Welcome to a new, light-hearted and definitely different program that blends Chinese and English, partly in response to the government's current initiative to motivate civil servants to improve their already advanced English foreign language speaking skills, and partly in response to research that recommends specific and excellent resources for professionals. In this program, our target audience is you; the professional! So, that is why we say, this program is "for professionals by professionals".

   Episodes air Saturday's at 1405 pm, after the news. This is not a "language teaching" program, however, it will focus on pronunciation and listening at the advanced level. Each program is a little different in content. And, each program has Chinese translation inserts in the first half, but not during the professional interview/conversation. The first half includes lots of culturally influenced information, oral "yoga" and in the second half, we invite you to listen in to a re-recorded conversation between the host Deb and a special guest professional. Your goal, should you choose to accept, is to enjoy the conversation as is, yet, use self-reflection listening skills to improve your listening skills. This week, Deb outlines her philosophy of the program, using British author, Rudyard Kipling's East is East and West is West ballad. The goal of speaking is to communicate. For communication to be effective, the listener needs to be able to understand easily. Speaking is not the only method of communication, but it is the focus of this program.

   SPECIAL PROFESSIONAL GUEST: Mr Bruce Bateman. Part 1. Recorded at Grand Hotel, Taipei.

   Bruce has launched over 30 companies, 9 successfully, at least 8 failures (!), and is currently managing 5 companies. He has worked all over the world including Silicon Valley, lectures and continues to learn, a self-described "super geek," expert in start-ups, business traveler (over 70 countries), businessman and friend. His conversation is his story of how he started to where he is now.

   We invite you to listen as he talks generously about his life and what brought him to Taiwan and to this point in his life. His story is one of dedication, creativity, joy, dealing with failures, intelligence, humility and loving respect for his family and Taiwan. This story has four parts, but will be interrupted and then completed in May.

   All our interviews are conducted in a conversational tone, to meet two goals of our program. 1. To be a valuable language improvement resource. 2. To encourage international communication in English. The English spoken on this program is advanced level and is mindful of one’s goal for professional development.

    Using the radio, our interviews are conducted in either a real-life environment, where background noise is part of the conversation, as it is most realistic, or in the beautiful NER recording studio. Our goal is to bring authentic English to you, spoken by professionals for professionals.