The cost of poor English to businesses has long been a subject of debate. The most intangible issue is the effect that poor English has on weakening a company's brand value. More tangible, but nonetheless just as hard to calculate, is the amount of business a company loses due to poorly written proposals.

However, new research shows that aside from the above intangibles, there is a direct cost that can be calculated right down to the last cent, and that is "productivity loss."

The study found that Client A, a financial services companies, had no less than 58 senior staff, earning an average HK$59,680 per month, spending an average of 30 minutes a day on editing their colleagues' work into presentable English. This equates to lost productivity of HK$3,730 per month, per employee. This may not seem like a lot of money, but when this cost is calculated for the whole company (i.e. 58 people) the costs amount to a staggering HK$216,340 per month or a whopping HK$2,685,600 per year.

Added to this definitive cost is the intangible cost of the senior members of staff being removed from the core role that they have been employed for. For example, if a marketing director spends half an hour a day editing their colleagues' grammar, that's half an hour that he/she is not marketing, and hence potential lost opportunities for the business.

Client B, a property management company, spent even more time than Client A ensuring that their English quality was of a respectable standard. Client B's senior managers spent about one-twelfth of their day editing colleagues' work, or a month out of every year.

According to figures compiled by Watson Wyatt, the average monthly salary for management positions in Hong Kong is HK$125,000 for top managers, HK$75,000 for senior managers, and HK$40,000 for middle managers.

Mind Your Language has found that many second-tier and local companies do not place much value on high quality English communication, believing that the problem pervades so deeply into day-to-day business that they are "just as bad as everybody else." However, this is where the astute corporation can win business from their more lackadaisical competitors. Companies wanting to dramatically improve the quality of English communication inside their company should take the following simple two-pronged approach:

It is clear that the winners in any economic environment lead the field in communication, as good communication translates into increased brand value and increased business. Communication starts right at the basic level of communicating effectively in the preferred language choice of the customer. Companies that choose to ignore this fundamental truth do so at their peril.