• Spotlight - Hispanic Heritage Month
• Workshops & Conferences
• New Article: Engaging your Multicultural Workforce
• Did You Know?
• Blog Highlights
  • Opportunities in Multilingual Workplaces | Cultural Competency in the Medical Field | Two Police Departments Start Spanish Classes for Force | Latinos’ Job Fatality Rate Highest of All Workers
• Our services

Since 1968, American has honored the culture, traditions and contributions of people from the Spanish-speaking world with a celebration each September. Originally a week long, it was expanded in 1988 to last a month. The starting date, September 15, was chosen to correspond to the independence celebrations of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Mexico’s independence is celebrated on September 16 th, and Chile’s on September 18 th.

Some great resources on Hispanic Heritage Month inclue the US Census Facts for Features, the Smithsonian Institution and PBS.

Maybe you’re a human resources director or plant manager who wants to be able to communicate more effectively with your Spanish-speaking employees, or perhaps you have an employee whose English skills or accent would benefit from some individual attention. Either way, talk to us about the benefits of language coaching. But don’t just take it from us:

I would recommend this program to any employer looking to have better communication and and a better relationship with their employees. While I am not fluent in the language, my employees have noticed a huge difference in my communication, and we have improved productivity by 15%. Employees that rarely spoke to me or asked questions before now feel comfortable asking me questions or addressing concerns .
- VP, Huron Paper Stock

Spanish for 40 Wal-Mart managers who were interested in improving communication with Latino customers and employees.

This was a great experience for me, not having had Spanish in high school or college and also having a lot of Spanish-speaking customers in my store’s community. What I learned today has created a spark to learn more and take it to the next level. Thank you!

Spanish for Wyndham Glenview staff and English for Wyndham Glenview hourly employees to bridge the communication gap

Spanish for Valley Industrial Association...

Presentation at the National Restaurant Association’s Restaurant Show on Recruiting in a Multicultural Environment

Presentation for BlueCross BlueShield Association employees on immigration and health literacy challenges

Spanish-language harrassment prevention for Quadrangle …

Interested in holding a workshop at your organization? Contact us to discuss the details.

Founder & President Jill Bishop was published in the July/August issue of the BoardRoom Magazine. Her article, Engaging your Multicultural Workforce, provides concrete suggestions for engaging and leveraging your workers – regardless of industry. With one out of every two new workers born outside the US, addressing the needs of your culturally and linguistically diverse workers has never been so important. Click here to read the article.

Every year, the Multicultural Foodservice & Hospitality Alliance hosts a reception during the NRA Show. One face featured in Nation’s Restaurant News article MFHA reception pays tribute to industry’s ‘Faces of Diversity’ was son of Founder & President Jill Bishop.

Click here to see little Henry, clad in his chef’s jacket, looking like someone spiked his sippy cup.

Our blog continues to expand its coverage of a wide variety of issues, including language in the workplace, language policy, translation, immigrant workers and Latino culture. Please feel free to contact us if you encounter any articles that would be relevant. Some recent blog highlights include:

Seven Signs of Work Bias
A recent survey by the Level Playing Field Institute reveals that, when compared with white men, other workers, including people of color and gays and lesbians, are up to three times more likely to leave a company because of unfairness alone. What’s more, unfair or biased treatment costs U.S. employers some $64 billion a year in lost productivity and profits…

A Nation of American Polygots?
What does having 15 million Spanish speakers who don’t speak English “well” mean for us? So here’s the translation: Those needs increase the demand for doctors, teachers, lawyers, writers, radio hosts, construction foremen, salesmen and many other types of blue and white collar U.S. workers who can speak Spanish…

States Legislating Cultural Competency Training for Health Care Providers
New Mexico , New Jersey, and California are among a handful of states that have passed legislation requiring the public institutions with health education programs to provide cultural competency training to students…

Banking and the Hispanic Market
Various sectors are reaching out to Latinos because of the increase in their numbers and buying power.  And the financial industry is no different.  In fact, financial institutions might see unprecendented growth over the coming years as they reach out to Latinos in the U.S…

Cultural Competency a Must for Indiana Teachers
A recent series of workshops aimed at educating Indiana teachers in how to be more culturally competent and sensitive to their students’ backgrounds and cultures.  Cultural competency training is even more imperative in school districts where teachers are overwhelmingly Caucasian compared to less than half of their students.  A lack of cultural competency can severely affect students’ performance and self-esteem, thus perpetuating the cycle of low attainment for minority students…

If you're new to Workforce Language Services, here's a quick overview of our services. More information can be found at our website. We offer:

• Onsite business or industry-specific Spanish classes, workshops and one-on-one language coaching
• Onsite job-specific English classes, workshops and coaching
• Translation of internal and external written communications (to and from any language)
• Transcription of Spanish, English and other language audio files, whether academic, marketing, legal or otherwise.
  
• Interpretation for HR investigations, new hire orientations, conferences, etc.
  
• Diversity training (English and Spanish)
  
• Harassment prevention (English and Spanish)
  
• Leadership training (English and Spanish)

As always, contact us for more information about how we can help bridge the language and culture gap at your organization.

2630 N. Drake Ave. | Chicago, IL 60647