Lastminute.com Blazes A Trail In Corporate Language Learning With Rosetta Stone Software

Published 14th November 2006

Travel and leisure giant lastminute.com is trialling Rosetta Stone’s online language learning software to enable employees to get up to speed in any of 30 different foreign languages.

“lastminute.com delivers a product that is widely used by people around the world and it is important that our employees are able to communicate in a variety of different languages to remain competitive in an international market”, comments Soraya Malik, Operational Training Manager, “As an organisation, we felt that it was essential to offer this type of training, both for the commercial benefit of the organisation as a whole and individual employee development.”

A recent YouGov survey of 2,500 UK employees revealed that 80% had not been offered the opportunity to learn a second language at work, despite EU expansion and tougher competition from European businesses. Additionally, the National Centre for Languages (CILT) reports that nearly half of exporting British companies have experienced linguistic or cultural barriers and 20% have lost business as a result.

Having recognised the benefits of offering foreign language learning opportunities to employees, lastminute.com needed to find the most suitable method for delivering language learning. As an internet company, it seemed appropriate to provide an online solution.

Rosetta Stone was selected because of the success of its unique dynamic immersion methodology, which teaches via context, in the same way that people learn their first language as children. The technique requires no tedious memorisation or list learning and makes learning a language both enjoyable and easy.

Currently, 25 lastminute.com employees are each learning one of ten different languages, including French, Spanish, Korean, Chinese Mandarin and Arabic.

“Rosetta Stone software has been received well by those trialing this method of learning who are finding its interactive teaching method highly effective,” continues Soraya Malik. “Voice recognition technology builds confidence that they are speaking with the correct accent and pronunciation. One of the key benefits of the online programme is that staff can access the course remotely and can therefore learn from home or even on business trips.”