BE 398: Phrasal Verbs That Will Help You Speak Up at Work
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This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 398, Phrasal Verbs That Will Help You Speak Up at Work.

Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English. Get the English skills you need to achieve your dreams in global business. For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Aubrey, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA. Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English.

Hey, listeners, we're happy to have you with us as we explore business and sharpen your English language skills. If you're looking to take your learning even further while gaining invaluable business insights, we highly recommend a podcast that we love called TED Talks Daily. This show delivers daily TED Talks from some of the world's brightest minds covering topics like technology, career growth, education, and beyond.

It's the perfect way to improve your English, fuel your curiosity, and get inspired. Listen to TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. Hey there, Aubrey. How are you today? I'm great. How are you, Lindsay? Good. Welcome to Business English. Glad to be over here. Aubrey, is there anything that's holding you up at work at the moment?

Yeah, I had to send an email to the software, the company that creates our courses, you know, a little sort of snafu we're seeing. And it is kind of holding me up a little bit because I need to figure out the fix on that before I can know exactly how to do feedback for students. So, yeah, I think it'll be a pretty quick.

quick fix that is frustrating when something is holding you up from getting done what you need that can be frustrating you know by the time this episode comes out it will definitely be resolved but in the moment when you have a workflow and you have a number of tasks that you need to complete in a week it can be frustrating right I'll breathe to be held up mm-hmm yes absolutely this is part two of a series of

phrasal verbs that have up that we use both in work and in conversations. So part one was over on Allers English. Stay to the end and we'll share the episode. You can definitely listen to these out of order. Yes. Today's are more that we use all the time at work, but of course also in everyday conversations. I love it. So you already used the first one, Aubrey, which is hold up. I asked you, is there anything holding you up at work?

Exactly. And this is interesting. It can mean these two different things, either something that's keeping you from progressing. Mm-hmm.

Or we also use it to mean wait, right? We'll often interrupt when something's surprising and say, hold up, did you say they haven't signed the contract yet? Yeah, that's a casual way of asking someone to wait, you know, hold up, hold up. It's very casual. It's very human, but we can use it at work, depending on how casual that scenario is, right? Yeah.

Let's do a little mini role play where we might see how that would look. All right. So we won't know about that until Q2, but we can...

Oh, hold up. Why won't we know about that until Q2? Okay. So you cut me off here, right? Yeah. So there's like needing more information, right? It is tricky. This is the type of thing where you do have to think about the relationship, the scenario, how casual is the meeting. Because when it comes to interrupting a presentation or a meeting, like...

that is tricky to think about. You would only want to do that if it's absolutely imminent, if there's no way that that could be handled later, if someone's going to waste time sharing information, we don't need to know something like that, right? I totally agree. It's tricky to know how to express that. Yeah, who's around? Who's at this presentation? How formal does it feel? This all determines our word choice, right?

Absolutely. Right. And then we have that second way that we used at the top of the episode that something is holding us up at work, a bottleneck. We've talked about this recently on the podcast. I remember sharing bottleneck. We use that a lot, but there are things that can hold us up that just impede our progress. Yes. Bottlenecks are the worst. Next one is keep up. Now this one's good. Keep up, pay attention, follow along.

maintain the same speed when I ski, you know, I feel the pressure to keep up with my father-in-law, for example. Yeah.

And then we might say at work, we're going to go through the next agenda items quickly. So please try to keep up, right? Especially if you're wanting to warn someone that the speed's going to increase, like, okay, keep up everyone. Yeah. Very common. Very common. And then staying up to date on something, right? That's also a form of keeping up. Now, for example, you know, do you keep up with the news, right?

right staying up to date would you keep up with the news are you able to keep up with your tasks at work right it means you're able to complete everything and stay on track yeah exactly or do you keep up with politics are you up to date on what's you know right now things are moving so fast it's not easy to keep up right we have to check the news all the time so this just means staying in line with what's current okay exactly and then our third um phrasal verb here is bring up we use

We use this a lot at work. It means to raise a matter for discussion or consideration. I might say, I need to bring up our concerns at the next meeting. It means I'm going to raise them as a topic of discussion. Exactly. Exactly. Or sorry to bring this up again, but we still need to resolve the HR issue.

Yeah, yeah. So you're feeling like I've brought this up a few times, it still hasn't been fixed. I'm trying to politely bring it up again. Yes, to raise the issue. Right? Love it. And then speak up, right? We talk about this a lot in our professional English course, right to speak up when can we speak up in meetings?

Yeah, this means to express one's opinions openly and frankly. You know, I might say, I've witnessed some disturbing behavior and it's time I speak up. Right. And this does often imply that whatever you're going to say might not be well received. Like someone you're telling might not be really thrilled to hear it if you say, I need to speak up. I'm going to speak up.

Yes. Or you need to speak up if you want your boss to know how hard you've been working. Right? Love that. Right. You have to advocate for yourself, right? If there are a lot of things you're doing behind the scenes, you might need to speak up so that that's recognized. Exactly. And then there is a second nuanced meaning of speak up.

And how is it different, Aubrey? Yeah, it means to speak more loudly. So for example, if someone's giving a presentation and you say, can you speak up? We can't hear you very well. This means, can you speak more loudly? Yeah. And in the first meeting that we discussed, meaning expressing your opinions, frankly, bringing up a topic, it doesn't necessarily mean speaking louder. I guess it

could, but not necessarily. These are two different things. Yeah, it usually means more like advocating for yourself, right? Exactly. Saying something that, yeah, so these are two different meanings. It might be both. You need to speak up for yourself and also speak up. I can't hear you. Yeah. And often, especially if you work in a workplace where people, maybe if people are from a different...

part of the world and it's more normal to speak up, we need to make sure that we're representing ourselves well and that people are hearing us. So speaking up in both senses of the word. Yes, good point. That can be very cultural. So you will need to pay attention. Is this difficult for you? And maybe even practice speaking up at home with a speaking partner before you do so at work. For sure. All right.

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Okay. We are back, Aubrey, with buildup. There's another one. Oh my gosh. Yes. This is a good one. It has a few meanings. So first it means to establish and develop an organization or situation over a period of time. So maybe staff, right? We've been building up our staff and now we're in a good position to expand. So building, developing...

But there are more meanings. What's the second meaning? Well, this is kind of more of an emotional thing, right? When something increases gradually, right? So typically something negative, like a feeling, which could lead to a problem or a crisis, right? So it can be emotional or it can be...

Like forms, right? Forms that need to be processed are building up. We may need to hire another person to help with this workload. Yeah. It could be bureaucracy stuff, right? Right. Your to-do list could be building up. The emails in your inbox are building up. It just means increasing. But we use this phrasal verb, build up a lot at work. Like, oh, things are building up. Yeah.

Totally. Exactly. And then there's a third way. Wow, we really make use of these phrasal verbs, don't we, Aubrey? We really do. And this, there's a little grammar note here because previously we were using phrasal verbs. This third way is, it's actually a noun. And it's written, we squish the two words together, build up, we write it as one word and use it as a noun. Yes. A gradual accumulation or increase.

typically have something negative and typically leading to a problem or a crisis, right? We have quite a buildup of forms that need to be processed. Now, this sounds different. For our listeners, guys, try to listen for the difference. We have a buildup of forms versus those forms tend to build up.

- Sounds different, doesn't it? - Right, because it's one word, we do squeeze it together when we're speaking, right? We would never have any kind of breath or pause between the two words, build and up. We write it as one word, as a noun, and we say it that way as well. It's interesting. - You got it. All right, let's see how this looks in a role play. So here we are in a standup marketing department meeting. And in our course, we talk a lot about standup meetings. They're super common, especially if you work in technology.

Right? Absolutely. I'll start us out. Ready? I'll be tackling logo selection today. We have a buildup of options since I've been having a hard time keeping up with submissions. Sounds good. I know those had been building up for a while. That's good though. I'm glad so many were sent in. Yes, I was going to bring that up at the meeting this Friday. That was a great idea to ask for submissions from all departments. Hold up. Was that Anne's idea? I'm glad she spoke up.

Nice. Awesome. And I can imagine you like, you need to take a note of that. Like, okay, hold up. I need to make a note of whose idea that is before we move on. Right? Yes, totally. Totally. This style of coming together on a daily basis or a weekly basis to talk about what you're working on that week. What are your blockers? Very common scenario here.

Absolutely. Let's go through how we use these. First was that noun where you would write it as one word. I said we have a buildup of options. So the buildup here is a noun, right? Options have been building up. We have a buildup of options. Yes, a buildup.

Exactly. And as you said, Aubrey, no gap, no extra breath between build and up when it's a noun, right? Exactly. And then I said, I'm having a hard time keeping up with submissions, which means I'm getting overwhelmed, right? I can't stay up to date. I can't keep everything done when I would like to. Yes. And then I said, sounds good. I know those had been building up for a while. Now I'm using the phrasal verb, right? I know those had been building up for a while, accumulating.

Exactly. You had seen a lot of them being sent in. You're seeing the pile maybe or the stack or maybe I've been venting my frustrations about it for some reason. You know, that's been building up. Yeah, for sure. And then I said, you said, yes, I was going to bring that up at the meeting this Friday, meaning I was going to raise the issue.

Exactly. For discussion, right? Bring that up means I'm going to say what's happening so that we can discuss it and come to some kind of decision together. Perfect. And then what did I say, Aubrey, for the last one? And then you said, oh, hold up. Was that Anne's idea? So you're interrupting here in a way that means the same as like, wait, wait just a second. For some reason, I'm imagining you taking a note and then you say, I'm glad she spoke up.

Yeah. So we have that phrasal verb speak up, right? Maybe. And it has more of a tendency to be quiet to not speak up a lot. So you're glad to see this. Yes. And this is not the one where she's raising her voice necessarily, right? This would mean you're glad she shared this amazing idea. Exactly. Exactly. All right, Aubrey. So where was part one again for this series?

Yeah, you can scroll up. It was 2386. Weight up English phrasal verbs for softening imperatives. This was a great episode. Do not miss it. Love it. And where should we leave our listeners?

Yeah, well, we use so many phrasal verbs with up in business English. So we want you to be able to use today's tips to speak in a very native natural way. Often there is a different verb, maybe multiple verbs that you could use that will feel a little more formal, a little more stiff. But even in business English, we often will opt for the phrasal verb instead.

Yeah, phrasal verbs are everywhere, right? We can't avoid them. We can't ignore them. So listen again, start using one or two of these out in your workplace and let us know how it goes. Right, Aubrey? Yes, absolutely. Awesome. Thanks for joining me today, Lindsay. All right. See you soon, Aubrey. Have a good one. You too. Bye. Bye.

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