They are afraid to speak
“I know quite a few colleagues that have already had Dutch classes with the purpose of being able to help customers in both languages, but sadly enough more than half of them don’t dare to speak. So, that leaves me as one of the only bilingual employees to take care of everything. If a Flemish person calls, it’s ‘I will pass you on to my colleague’, but that way I never get my own work done.”
They are impossible to understand
“One of our employees is just the greatest; super motivated and capable, but his Dutch… He tries to speak, but most of the time you just don’t understand what he’s saying. We often just nod yes and get on with our jobs, but of course this slows everything down considerably, plus we even got into deep trouble once when this exact issue produced a misunderstanding with a customer.”
We miss out on Dutch-speaking customers
“Honestly, we always limit ourselves to customers coming from Brussels or Wallonia, because we know that English or French are most commonly used. Our level of Dutch just isn’t good enough, not even to present ourselves. I feel ashamed every time we need to ask to continue in French. After a while you just start avoiding Flemish prospects overall, requests remain unanswered for weeks while French requests are handled within 24 hours.
They lose their motivation
“Our working language might be English, but most employees are still Belgian. Belgians who (at our company) speak Dutch to each other during breaks, in the hallway, amongst each other at meetings. We sent a lot of expats to night school, but even after 3 years, they still don’t speak a word of Dutch. Eventually many leave after a few years of trying because they still don’t feel at home.”
This is what most companies told us when they called upon the assistance of Hello Languages regarding Dutch classes. Please bear in mind that this is not an exhaustive list. That’s why we won’t go too far into detail when it comes to previous customer’s experiences:
- Losing customers to the competition who are able to provide Dutch-speaking services.
- Perfectly bilingual company with only one manager or employee who cannot speak both languages much to the dismay of co-workers who did take the time and effort to learn.
- The account manager that loses his/her personal flair in Dutch, therefore not being able to win over the customer’s trust, while he/she can perfectly do so in their own mother tongue.
- Functioning more slowly within the company due to communication issues: doesn’t understand the issue, has an accent that is difficult to understand, cannot fully explain what needs to be explained.
- Missing out on Dutch-speaking customers and its market entirely.
- The expat manager who cannot communicate with his co-workers, be it employees or blue-collar workers.
- The expat who cannot seem to integrate, does not function as well as in normal circumstances and ends up leaving.
- …
All our language trainings are made-to-measure.
We can provide private classes as well as in-company group classes on-site or at our office.
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SUCCESS STORIES
What do our customers have to say?
Arosha
Association for Intelligent Transport Systems
Tanika has been fantastic in her approach with me. She recognised
our strengths and kept our interests alive. With every lesson, we got a confidence boost. The method of teaching was very “today” too. So far, I am loving it. Keep up the good work, Tanika.
Monica
Customer service associate @Janssen Inc.
Tanika is an excellent teacher. She helped me improve my Dutch Language skills through a few private and small group lessons over the course of three months. She is very thorough and consistent and quick to identify problem areas and hone in on them. Tanika is also very flexible and happy to customize a lesson according to the needs and goals of her students. I highly recommend her as a language teacher.
Paulina
2D/3D-generalist
Learning a language is nothing I haven’t seen before, but when I took classes with Tanika, it felt like a whole new experience. She knows exactly which method works best for each individual student. After only a few months, I could speak Dutch confidently in my private life, as well as professionally.
Sophie
Owner of HoHm.be, interior design & soft furnishing
I would highly recommend Hello Languages to anyone hoping to learn a foreign language. Learning basic Dutch in school is not a problem, although it is time consuming. Once you need to know more technical words for example, for work purposes and a better comprehension of sentence construction then a one-to-one course is ideal. Tanika really makes the effort to understand the ideal way of teaching you so that you don’t struggle. I will continue improving my Dutch language with Hello Languages and would suggest others to do the same!