English with Darren

Talking about your job is an important skill when you meet someone for the first time.  Try using some of these everyday phrases to make your English sound more natural. 

Examples

1.  I'm a customer service advisor.  I deal with hundreds of phone calls and emails every week. 

2.  I'm a language teacher and I specialize in Business English.  My job involves planning lessons, teaching and marking homework.

3.  I'm a machine operator in a factory.  I check the machines at the start of the shift because it's really important that they work throughout the day without stopping.  I can control the speed of the machines by pressing different buttons.

4.  I work in a small IT department with three other people.  We all deal with general IT problems in the office, but we also have specific tasks.  I'm responsible for the phone system, but Carole's responsible for the printers and photocopiers.

5.  I'm a HR director.  I'm in charge of the HR department. 

Learning Points

1.  This is a general phrase that you can use for any job to talk about tasks.  

2.  This is a great phrase when you want to talk about two or three main things that you do in your job. Remember the structure:  My job involves + verb + ing.

3.  Be careful with false friends!  Control in English can often mean steuern or regeln in German, and kontrollieren to check in English. 

4.  You can use be responsible for to describe specific tasks that only you do in your company.

5.  Use this phrase when you have a lot of responsibility for people or processes, or both.  It's often used by senior managers. 

Make sure that you always use the correct preposition with each phrase.  I'm responsible of for the phone system.

Interested in learning more?

You can change the structure of the phases in Examples 4. and 5.  Instead of using a phrase with a preposition + noun, you could use preposition + verb + ing.

Tell me more!