Supporting success: Foreign language skills for business education. Modeling the Japanese language competencies of Americans and other English native speakers engaged in business in Japan

摘要

The research question, "Which language competence, organizational or pragmatic, within the Bachman (language) Model is most useful to AENS businessmen in Japan?" examined types of language competence as they apply to the current foreign language teaching paradigm in higher education. What relative roles do these language competencies have in promoting business success? Few MBA programs require foreign language skills for graduation--are language skills a necessity? The results of this research, testing competing paradigms of language competence and their roles in business success, demonstrate that language competence does promote success for American and other Native English Speakers in Japan.;This study supports the hypothesis that Pragmatic Competence, the skills that dictate when speech is culturally correct, and Organizational Competence, the skills that dictate when speech is grammatically correct, play equal roles in General Language Competence. General Language Competence is a strong presence predicting "Personal Success" in Japan. Neither General Competence nor the specific Organizational and Pragmatic competencies exhibited significant direct effects on "Company Success," but all showed strong indirect relationships to "Overall Success in Japan," a higher-order combination of Personal and Company Success. These results indicate that those who do have appreciable skill in Japanese, cultural, as well as grammatical, find it supportive of Personal Success and through Personal Success their Company Success. This partially supported claims in the literature, which put forth the need for cultural understanding as paramount. Further studies are needed to better understand the separate cultural and grammatical aspects of Japanese as they relate to the speakers' personal characteristics; how do these skills help certain types of nonnative speakers in their pursuit of business success in Japan, or in countries with other "truly" foreign languages?;It appears that business education for both men and women should spend more time considering foreign language courses focused on Pragmatic skills, learning the cultural proprieties of doing business in Japan. This will require reexamining humanities-oriented paradigms forming the basis of the majority of foreign language learning in higher education, which have since time immemorial focused on Organizational Competence, practicing grammar as the primary way to teach modern language skills. Higher education in general needs to reconsider its liberal arts paradigm for the study of modern languages. Enrichment and utility need not be inimical--humanism and vocationalism can support each other's goals for the academy.