess. As is ours, mind you… and don‘t get us started on Marcus Rashford! In this episode we delve into the different layers and facets of identity construction in digital space. Via small stories, solo selfies and networked narratives, we offer ways to inspect different senses of selves as they are created in online environments. The journey will take us past talking dogs, overpowering teacher personas (yes, we are talking about ourselves!) socially constructed bosse...
Jun 24, 2022•45 min•Season 3Ep. 23
Yesterday’s sci-fi has become today’s reality. Join us as we venture our way into the ever-growing domain of Language Technology in which we discover and discuss current and future developments in speech recognition, automated literary translation, opinion mining and open domain chatbot applications. Not only do we find ourselves having cheeky chats with clever cars and critical conversations with experts, we also ponder over the pros and cons of Artificial Intelligence and assess our position a...
Mar 11, 2022•56 min•Season 3Ep. 22
We eavesdrop on police interrogations, wire-tapping and immigration interviews, and sneak on a Keolis bus (on board entertainment: The Interpreter) to explore the complex processes of translation and interpreting in high stakes contexts. Joining us are a forensic linguist, an expert in asylum seeking procedures and a researcher on multimodal translation, who illustrate the pervasive impact of translators as important decision-makers that may affect the future, safety and prosperity of people and...
Dec 03, 2021•47 min•Season 3Ep. 21
“I’m not hungry. One egg is an oeuf”. Is the author funny? Debatable. Is the author multilingual? Ça dépend. In this multi-voiced episode on multilingualism we tackle different interrelated aspects ranging from translanguaging over accommodation to effectiveness and proficiency and we cast more light on multilingual settings and the role of BELF in them. In the process, we make Bernard eat humble pie by interviewing a very, very multilingual person and we raise multilingual voices to stop cruelt...
Oct 15, 2021•45 min•Season 3Ep. 20
For more info and a transcript please head over to www.wordsandactions.blog . In the introduction to this episode on negotiations, we mention the haggling scene in the Monty Python film Life of Brian (1979). Treat yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2iZjxSGca8 On a more serious note, we mention this academic definition of negotiations: Roloff, M.E., & Jordan, J.M. (1992). Achieving negotiation goals: the “fruits and foibles” of planning ahead. In L.L. Putnam and M.E. Roloff (eds) Comm...
Jun 11, 2021•47 min•Season 2Ep. 19
Are you suffering from zoom fatigue, meeting migraines or the occasional shark bite? Have a listen to our next episode and find out more about office diary sweet spots, biochronology, meeting categorizations and how to deal with sharks in conflict resolution. As always, we bring in the expert advice of an academic and we’ll discuss the added value of the Quaker peace testimony with a workplace mediator. In the analysis, we’re heading for the deep waters of the notorious Handforth parish council ...
Apr 23, 2021•49 min•Season 2Ep. 18
In this episode we talk about creativity in language and visual communication. We published many of the images and logos we mention on our website, http://wordsactions.blog . Here you can find the full transcript, too. In the first part of the episode, Erika mentions the following study on how colour influences investment decisions: Chan, C. R., & Park, H. D. (2015). How images and color in business plans influence venture investment screening decisions. Journal of Business Venturing, 30(5),...
Mar 12, 2021•40 min•Season 2Ep. 17
Yes, we are glad to see the back of 2020. But so much happened over those 12 months that we think it warrants a special New Year’s episode. We invited four guests to come with us on a tour of the year, from Brexit Day to university strikes, Black Lives Matter and the US elections. Oh, and we also mention that pandemic that just went and upended everyone’s lives. Please visit our blog, www.wordsandactions.blog for information about our guests, further links and resources. In this episode we start...
Jan 15, 2021•45 min•Season 2Ep. 16
In the second part of our mini-series on the language of entrepreneurship, we enter the dragon’s den, meet an angel and look for gold among the crowds. Episode 15 is all about business pitches and how (not) to use language to find investors. We talk to an expert about how to pitch across cultures, get helpful advice from a venture capitalist and analyse a crowdfunding video. For further details and a full transcript please visit our website at wordsandactions.blog . This episode was sponsored by...
Dec 11, 2020•45 min•Season 2Ep. 15
From Steve Jobs strutting the stage at Apple to that hairdresser with the quirky name on your local high street: in this episode, we start a new mini-series on the language of entrepreneurship. We look at intrapreneurs, social entrepreneurs and mumpreneurs, talk to an entrepreneur with a background in linguistics and analyse how language is used in a business plan. Whether you’re thinking of starting your own business, want to help people do so or can look back on years of running your own compa...
Nov 13, 2020•44 min•Season 2Ep. 14
In this first episode of the new series we talk about change management and the role of language in successfully bringing this change about. In the introduction, we underscore the importance of language in terms of its potential to construct and mold reality (which was also addressed in episodes 1 and 2 of season 1), especially during sensemaking processes of a reality that does not exist yet. In order to make sense, it is established there need to be obvious reasons for the changes that are imp...
Oct 16, 2020•47 min•Season 2Ep. 13
As always, you can find our longer notes on our blog: wordsandactions.blog. In this episode, we discuss job interviews. In the introduction, Bernard mentions the finding that employers give lower ratings to candidates who interview on video. This is reported in Blacksmith, N., Willford, J. C., & Behrend, T. S. (2016). Technology in the employment interview: A meta-analysis and future research agenda. Personnel Assessment and Decisions, 2(1), Article 2. Available at: https://scholarworks.bgsu...
Aug 14, 2020•45 min•Season 1Ep. 12
This episode of Words and Actions starts with Veronika mentioning that the chief adviser to the UK government, Dominic Cummings, used his blog to ask “weirdos and misfits with odd skills” and “true wild cards” to apply for a position as his personal assistant. We also made the point that how much time recruiters spend on filtering CVs is a matter of seconds. These two studies provide evidence for this claim and suggest that the initial time screening a CV has actually gone down from 30 seconds t...
Jul 17, 2020•39 min•Season 1Ep. 11
At the beginning of this part of a miniseries on finding a job, Erika sets the scene by referring to a very recent study on the specific challenges faced by people who start their careers in times of crisis: Arellano-Bover, J. (2020). The effect of labor market conditions at entry on workers' long-term skills. IZA Discussion Paper No. 13129. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3573299 . We then talk a bit about different ways a company or business can advertise positions they hope to fi...
Jun 12, 2020•39 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Episode 9 is a co-production by the Words & Actions and en clair podcasts, sponsored by the Aston Institute of Forensic Linguistics. For further info, references and a full transcript please visit our blog https://wordsandactions.blog . The way we decided to work together is by having the usual parts of a W&A episode ‒ introduction, interview and analysis ‒ bracketed by the en clair host, Claire Hardaker, tell the story of the rise and fall of Enron. In the introduction part after Claire...
May 15, 2020•46 min•Season 1Ep. 9
In the first part of the episode, we start by talking about the gendered connotations of leadership and Erika mentions the results she got when searching for images of a “boss”. We also mention the advertising campaign that pen maker BIC (see also episode 5 on customers talking back) ran for International Women’s Day 2015 and for whose sexism they later had to apologise. Listeners can find the image on our blog, https://wordsandactions.blog . We then move on to different leadership styles and ho...
Apr 17, 2020•38 min•Season 1Ep. 8
We recorded this episode in September 2019, when Britain was still part of the European Union and the Brexit debate was in full swing. At the beginning of the episode, we talk about a contribution to a debate in the British House of Commons that started with a story. The transcript can be found on our website: wordsandactions.blog. We then discuss how people relate life events, such as a divorce, by telling stories rather than completing questionnaires, as shown in the research by sociologist Ca...
Mar 13, 2020•42 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Please visit our website at wordsandactions.blog where you can find more data analysis, glossary and the complete transcript. In the first part of this episode, we introduce different types of crisis as well as communication strategies to deal with them. Two central readings here are: Benoit, W. L. (1997). Image repair discourse and crisis communication. Public Relations Review, 23(2), 177-187. Coombs, W. T., & Holladay, S. J. (2012). The Handbook of Crisis Communication. Malden, MA: Wiley-B...
Feb 14, 2020•39 min•Season 1Ep. 6
In the first part of the episode, we introduce the topic of customers talking back, starting with the Stop Funding Hate campaign, which lobbies companies not to place advertisements in divisive British newspapers. Information about the campaign is available on their website https://stopfundinghate.info/ . We also mention the example of fake reviews of gendered Bic pens on Amazon as a form of customers engaging in social critique through humour. You can find a selection of those fake reviews here...
Jan 17, 2020•38 min•Season 1Ep. 5
In this episode we bring in the know-how of a politeness expert, we get practical insights from a seasoned consultant and we get an interesting visit from a kangaroo on a unicycle. Each in their own way, these guests show the importance of different aspects of language in sustaining healthy customer relationships, ranging from language choice, over politeness issues to bonding through creativity, all the while underscoring the importance of context, as also shown in our analysis of a B2B example...
Dec 13, 2019•39 min•Season 1Ep. 4
Why is it that many commercial spots on fragrances and cosmetics resort to French words or French accents? How come that ‘The Gates of Mordor’ sounds more frightening than ‘The Gates of Mirdir’ and why is that a New York-based ice-cream maker decided to go for a Scandinavian sounding brand name? Find out more about the impact and use of language in and on branding and advertising in our third episode in which we talk about sound symbolism, linguistic fetishism, language choice and how they conne...
Nov 15, 2019•37 min•Season 1Ep. 3
In this episode the hosts talk about how communication and language actually create our social realities; how they influence or even determine how we perceive what we think is true, and how language is used by others to mould or even manipulate our perceptions of reality. They demonstrate the power of language in psychology experiments, inflated job titles and the wording of business letters. Our interview guest for this episode is Professor Dennis Mumby from The University of North Carolina, Ch...
Oct 11, 2019•42 min•Season 1Ep. 2
In this first episode, the three hosts discuss how language matters in business and show how communication, far from just passing on information, is used for many different functions in organisations. Their guest is Michael Handford,who has taught communication skills to and developed training materials for professionals in a variety of industries. They talk about communication textbooks and the need for large collections of real texts to improve them. The episode also features a short analysis ...
Sep 13, 2019•36 min•Season 1Ep. 1
