Strategic Language Focus - Describing Financials (Video 9)

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En provenance du cours de University of Pennsylvania

English for Business and Entrepreneurship

1164 notes

University of Pennsylvania

English for Business and Entrepreneurship

1164 notes

Welcome to English for Business and Entrepreneurship, a course created by the University of Pennsylvania, and funded by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, Office of English Language Programs. To enroll in this course for free, click on “Enroll now” and then select "Full Course. No certificate." This course is designed for non-native English speakers who are interested in learning more about the global business economy. In this course, you will learn about topics and language necessary to succeed in the international workplace. You will explore business English through authentic readings and video lectures, while learning about business vocabulary, concepts, and issues. Unit 1 will provide an introduction to entrepreneurship by examining ideas, products, and opportunities. In unit 2, you will learn about the basics of market research, including how to identify an opportunity. The next unit in the course will focus on business plans, why these plans are important, and will give you a chance to practice composing a business plan. In the final unit of the course, we will present basics for funding a business and will help you create a persuasive presentation, or pitch, based on a business plan. Unless otherwise noted, all course materials are available for re-use, repurposing and free distribution under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution license. Supplemental reading materials were provided by Newsela, which publishes daily news articles at a level that's just right for each English language learner.

À partir de la leçon

Unit 3: Creating a Business Plan (Part 2)

In this second part of Unit 3, we will learn about the Financials section of a business plan and how to create a simple, brief business plan of our own.

Financials: Part One—Startup Costs, Operating Costs & Sales Projections (Vocabulary & concept focus) (Video 6)5:16

Financials: Part Two - Income statement (Vocabulary & concept focus) (Video 7)6:34

Financials: Part Three - Startup Costs, Sales & Revenue Projections, Cost Projections & Income Statement (Calculations) (Video 8 Part 1)4:03

Strategic Language Focus - Describing Financials (Video 9)5:55

Creating a brief business plan (Video 10 Part 1)3:19

Creating a brief business plan (Video 10 Part 2)3:44

Unlockable Achievement0:09

Rencontrer les enseignants

Amy Nichols
Manager of International Research and Program Development
English Language Programs
James Riedel
Executive Director
English Language Programs

Welcome to unit three, video nine, language focus, describing financials.

In videos seven and eight.

We discussed how to calculate the numbers an entrepreneur needs for a business plan.

But a business plan needs more than just numbers.

It also needs sentences that describe these financial numbers.

In this video, we will look at how to describe financial information in words.

This video will review the vocabulary needed to discuss changes over time.

We will also look at how to use the passive voice with verbs in a business

plan.

Let's look at an example sentence we might find in a business plan.

Revenues are expected to increase from 2015 to 2018.

Let's first look at that verb, increase.

You probably know that this means revenue will get bigger.

The business will make more money.

So we can say, revenues will increase.

We could also say, revenues will grow or revenues will go up.

These verbs are synonyms, they all have the same meaning.

Now let's look at the opposite of these words.

Maybe you expect costs to get smaller over time.

So you could say costs will decrease.

Costs will decline.

Costs will go down.

These are all good ways to express this idea.

There are others but these six phrases are enough to start writing sentences for

your business plan.

In addition to this special vocabulary,

you can use a special grammar structure to write about financials.

This is the passive voice.

Let's look at this sentence in the active voice.

Our company expects revenues to increase next year.

English speakers sometimes use the passive voice to focus attention

on the most important noun in the sentence.

In this sentence, that is revenues, not our company.

The reader will understand that your company is calculating

this financial information.

It's more important to focus on revenues.

So you could write, revenues are expected to increase next year.

The form are expected is called the passive voice.

Notice the I or R company is not in the sentence.

Let's take a closer look at how to form passive verbs using the verb to expect.

Passive verbs have two parts, a form of to be, and a past participle of the verb.

In this video, we will only look at the present

tense as that is used to describe data in a business plan.

So to be becomes is or are.

The past participle of expect is expected.

So we have it is expected or they are expected.

For your business plan, chose is or

are, depending on if a noun is plural or singular.

So you would write, revenue is expected, costs are expected.

Let's practice.

Try another example on your own.

How would you change these sentences to use the passive voice?

Remember, which noun is the most important?

A, I designed this product to help children with their homework.

B, I designed these products to help children with their homework.

Remember, you can use the passive voice

to focus the reader's attention on the product or products, not you.

Because they already understand that you are the business owner.

For more practice with the form, play the game that follows this video.

Let's put it all together.

If we look at this graph of costs, we can use special vocabulary and

passive voice to write a description.

Costs are expected to decline in the future.

Costs are expected to decrease or go down.

In this video we looked at describing financial information with special

vocabulary for changes over time and the use of passive voice.

Gain five, will help you to continue to practice your understanding of financials.

And how to describe them.

Keep playing until you feel confident.

We will review the steps for creating your own brief business plan in video ten.

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