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View Full Version : Workers told: Speak English or lose out on pay!



kevinh
01-11-2007, 02:53 PM
An Australian company famous for it's innovative hearing aid products is apparently at loggerheads with it's own staff and the Manufacturing Workers Union, over claims that the company is trying to force it's multicultural workforce to speak English, at all times!

You can read the Age article on line here. (http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/workers-told-speak-english-or-lose-out-on-pay/2007/10/30/1193618886911.html)

It would be interesting to hear HR views on this controversial issue. We have also created a quick straw poll (see above this post).

Moz
02-11-2007, 10:35 AM
This is a tricky one, I can see where Cochlear is coming from. It doesn't do much for social integration or harmony in the workplace if you have cliques within the workforce who converse in languages that fellow workers cannot understand. Imagine if you had to spend every day among a group of co workers and you couldn't understand a word they were saying.

I once attended college classes which were dominated by Kuwaitis and although they all spoke very good English, it was obvious they often had a laugh and a joke at our expense speaking Arabic while they did so. The minority native English speakers got on well with them and it was all very good natured, but I can see how it could have easily been quite the reverse.

What is the employer to do if a worker claims of intimidation or harassment because he or she believe their co-workers are making fun of them in a foreign language?

Although I believe there are several valid reasons for Cochlear's desire to have their staff speak English in the workplace, I think they need to encourage people to do this rather than blackmail them. Just to make things worse it sounds like the MWU are taking advantage of the situation.

Pete
08-11-2007, 06:00 AM
Sounds like there is a whole lot more to this story than just a "speak English" directive. So the obvious, supportive and consultative responses to a workplace with a high proportion of speakers of other languages are not going to fix the whole issue. I have worked in similar situations where we provided free (community funded) ESOL tuition to staff, as the staff wanted to learn and to practice in the workplace we rapidly found the barriers and perceptions of isolation coming down. (Encourage as Moz put it, not chase with big stick!).

Sounds like there is a bigger IR issue here that needs to be addressed first.

kevinh
08-11-2007, 02:18 PM
It seems the situation is not getting any better. There was another article on this topic in the Sydney Morning Herald last week - you can read it here (http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/coworkers-in-firing-line-at-cochlear/2007/10/31/1193618974097.html)