In the July 6, 2026 episode of You Should Know, a WRKdefined podcast on workplace leadership, communications coach Peter Novak makes a compelling case that effective global business communication hinges on clarity and confidence rather than perfect grammar or expansive vocabulary. Novak, founder of Strictly Speaking Group and a former professor at the University of San Francisco, draws on his 25-year academic career and coaching practice with executives at major corporations to argue that inclusive communication is a bottom-line business issue, not a political one.
Novak highlights how unconscious biases, particularly the well-documented like-me bias, influence who gets promoted and believed in the workplace. He points out that phrasal verbs like "take off," "take up," "take over," and "take down" can quietly derail non-native English speakers, and suggests using AI prompts to swap them for stronger, clearer verbs. A McGill University study on foreign accents, Novak notes, reveals how trust and credibility are affected by accent and delivery, emphasizing that non-native speakers often translate, interpret, and vocabulary-hunt in real time while native speakers barrel ahead.
Novak reframes the narrative around adaptation, stating, "The best way to position it is that this is a business issue, that you need your communication to be as clear as possible to everyone, not just to a select few." He invokes a Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers analogy to illustrate the extra effort non-native colleagues exert. The conversation also touches on how investor relations teams now run CEO earnings calls through AI to score language choice and tone of voice, and how building executive voiceprints by feeding hundreds of hours of transcripts into AI helps leaders deliver scripts that sound authentic to them.
Practical tactics include a 20-question intake Novak uses to help new executives communicate their preferences, from pre-reads to agenda formats. He references Yakov Smirnoff on the absurdity of English, contrasts Ernest Hemingway's accessibility with Oscar Wilde writing "for about 6 people," and notes that Latin American teams often operate trilingually until a monolingual American enters the room. Novak also shares cultural intelligence lessons from his preparation for business in Tokyo and Dubai, underscoring that clear communication across borders is increasingly urgent as global teams grow more distributed.
