This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 131.
Get your foot in the door with these business idioms.
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Foot shaking, Aubrey. How's it going? I'm great.
I have a fun question for you. Okay, I'm ready.
I think I could guess the answer, but are you the type of person that is able to keep your chin up?
Yes, I definitely have been a pretty positive person my whole life.
It helps when people around me are positive too, right?
People around you definitely set the tone, but I think naturally I'm a pretty positive person.
What about you? Do you keep your chin up?
Yeah. In most situations. Yeah, same. I feel like all of us on the Allers English team have this characteristic in common.
Yeah, we do. We do. This is such an interesting idiom.
We're going to talk more about it today.
And there are so many idioms that we use in business English that are about body movements, right?
So many. As I started preparing this, I'm like, oh, man, there's like one for every single body part.
It's crazy. Yeah, it's important. So I'm excited that we're going into this topic, right?
Body expressions used in the business world.
So cool. But guys, first, go ahead and hit follow on this podcast right now.
Make sure you don't miss it. We drop three episodes a week for you on Business English, and we really show you how to build relationships and business using English, right?
Informal, formal, and semi-formal. We cover it all.
Yes, exactly. So wherever you find your podcast, wherever you're listening to this, be sure to hit the follow button.
You never know when there'll be a bonus.
Yeah. Or I don't know about you, Lindsay.
I know I've mentioned this to you before.
Sometimes I'll just like a podcast will drop off my radar and I'll realize I've missed all these great episodes.
And if you follow, then that won't happen.
And we publish so many that you can't miss anything, guys.
You cannot miss a thing. So where do we want to send our listeners to, first of all?
Yeah. So first of all, in a recent episode, it was 1967.
We talked about fairness in American education and we use this idiom giving someone a leg up.
We talked about studies that suggest degrees from certain universities give students a leg up.
So you can definitely check out that one if you missed it.
It was a really interesting conversation, but it kind of inspired this episode for other similar idioms.
Right. And I could see how that would be a strange expression.
What does that mean? Right. I put my leg up.
What? What does that even? Yeah. Yeah. So, so I'm glad we're going into this today.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. We talked about that one in that episode, but it just means to have an advantage, right?
And then we're going to go into three more that we use all the time at work.
We want you to be comfortable using these, just like we talked about.
We're pretty informal using a lot of idiomatic language at work and you want to be able to use these to connect.
Yeah, and this first one I really like, Aubrey, because it sounds like a little less of a cliche.
It sounds a little more formal to me, kind of.
I don't know why. It just, it feels like it's good for work because at work we take on responsibilities, right?
Exactly. This one is shoulder responsibility.
I agree. It doesn't sound cliche to me. I hear it quite a bit, but it always is like the most appropriate thing you can say in the conversation.
Yeah, and why isn't it like elbow responsibility or...
Wrist responsibility. Why shoulder? What do you think?
Who knows? Yeah. You know, I guess if you think about someone, if you're carrying a pack, like a backpack that goes on your shoulder, you think of your shoulders as being, or, you know, if there's like a yoke where people are, they have something, it's often your shoulders that are carrying that.
Yes. A hundred percent. That takes on all the weight, right?
So here's some examples, right? So we'll assign tasks to each member so that no one shoulders too much of the responsibility, right?
So we're talking about like a team where instead of, you know, if things aren't assigned and we're just working together to complete a project at work, that's going to happen often that one person shoulders a lot of the responsibility, whoever's the most of a go-getter.
Yes. And so you got to, right, assign those tasks so that the work is equally dispersed.
Yeah, Michelle and I talk a lot about, well, I mentioned this a lot with Michelle about graduate school.
And I'm not sure if you had an experience in graduate school, but in grad school, everyone is working.
Most people are working full time, right?
They're adults. They're not kids necessarily.
They're not like hanging out on the quad and campus.
And so everyone's got a job. So when it comes to the group work, there's usually a lot of group work in graduate school assigning those tasks.
There's always one person that shoulders more responsibility.
Unfortunately, it feels that way. Yes, it's so true.
It was the same for me where we were all working full time.
And if you let them, someone's just going to have their name on the project and they're not going to do a lot because they're busy.
Yeah, 100%. It happens. It happens. So that is shouldering the responsibility.
Any other example here? Yeah. Yeah, let me give another example here.
You could say, she shouldered a lot of responsibility for this project and handled it really well.
So it's actually a great way to compliment someone.
If you say they shouldered something well, they shouldered responsibility well, you mean that they're like a good leader.
They had all of this responsibility and they didn't break under the pressure.
Yeah, and it's always a good thing. Don't get us wrong here.
It's always a good thing to volunteer to take on more responsibility at work, right?
Maybe something is a little out of your comfort zone, like an angle on a project.
You volunteer, you say, I'll take care of that.
Like, I'll figure it out, right? That's really impressive to a manager.
And it's taking the responsibility off the manager's shoulders, right?
And you're going to take it over, which is really good.
A good way to get ahead, I think. Yes, absolutely.
I love a team member who has this quality where if they have the bandwidth, if they have extra time, they're going to say, you know, hey, what can I take off your plate?
I could shoulder a little more responsibility this week.
Let me know how I can help. Love that. The communication is key too, right?
Within the team, making sure. Yes. So that's always a good thing to do.
What would be the next one, Aubrey, talking about going up to the face now, something on the face?
Yeah. Yes, this is the one I asked you about at the top of the episode.
If you are the type of person that keeps your chin up, this means to stay positive, to not get discouraged.
And often we'll just shorten it to chin up, especially if we're giving someone advice saying like, stay positive, just chin up.
Or like, hey, chin up. Come on. You know, that kind of thing.
Yeah. Let's give some examples. So here's the first one.
We didn't meet our goal this quarter, but keep your chin up.
We've got a lot of prospects in the pipeline.
Nice. Nice. Yeah. Right. It's a good way to just stay positive.
Maybe something's not going perfectly, but keep your chin up.
It'll get better. Yeah. And then it also could be more casual, right?
This could be at work or even at home talking to your kids or something.
Yeah. Right. Absolutely. Right. You might say, sorry, you're having a bad morning, but chin up.
It's almost Friday. Right. Right. And would this be useful like at all levels of business talking to anyone?
What do you think, Aubrey? Let's imagine where at work.
Yeah, that's a good question. It's probably not something I would say to a boss or a supervisor, even if they do seem like they're having a bad morning.
Yeah, because it is very informal. It's very friendly.
Yeah, it's kind of like peer-to-peer, right?
Or parent and kid could work too at home, but peer-to-peer.
It's really, it's not so much like, yeah, it's really about on the same level in a way because it's casual, like you said.
Exactly, right? A little casual. So for coworkers, colleagues, absolutely.
Probably not for clients or your boss because peer-to-peer is really good.
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Now we're going down to the foot. Yes. So let's do it all over the body.
So get your foot in the door. I bet our listeners have heard this one before, but maybe they don't know how to use it.
So let's do it. Yeah. Yeah. It means to gain entry into either an organization or a career as like a starting point.
So you might say, you know, I'm applying for this entry level position.
I'm fine with that. I just need to get my foot in the door.
So maybe you're hoping to progress after that, hoping to be promoted, but you get your foot in the door with those entry-level positions.
Yeah, this reminds me a little bit of internships.
I feel like internships are kind of fading out or people aren't doing them anymore as much, right?
Like in the aughts, there were big unpaid internships or low-paid internships is what people- That was the way to get your foot in the door.
Right, to get their foot out. I'm not sure those are happening anymore as much, rightfully so, right?
But- People have to do something in their 20s to get their foot in the door, whether it's networking.
How do I meet someone in a power position at that company?
What do I do? How do I work the channels?
Yes. I love that you brought up networking because that's a lot when we're going to these conferences and we're socializing.
We're putting ourselves out there for this reason, right?
We need to get our foot in the door with each person we meet so that we're building those relationships.
It's so vital. Yeah, I mean, that's the whole reason people join, like clubs, I mean, like golf clubs, like it does make me think a lot about systemic issues to on the on the negative side, like it's hard to get in, which I hate that it breaks my heart, right.
But a lot of these deals are these getting your foot in the door sometimes happen at like parties, or clubs that are already hard to get into.
But That's very similar. It's similar to that episode we mentioned at the beginning, 1967, right, where we're talking about how sometimes people are able to get their foot in the door just because of who their parents are or who, you know, just that they happen to be born into a world of privilege.
And it's easier for them to get their foot in the door.
And some of us have to like really hustle.
Yeah, 100 percent. I mean, there's a whole cohort of legacy admissions at the at the Ivy Leagues.
Right. That we know that's a legacy admission.
Right. We know because their parent went there or their grandparent or generations went to Harvard.
And so they're getting in. And maybe they were able to donate the funds for like a building.
They're going to get in their name. Their family name is on billing.
They are going to Harvard. Don't make any mistake about it.
Right. So tricky, tricky thing. Maybe we'll come back to this societal issue later.
Yeah. Yeah. We have one more example here just to say she was lucky and got her foot in the door with a PR firm right out of college.
And this, yeah, I love that. We'll, we'll talk about it this way.
If someone goes straight from college to like their dream job, exactly where they want to be without all the steps that some people are having to like, maybe, you know, work hourly job, not doing exactly what they want while they're waiting for the right opportunity.
Yeah. But some people are lucky and get their foot in the door right away with a company that will really be what they want.
It makes me think of the movie Devil Wears Prada.
Do you love that movie? I love that. I just think it's so entertaining.
It's so fun. Meryl Streep is fantastic in that movie.
And Emily Blunt. She was my favorite. She's kind of the other co-worker.
Yeah, I love Emily Blunt. That's such a good film.
Yeah. You guys have to check it out if you haven't.
Anne Hathaway is sort of the main actor worker in this office.
And Emily Blunt is sort of the one that's getting like replaced, but they're both working for Meryl Streep.
It's really interesting office dynamics at like a fashion magazine.
Yeah. And I think Meryl Streep is supposed to be a real person who exists.
Yeah. I think she is based on- Anna Wintour, right?
It's supposed to be Anna Wintour. Yeah. Anyways, at Vanity Fair.
Is that right? Vanity Fair? I don't know.
I don't think I could work for someone like that.
No. Oh my gosh. So that was the whole idea, right?
She thought she was in New York, but she needed to get into writing and editorial.
She thought working at the vanity fair of the movie would have been the way in, but she found out it was not the way for her.
Right. Not the way to get your foot into the door.
Not the right way. Get your foot in the door.
Yeah, very interesting. That's interesting.
I'm actually glad I made that mistake because we don't remember all the time that idioms really have to be word for word.
That sounded really odd to me when I said, get your foot into the door.
No, that's not true. It has to be in the door.
Yeah. Use the correct preposition always.
Yep. Yep. So interesting. So I think I, every time I fly, that's always in the deck of options and I watch it like two out of three times.
I love it. Anyways. All right. Let's get, let's get to the role play here.
Oh, we had a couple others though to Oh, I just wanted to point out there are so many guys, right?
Have a stiff upper lip, stick your neck out, keep your eye on the prize.
So we will definitely do another episode soon.
So be sure to follow the podcast so you hear how we use those in business English.
Yes, good stuff. So here is our role play today.
Aubrey, you and I are co-workers. We're discussing one of my tasks, one of my many tasks.
Yes, I'll start us out. I've got some extra bandwidth this week.
If you could use some help, it's got to be tough to shoulder the responsibility for that entire project.
I'd appreciate that. Actually, I keep getting bogged down and I'm not sure I'm going to meet that deadline.
Chin up with both of us working on it. We'll get it done for sure.
That'd be awesome. If we can get our foot in the door with this client, it could be a huge account.
Nice. Love that teamwork. We used them all there, right?
It's just like what we were talking about.
Be that coworker that if you have the extra bandwidth, meaning a little extra time, that yeah, you offer to help.
Especially when someone, you know, someone is bogged down, like we said, has too much on their plate.
100%. So here you went ahead and said, it's got to be tough to shoulder the responsibility for that entire.
So you're already thinking, oh my gosh, that must be really hard.
Yeah. Exactly. I know you've been assigned a project that seems big to me, seems like a lot.
It's got to be tough to shoulder that responsibility, meaning to have all of that responsibility on your shoulders.
Yeah. And then because we're peers, well, I mentioned getting bogged down.
That's a good bonus for today. Right. Exactly.
Meaning you're underwater is another idiom we use where I'm also thinking like drowning.
There are so many idioms for being overloaded at work.
We can do another episode on water idioms for work.
That'd be fun too. Right. Hit follow if you want that episode.
That'll be a fun one to record too. So bog down is really good though.
It's very, what makes me think of like the cranberry bog, striped bog down, like you're just pushed down.
Right. Yes. Yeah. Then what did you say?
And then because we're peers, like you said, I said, chin up with both of us working on it.
We'll get it done for sure. Right. So just a way to encourage to let them know, like, OK, you got this.
And again, important that you said, as we said before, because we're peers.
Right. You wouldn't necessarily say that to a boss.
Right. Again, it means you're in a similar level, your teammates, you're working together.
Exactly. Good. Imagine how weird it would be to say to a client, if the client's like, I don't know if you're going to get this into me on time.
You're like, chin up. I can do it. No, that doesn't make any sense.
No, peer to peer, peer to peer. Love it.
And then I said, that'd be awesome. If we can get our foot in the door with this client, it could be a huge account.
So you're just trying to open the door a little bit to get in.
Exactly. Yes, we use all of these so often in business English.
Now that you have all of the meanings and examples, we want you guys to challenge yourself.
Use these idioms at work to sound more native natural to build that connection.
You don't want to be too formal at work.
Yeah. Don't be too formal. Be a human being at work.
That's our philosophy on business English.
Always go for connection, not perfection.
But the way to do that is not to enter into the workplace sounding like a robot from a textbook.
It's to be a human being. So let's connect that way.
Yeah. Yes. The more you can use idioms and phrasal verbs, this more fun language, that's the way to not sound like a robot.
Yeah. Got it. All right. Thanks for hanging out on Business English and I'll talk to you soon.
Awesome. Thanks, Lindsay. See you next time.
Bye. Take care. Thank you for listening to Business English, a podcast just for you, the high achieving global professional.
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