Author: Yenny Urrego

Tips about interactions and culture

Don’t be too direct! Start your conversation with icebreakers

*All levels*

If you have spoken Spanish with Latin Americans before, you probably know they usually don’t go straight to the point immediately, they chat a bit first.

When you need to ask someone to do something, or you just need something, it’s very important to interact with the person a little bit before you ask. It could be rude for some people if you don’t have a small talk before. Let’s go to an example to see the whole picture.

This is the situation:   

You would like to start an alliance with another company, you have been in touch by email with the decision maker, and agreed to have a meeting.

If you just introduced yourself and started talking about the topic, it could be a little abrupt for your listener, and you might not have caused a great impression.

So, how can you have a successful meeting?

  • Start with friendly greetings:

Depending on the relationship you have built you could say:

¡Hola! ¡Buenas tardes! ¿Qué tal? ¿Cómo ha(s) estado? ¿Cómo le/te ha ido? ¿Qué tal todo? ¿Cómo van las cosas?  

  •  If you have some background of the person or the company, show genuine interest:

¿Mucho trabajo? ¿Qué tal la familia? ¿Qué tal el cambio de sede? ¿Cómo van los proyectos?

  • Don’t say vague and short answers. Try to say at least another sentence:

To the question: ¿Qué tal todo? Don’t say only: “bien.” Try to say something else, for example: “bien, con mucho trabajo”/ “emocionado con el proyecto”, or if you just don’t know what to say, the weather is always something to talk about. You can say: “bien, con frío/con calor/contento con el clima”.

  • Once you started the conversation, try to move it to the point you want to tackle:

If the person commented about working hard, for example, you can mention how convenient it is to have help and later on how your company could give a hand with an alliance, in a win-win strategy.

The core of the issue is to create a friendly and smooth conversation to build trust and confidence with your new stakeholder.

Of course, you shouldn’t take half an hour talking about personal issues and not covering the topic you want, it’s just about some comments that would make a great difference in order to create a fluent relationship.

By Yenny Urrego – Espanovo Team

 

Tips about interactions and culture

How Can I Introduce myself properly in Spanish?

*Beginner*

Just by using simple tips, you could have a great first impression in Spanish

It’s very common to hear from Spanish learners sentences like: 

Soy 40 años* Soy un abogado* or soy interesado en … (subject)*

Find out why these phrases are not accurate and how expressing correctly what you meant will help you interact better in Spanish.

  1. In Spanish we have age, we are not a certain age

How come?

Yes, we know it sounds incredibly weird to say: I have 40 years* (tengo 40 años), but to master a foreign language we need to understand the world is conceived in different ways by different cultures.

In Spanish we can BE (ser) nice, polite, respectful, honest (amable, cortés, respetuoso, honesto), because it’s what it should be by nature or what is supposed to be or you can BE (estar) happy, annoyed, overwhelmed or crazy (contento, enojado, abrumado, loco), because it’s usually something temporary, emotions experienced at a certain situation.

However, when it comes to age, things are different. To help you understand this, you could think of old people saying they can’t believe time has passed so fast, they feel they ARE not that old. My grandmother, for example, used to say she didn’t feel she was an old woman, she felt as if time had passed but her BEING was still the same. So, age in Spanish is not permanent (SER), because it changes, nor temporary (ESTAR), because it accumulates… then you HAVE it, it’s a possession you have with time.

  1. Don’t include an indefinite article (un, una) when you express your occupation

When you say “soy un abogado*”, you’re not saying “I’m a lawyer”, it sounds as if you were saying “I’m any lawyer”,  one of many. So, in your first contact be careful and say: “Soy abogado” this is the message you want to convey. You can use indefinite articles when introducing yourself but in sentences like:

  • Trabajo para una compañía en el campo de … (I work for a company in the field of…)
  • Ofrecemos un producto/servicio … (We offer a product/service…)
  • Permítame presentarle a una compañera (Let me introduce you to my coworker)
  1. Be careful with ser

When you want to express you’re interested in a subject avoid using ser. As we mentioned above, ser is permanent, it’s usually used to express the essence of things, it’s nature… If a person’s nature is to be interested that person would like to benefit for himself  all the time, and that’s why we need to be careful, if you say: “soy interesado” that means you like to take advantage of others, benefit from others in any way. So, it has a bad connotation. If you have a friend who only calls you when he or she is in trouble, or need money and is not for you when you need him/her, then, you would say: “Él/ella es interesado.”

What you would probably mean was that there is a subject that calls your attention, in that case you would say “Estoy interesado en …(subject)”

By Yenny Urrego – Espanovo Team