English for Business, Accounting and Financial Studies (BAFS)
Speaking
Common topics for classroom discussions/ presentations
Controversial Business
- Free Market Capitalism
- Lower minimum wage and job creation.
- Would a minimum wage trap people in poverty?
- Is outsourcing an Ethical Practice?
- Outsourcing: Theories versus findings.
International Business
- Surviving International Competition: A Critical Analysis of the Strategic Measures Employed by Local Companies.
- International Investment: The Importance of Educating the Public on the benefits of international investment.
- Business at Sea: The Importance of Instituting and Implementing Environmentally-friendly Approaches.
- Transforming Small Local Businesses into widely Recognized International Brands.
- Human Resources: Effective Strategies for Maintaining Largely Diversified Organizations.
- Branding: Effective Strategies to Provide a Competitive Advantage for International Businesses.
Business Ethics
- Gender Discrimination: A close investigation of its impact on employee performance in an organization.
- Organizational Environmental Pollution: A critical look at its effects on consumer trust levels.
- Labourer Abuse: Analyzing its repercussions in the construction sector.
- Profit Seeking: A critical evaluation of its impact on product quality.
- Advertisements: An Expository Study of the effects of misleading advertisements on consumer trust.
- Gift-giving by Pharmaceutical Representatives: Any strings attached?
- Business ethics: A Philosophical approach.
- Ethical issues in governing a corporation.
- Ethical conflicts: Avoiding religious, political, and cultural arguments at work.
Business Communications
- The effect of internal business communication on the external image of a business.
- The Impact of Interactive online communication on public relations outcomes.
- Interpersonal Communication: The Influence of Culture on interpersonal dialogue.
- The impact of Computer-mediated Interaction.
- Business Communication: Exploring different mediums and channels for effective communication in business.
- The effect of intercultural information exchange on closing business deals.
- Business Negotiation: A language-centred activity.
- Symmetrical Dialogue: A critical look at the processes involved.
- Business Negotiation: Styles in intercultural dialogue.
- Exploring the differences between business communication and general communication.
Design of a successful presentation
Design slides like academic paragraphs using PEE:
- Point – As the title of your slides
- Evidence – As the points of your slides
- Explanation – As your speech in the presentation
Make the evidence visual:
PowerPoint is a visual medium; its purpose is to help an audience visualise what the speaker is saying. The purpose of a presentation should not be information transfer, it should be about enabling understanding and encouraging further action or research.
The best way to make your slides more visual is to use images and diagrams as the evidence to support or illustrate your main point (your slide title). For example, if you want to show the results of a survey, pie charts or line charts are useful figures to display such information.
Microsoft has offered several templates for academic presentation. They are available at this link.