EEC 429: Why 2.2 Billion Potential Employees, Stakeholders and Clients Can't Understand You, with Myke Wilder

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: Excellent Executive Coaching: Growing Your Business and Enhancing Your Craft
Episode: EEC 429: Why 2.2 Billion Potential Employees, Stakeholders and Clients Can't Understand You, with Myke Wilder
Host: Dr. Katrina Burrus, PhD, MCC
Guest: Myke Wilder
Date: April 21, 2026

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Overview

This episode centers on the challenges of communication for managers and leaders working with multinational, multilingual teams—particularly when English is not everyone’s first language. Dr. Katrina Burrus interviews Myke Wilder, a coach specializing in helping leaders bridge language gaps. Drawing from his unique experience with hearing disability and bilingual work history, Myke connects the experiences of hearing impairment with those of L2 (second-language) English speakers, offering actionable strategies for clearer, more inclusive business communication.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Language Barriers in Multicultural Teams

• Main Challenge: Native English-speaking managers are often unintelligible to team members who speak English as a second or third language.
• Common Problem: Use of idioms, connected speech, and informal expressions make messages difficult to process for L2 speakers.
  • Quote:
    “The vast majority of them cannot understand that manager when they speak regular conversational English.”
    — Myke Wilder (02:44)

2. The Impact of Hearing Disability on Communication Coaching

• Personal Connection: Myke, with his lifelong hearing impairment, draws parallels between “partial hearing” and limited comprehension due to second-language barriers.
• Insight: Strategies for coping with hearing loss also benefit those working in a second language.
  • Quote:
    “Working in your second language is an awful lot like working with a hearing disability. If you can't hear the words, you can't understand the conversation.”
    — Myke Wilder (01:23)

3. Techniques for Speaking to be Understood

• Broadcast Voice: Emulate news anchors—speak clearly, enunciate, and eliminate unnecessary complexity.
  • Quote:
    “Your national news anchor is speaking more like this than a regular conversational person. They have what’s called a broadcast voice. … The problem is that no one else has this training.”
    — Myke Wilder (03:20)
• Content Words: Emphasize key nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs; de-emphasize articles, prepositions, and filler words.
  • Demonstration Example:
    “Katrina, I’m going to the store to buy some gum.” versus “Katrina, going store by gum.”
    (04:34)
• Linear Sentences: Avoid complex, clause-laden sentences—keep messages direct and linear.
  • Quote:
    “Try not to say sentences that have to have commas in them.”
    — Myke Wilder (16:07)

4. Consequences of Poor Communication

• Individual Impact: Decreased engagement, loss of confidence, foreign language anxiety syndrome.
  • Quote:
    “People feel that they're not seen, they feel they're not heard... I was afraid to say that I wasn’t following the conversation.”
    — Myke Wilder (07:05)
• Organizational Impact: Undervalued talent, missed opportunities for creativity and input.
  • Quote:
    “People who have the potential to make contributions... just stay quiet, especially if the culture is not conducive to them speaking.”
    — Myke Wilder (08:13)

5. Practical Solutions and Training

• Plain Language Movement: Adopted in writing (e.g., ISO standard), but not yet widely applied to speaking.
  • Quote:
    “There is no ISO for plain language speaking. And this is what I'm talking about.”
    — Myke Wilder (09:52)
• Simple Comprehension Signals: Nonverbal cues (e.g., forming a “C” with your hand) signal lack of understanding without embarrassment or interruption.
  • Quote:
    “If you hold your hand up in front of your face, fingers forming the letter C... it just signals the speaker quietly, without interrupting, that there is a comprehension issue.”
    — Myke Wilder (13:09)
• Custom Glossaries and Vocabulary Training: Using AI tools to develop job-specific term lists and sample conversations for faster integration and comprehension.
  • Quote:
    “It generates glossaries... and also gives sample conversations that they can practice. ... Fewer mistakes, fewer errors, fewer accidents, more engagement.”
    — Myke Wilder (21:55)

6. Bridging Cultural and Linguistic Silos

• Name Games for Team Integration: Managers are encouraged to learn and practice correct pronunciation of all colleagues’ names to foster inclusivity.
  • Quote:
    “If you mess it up, you try again and you get help. And yeah, everybody's laughing, but... we say, ‘Oh, these Arabic names are so difficult.’ [But for] the second language speakers, ‘Arnold, how do I say Arnold?’”
    — Myke Wilder (20:18)

7. Mindset Shift for Managers

• Golden Rule: Focus on the needs of the listener.
  • Quote:
    “When you are speaking, you aren’t speaking for yourself to your listener. You have information that you want to deliver ... you need to be sure to package that in a way that is comprehensible for your listener.”
    — Myke Wilder (23:37)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On language anxiety:
  “Tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of workers in North America suffer from [foreign language anxiety syndrome] all the time. So what you have are people who nod that they understand, but they don't.” (07:05)
• On idioms gone wrong:
  “There are no flowers in software design ... [the VP] had said ‘put the pedal to the metal’ ... and the whole team was in a panic because they didn’t know what they were supposed to do.” (17:00)
• On the scope of the issue:
  “There are 2.2 billion people in the world who speak or are learning English as a second language. And English is the global language of business.” (06:08)

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Important Timestamps & Segments

| Timestamp | Segment Description | |-----------|----------------------------------------------------------| | 01:23 | Myke explains the impact of hearing disability | | 02:44 | The core problem: Managers aren’t understood | | 03:20 | The “broadcast voice” and need for vocal training | | 04:34 | Role of content words in clear communication | | 07:05 | Individual and organizational consequences of misunderstanding | | 09:52 | Plain language writing (ISO) vs. speaking, and the corporate gap | | 13:09 | Nonverbal signal for comprehension issues | | 16:07 | Advice on using linear, simple sentences | | 17:00 | Idioms creating confusion in multicultural teams | | 20:18 | Techniques for integrating L1 and L2 team members | | 21:55 | Using AI-generated glossaries and job-specific vocabulary | | 23:37 | Overarching tip: Shift perspective to the listener |

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Practical Takeaways

• Speak intentionally (broadcast style) to L2 English listeners.
• Prioritize content words and clear diction.
• Keep sentences short, direct, and linear.
• Avoid idioms, cultural expressions, and complex grammar.
• Use non-disruptive signals for comprehension checks.
• Integrate both L1 and L2 speakers through inclusive practices (e.g., learning names).
• Leverage tools (e.g., AI glossaries) for job-specific language training.
• Always package information for the audience, not just for your own convenience.

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Closing

Myke’s central advice:

“Think of your listener. … you need to be sure to package [information] in a way that is comprehensible for your listener.” (23:37)

For further information, visit mykewilder.com.

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This episode is a vital listen for any leader or coach working across languages or cultures—providing both a mindset shift and practical toolbox for maximizing team clarity and engagement.

Transcript

[A]

As a manager or as a leader, you want your team members to understand you clearly, to tell them what the direction is and what is expected of them. Right. Well, what happens if you have a multicultural team member group? How do you address them if their English is their second or even their third third language? So let's ask Mike Wilder, a specialist in coaching leaders who have team members as English as their second or third language. How can they address the issue? Welcome to the excellent executive coaching podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Katrina Burus, and today we are going to interview Mike Wilder. Mike, welcome.

[B]

Thank you, Katrina. Thank you so much for having me.

[A]

I'm delighted to have you. And we have a different perspective about language and understanding. So let's get to it. You have an unusual background in that you had hearing disability. And how did it impact your work today?

[B]

Well, my hearing disability had a very large impact on, certainly on my career because I ended up having to leave a 30 year career in corporate communications just because I couldn't manage to hear the conversations well enough. And I became an English second language teacher, always having worked in two languages. So my in communications, I worked in English and French. English is my first language. Then I taught English to second language speakers and discovered that they had the same problems that I had when I was working in French. And it was the training that I got to deal with my hearing disability that allowed me to put all of that into focus. That is where all of the little pins fell down. Because working in your second language is an awful lot like working with a hearing disability. If you can't hear the words, you can't understand the conversation.

[A]

Very interesting. And so we'll come back to that before the end of our podcast. And I would like to ask you, what is the biggest problem managers face when they're leading teams of workers who speak English as a second language?

[B]

The vast majority of them cannot understand that manager when they speak regular conversational English. And I am not speaking regular conversational English right now. This is regular conversational English. We use things like connected speech, which I would have to explain, and idioms and all kinds of things that make it hard to understand but that ethnic English speakers just process immediately.

[A]

I see. So how do you help them?

[B]

Well, one of the very first things that I do is I give people vocal training, voice training on how to speak, and people think, well, this is going to be very weird. You know, how can I do this? If you just listen to your local national news anchor, your national news anchor is speaking more like this than a Regular conversational person. They have what's called a broadcast voice that they learn in journalism school or broadcast schools. And a lot of CEOs are given media training for when they have to present the company on air. And they also learn to modulate their voice. The problem is that no one else has this training. So managers and supervisors who are working with frontline workers who speak English as a second language are often virtually incomprehensible.

[A]

And what is the some of those specific. Can you give us an example of how to articulate so that you can be understood by someone who is speaking a second language?

[B]

Okay. The first thing that someone should do is really focus on pronouncing what we call the content words. So if I said, katrina, I'm going to the store to buy some gum, I'm going to the store to buy some gum. If I said, Katrina, going store by gum. Now that's not a perfect sentence, but you would have enough information to have a very good idea of what's going on. So the content words are the words like the nouns, the verbs, the adjectives, and the adverbs. And those are the words that carry information in the sentence and all those other little verbs, well, they're really important for the grammar. But if you focus on giving a good full pronunciation of the content words, you know that your message is going to land.

[A]

So they have to learn what are their context words and enunciate it properly.

[B]

Yes, that is a really good start.

[A]

I see. Okay, so what are the consequences of, you know, working with second language L2, as you say, people in a team. That makes it even more challenging because there's several people from different languages, especially in a multicultural team, to be honest.

[B]

Well, the multicultural aspect can be difficult. And I am not really focused on the multicultural aspect. I focus on the multilingual aspect. But the fact is there are 2.2 billion people in the world who speak or are learning English as a second language. And English is the global language of business. So when we see people from other cultures and other languages in Canada, in the United States, Great Britain, they are working in second language English. So the focus is on English. For, for me, I see.

[A]

So on a business level, to have lack of maybe sufficient English to be understood, what are the consequences on the team and organizational level?

[B]

On the team level, you have a massive loss of engagement. People feel that they're not seen, they feel they're not heard. There is something very well established called foreign language anxiety syndrome. And I have suffered from this dealing in French, where I was afraid to say that I wasn't following the conversation or I was afraid to say that I didn't understand because I would look incompetent, I would look stupid. I've lived through this. I don't really suffer from it anymore. But tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of workers in North America suffer from it all the time. So what you have are people who nod that they understand, but they don't. They're hoping to figure it out later.

[A]

That's a very good point.

[B]

That's a big problem.

[A]

Yes. And on a organizational level, I imagine that there's a lack of creativity potential. You know, the potential of creativity is lacked. Their full contribution as well.

[B]

Absolutely. And people who are actually very intelligent and really good workers and also have the potential to make contributions above their station in terms of new ideas and ways of doing something better, they just stay quiet, especially if the culture is not conducive to them speaking.

[A]

So these managers that you coach to work with a team that is using their English as their second language, what are the kind of suggestions you give to them?

[B]

Well, first of all, of course, speak to be understood. So the mindset is to focus on the needs of the listener, not on yourself. I know that people want to get their information across, but they have to be thinking about the listener. And this is actually not a new concept. In 2023, the International Organization of Standards, they're the ones who make the ISO courses that companies take to established themselves in corporate processes. They issued an ISO for plain language writing, and about a thousand lawyers immediately died of a heart attack. But what it does is it urges companies or it trains companies to focus on writing so that it's easy to read, easy to understand, and so that the reader is immediately capable of getting the information that they need from the written document. But there is no ISO for plain language speaking. And this is what I'm talking about. And companies that are familiar with plain language and the plain language movement, which is growing very rapidly, can really understand what I'm doing by applying the concepts of plain language writing to speaking.

[A]

Yes. And tell for our listeners that might not know what ISO is.

[B]

The International Organization of Standards is an international organization that sets standards for performance and excellence in various business processes. So you could get an ISO certification for your supply chain or for if you're in food, for food cleanliness in your kitchens. And being able to say that you are ISO certified assures your clients and potential clients that you have excellence in your operations in that area.

[A]

Yes, yes. This makes Me remind, I was senior assessor of tqm, Total Quality Management. So it's good to hear that they have an ISO 4 language. Yeah.

[B]

So writing language but not speaking it.

[A]

Ah, writing, writing. Thanks for that clarity. So when you coach managers to work with frontline people, how has your hearing impairment helped you to coach them?

[B]

Well, there are several things that transfer from that. One of them is the concept of partial hearing. Now, partial hearing means that you are hearing a lot of the message and it isn't always the speaker's issue. It is, somebody coughed in the meeting or a car went by outside and somebody missed a word or a couple of words because there was noise or maybe the speaker mumbled. Now, for a first language speaker, our vocabulary and our understanding of English is generally easily sufficient for us to fill in that gap. We didn't hear the word or we only heard part of the word, but we're able to fill that. Second language speakers don't have that capability. The other thing about partial hearing is when you hear words that you don't know or understand. Part of the training that I provide is I give my clients tools to develop vocabulary exercises, glossaries and dictionaries for training their employees for the specific jobs that they are doing.

[A]

I see. But for example, the person that the second language person, and there's a car passes by and they can't even hear the word. The English speaker, as you said, will fill in the missing word. The second person in the second language cannot. So what do you suggest to him to do?

[B]

What I suggest is that you implement a gesture that allows the listener to signal quietly that they are not understanding. Now, I talked a little about foreign language anxiety syndrome. If you're in a meeting and there's a lot going on and you don't understand something, it is incredibly embarrassing and difficult to sort of stop and wave your hand and say, oh, sorry, I don't understand. Can you fix that? But what I introduce with my clients is a simple symbol. If you hold your hand up in front of your face, this is for the listener. If they hold their hand up in front of their face, their hand, their fingers, their thumb on the bottom, the fingers on the top forming the letter C. If it's with the right hand, then it's properly a C. And that just signals the speaker quietly, without interrupting, that there is a comprehension issue. And the speaker seeing that can make a decision about, I'm going to finish this sentence or I'm going to get through this slide and then I'm going to come back and I Am going to address that comprehension issue with that person. And what it does is it really takes that onus to interrupt and to be public and embarrassed away from the second language speaker, from the listener, and just give them a quiet, confident way to signal that they want something clarified. But it has to be explained to everyone in the department, so everybody knows it.

[A]

I see. So really you work with managers and second language speakers as well? Because it's. Well, what I do is sign language

[B]

managers tools to work with their. Their employees.

[A]

So how else has your hearing helped you find ways to help managers to be sure that they express themselves well? Because you mentioned it. To focus. What you mean by focus?

[B]

Well, focusing on the needs of the listener implies several things. We talked about speaking with clarity, talked about focusing on properly pronouncing content words. One of the other things that we can talk about is keeping sentences simple and linear. Very often when we are talking, we bounce back and forth from the present to the future to the past. We have very complex sentences. What I kind of give a guideline is try not to say sentences that have to have commas in them.

[A]

Ah.

[B]

Instead of saying, before we go to lunch, I want to talk about this, say, I'm going to talk about this before we go to lunch. Just keep the sentences linear. Because if we change tenses, then first language speakers understand that the tense is not changing, that we're moving in time. But it's very difficult for second language speakers because their language, their first language, may treat verb transitions and tense transitions in a completely different way.

[A]

You make a very good point there. Very good point. Each language has a different sentence, a structure in their sentence. Like the Germans have the verb at the end. So. Yeah, yeah, very. Anything else that you can advise to our listeners?

[B]

Well, one of the things that I also really stress is that we need to try to separate out the cultural elements of English. So instead of saying, let's wrap this up, you should say, it's time to end or it's time to finish the meeting. I had an experience. I was working with a team in Dalian, China. They were all coders. It was a coding team that were making an app for a large American financial company. And I got a call from the Scrum Master in a panic. The Scrum Master is in charge of the group of coders. And she said, there are no flowers in software design. And I said that I was very aware that there were no flowers in software design. And they had just come off a meeting with their leadership team in New York. They had been Talking about deadlines. And the boss, the vp, had said, okay, put the pedal to the metal. And he closed the meeting. And she heard, put the petal to the metal. And the whole team was lost. And the whole team was in a panic because they didn't know what they were supposed to do. Could have just as easily said, it's really important that you work more quickly.

[A]

Yes, exactly.

[B]

Instead of using an idiom. So if we avoid idiom, we avoid expressions. Yeah, expressions are very difficult.

[A]

Right. Do you help leaders when they give a speech to a foreign country?

[B]

Well, I have done that in the past. I could probably still do it. But right now my focus is on the training.

[A]

I see. So tell us a little bit more about your training.

[B]

Well, the training, it's a seven week, seven session course. The first three sessions or a voice training on getting that plain language speaking voice down. And I just want to. The plain language speaking voice, all of this that I'm talking about, this is a tool. And you're not going to go home and start talking to your family like you were a news anchor. And if you're in a meeting with a bunch of people that are all English speakers that you've been working with, you're not going to speak to them like a news anchor. This is a selective tool that you use when you are addressing an audience that contains second language speakers. So there's that. After that, we have sessions on how to manage better, integrating L2 speakers into your existing culture, how to massage the culture to accept them better, and also how you train the other English ethnic English speakers on your team to work with the L2s. And one of them.

[A]

So L2s, just for a listener, second

[B]

language speakers, L1s are first language.

[A]

Right. Okay.

[B]

And one of the problems that we see is siloing. Really, seriously siloing, where you have the second language speakers grouped on one side and you have the L1s grouped on the other side. And we have some techniques and some exercises that you can do, some events that you can have to really connect the two sides. One of the things that I stress is getting the names right. And it can be like a game, it can be a meeting where everyone says their name and everyone goes around and has to say their name three times. And if you mess it up, you try again and you get help. And yeah, everybody's laughing, but we're not laughing at someone for their name. We're just laughing because it's hard. Names are hard. And we say, oh, my God, these Arabic names are so Difficult. Or these Russian names are so difficult. And the second language speakers are saying Arnold. How do I say Arnold? So it goes to both sides.

[A]

Right. So that puts them at the same level.

[B]

Get the names right. Then you start building relationships between the employees and especially between the supervisors and the employees.

[A]

Great. So it's really how to work with your voice in a situation where it's needed to talk like an anchor, not all the time. And how to manage your L2 speakers for clarity and also to transcend the culture differences.

[B]

Yes. And there's one last thing. In the training, I have developed an AI tool that I give to all of my clients, and I help them implement it. And this allows them to input data on their company, on the jobs that they're hiring for. Or you can do it for a specific job. You can, as many times as you like. And it generates glossaries of words. It generates phrases and sentences that belong in that job or in that they may hear in at work. And it also gives sample conversations that they can practice. Because one of the things about partial hearing is that if you know a word, it's easier to recognize it. If you're not familiar with the word, then even if you hear it, you're not going to be able to recognize it. So by giving them really specific vocabulary training and sentence training, then they are really much more able to get up to speed quickly. Fewer mistakes, fewer errors, fewer accidents, more engagement.

[A]

Wonderful. So we're coming at the end of our podcast. Tell us one tip that people can walk away. Our listeners can walk away with to better communicate with L2 speakers. And then how can people get a hold of you? This is a very helpful, you know, coaching that they can receive to communicate at all levels.

[B]

I really have to say that the one tip, the one overarching tip is think of your listener. When you are speaking, you aren't speaking for yourself to your listener. You have information that you want to deliver to your listener, which means you need to be sure to package that in a way that is comprehensible for your listener.

[A]

That's very good. Good tip.

[B]

And for people who want to get a hold of me, my website is mikewilder.com and there's a nice button that says booker. How can I help you? Call.

[A]

Yes. And Mike is spelled M, Y, K, E, and wilder is spelled W, I, L, D, E, R. This will be in the show note. I want to thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and your wisdom with the listeners. And I highly recommend to use you if they have to do a speech across cultures and across languages because comprehension is super important. I've worked in a multi language environment all my life. You know, with unaids, United nations, or the World Trade Organization, you walk down the hall, you hear five languages. But this kind of coaching is really super important. So thank you so very much. Mike thank you.

[C]

Katrina thank you for listening to the Excellent Executive Coaching Podcast. You can subscribe to all Future [e-mail] join us each Wednesday to learn more about the latest trends in leadership techniques and bring your coaching to the next level. To learn more about Dr. Burris CEO mastermind, use the contact form@Excellent Executive Coaching.com.