When Jack's company was taken over by another firm, they closed down their branch
offices in Boston and Denver and laid off all the staff. After two years,
the company was doing so well they started to branch out and take on
new staff. Let's discuss Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you
from New York City. And here's your English teacher, Michael. All right,
thank you John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael here from Happy English
and I help people speak English better. And this is Happy English Podcast,
Episode six eighty eight. Business Change. Frasil verbs phrasel verbs are a huge
part of English in both everyday English conversation and in the business world. For
today's English lesson, we're going to have a look at six different phrasel verbs
that we can use to talk about various changes in business. Let's dive in
the first one is take over. Takeover means to assume control or responsibility for
something, often a business or organization. When a person replaces someone else in
the job, we can say that they take over from that person. Here
are some examples. The multinational corporation acquired a smaller company to take over their
market share. The CEO announced to retirement and named his successor to take over
the company. Mister Hagar took over from mister Roth when he left the organization.
Next, we have closed down. Closed down means to stop operating or
stop running a business. For example, the small bookstore downtown had to close
down due to stiff competition from online retailers. That beer factory is closing down.
At the end of the month. The restaurant decided to close down temporarily
for renovations and will reopen in November. The next one is branch out.
Just like the branches of a tree that move out from the trunk of the
tree, when a company branches out, they spand their business into new areas.
We also use branch out when we talk about a person who expands or
extends their interests or activities into new areas. Here are some examples. The
company plans to branch out into international markets to increase their customer base. After
years of designing clothes, Maria decided to branch out and start her own fashion
line. John wants to branch out from his current job and explore opportunities in
a different industry. There is a podcast from All Years English called Business English.
Do you want to feel more confident with your business English. Would you
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say in a meeting? How about writing a more clear email in English?
The hosts Lindsey, Michelle and Aubrey show you real business English vocabulary for the
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Follow the new Business English podcast from All Ears English. Just type all
Ears English into your search bar wherever you are listening to this podcast right now
and choose Business English Podcast and hit follow. The next phrasele verb today is
step down, which means to resign or leave a position or a job.
In other words, step down means you quit, but we tend to use
step down when we talk about people who are at the executive or senior management
level of an organization. For example, after serving as CEO for ten years,
Mark decided to step down and hand over the reins to his successor.
The chairman announced his intention to step down at the end of the year.
Mary's boss encouraged her to step down from her current managerial role and take on
a new challenge in a position overseas. Lay Off means to end the employment
of staff, usually due to financial problems. In the company, we use
lay off in both temporary and permanent situations. Here are some examples. The
company had to lay off several employees to cut costs during the economic downturn.
More than half of the factory workers were laid off for two weeks because of
an inventory surplus. The management decided to lay off some workers from the night
shift due to low demand for their products. The last one for today is
take on. Take on means to employ or hire new staff. Here are
some examples. The company is planning to take on new employees to support their
expansion plans. After interviewing several candidates, they finally took on a talented marketing
specialist. Our team needs to take on additional members to meet the project deadline.
Keep in mind, the best way to remember this or any vocabulary is
to take the word or phrase, write it in a sentence that's true for
you or true in your world, and then memorize your sentences. Well,
that's all the time we have today for this English lesson. Thanks for letting
me help you branch out your English. If you'd like to get more practice
using your English, why don't you join my podcast Learners study group. There
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