This is one of the many e-newsletter articles (updated) I wrote during the period 2000 – 2015 when I was managing my technical recruiting agency, Caribbean Resourcing Solutions (CRS for short).  If you wish to read more of my business articles check out this link which searches the Media tab on the company website for my name.

¿Habla Español?

Some time ago I attended a breakfast technical presentation at a local hotel.  The gentleman sitting next to me turned out to be an American working in Trinidad. As I started to eat my eggs and buljol , he said “Buen provecho”. When he saw my puzzled look, he translated “Bon appetite!”.

First of all, I was ashamed that I didn’t understand such a simple Spanish expression.  Secondly, it’s ironic that the English translation was actually a French one. Thirdly, how come an American can speak Spanish and I can’t, and I grew up and live in a country just seven miles from South America? The reason, of course, is that he does business with South America.

The odd thing is that CRS also did business with South America at the time. We had an international client doing work in Trinidad and our client contacts lived in Brazil. I know, they speak Portuguese there but they can also speak Spanish and English.

From time to time, clients ask us to source Spanish speaking I.T. professionals to work in Trinidad and who can communicate with regional head offices in South America or the Dominican Republic. That combination of skills has been virtually impossible to find here in Trinidad.

Globalisation is already here – large multi-national companies lump the Caribbean with Latin America rather than English-speaking North America. We’re more comfortable shopping in Miami or visiting relatives in Toronto, than traveling to our much closer neighbours like Venezuela or Colombia.  This is because of the difficulty of the language barrier. Yet, many of the bars and gyms in Port of Spain (note the irony of our capital city’s name) are full of Spanish speaking people, mainly from Venezuela.

Years ago, I was playing a game of “Trivial Pursuit” in Tobago with some visiting English friends. The question was “What is the official language spoken in Trinidad & Tobago?”. To my amazement, my friends answered “Spanish”. Maybe I don’t pronounce my words well enough for them to think that English is my first language! Actually, they were misled by the fact that our country has a Spanish name … another irony.

So, I’m very pleased that in 2005 the T&T government established an initiative to drive “Spanish As First Foreign Language” to help our nation become proficient in Spanish by the year 2020.

This will make my job much easier when sourcing people for my Latin American clients, and we may get more such clients as a result. In fact, some of our local clients are already expanding to Latin America. I’m sure the demand for Spanish as a pre-requisite for good I.T. jobs will escalate as a result, together with the opportunities to work abroad.

So, think about enrolling in a Spanish language class. You can find them at UWI, NIHERST, the Venezuelan Embassy and many private institutions in T&T. Some companies are also introducing training for employees to learn business and conversational Spanish.  Of course, there are many online language courses available online, some free such as at www.futurelearn.com.

¡Hasta La Vista!