All Work and No Play

The "Longman American Business English" series is designed to improve the communication skills of professional people involved in international business. The series is suitable for classroom use or self-study. Each title has a book and a cassette. The subject matter is similar to that of the "British English Skills" series, but the books are not adaptations and have been written from scratch. They are at a slightly lower level than their British English equivalents and are less crowded and more guided, with the Asian market in mind. "All Work and No Play" aims to provide pre-intermediate and intermedicate students of English the tools they need to take part confidently and effectively in social situations within a business context. Guidance is provided on the following: the correct language to use when meeting someone for the first time and when meeting an acquaintance; appropriate small talk; ways to make invitations and to accept or decline them; strategies for beginning, ending and maintaining conversations; ways to act as both host and guest. Using this course, students should find guided exercises which are non-threatening for lower level students.
The course should also help students develop good relationships with business colleagues and clients and help them to cope with a variety of social situations which are likely to occur in their business lives. It should help even lower students to act confidently in social situations. The course shows a variety of people of different nationalities talking to each other in English, so it avoids the sense that they will always be up against people with native speaker fluency.