Learn how to apologize in a business setting
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Hi everyone, and welcome back to ItalianPod101.com. This is Business Italian for Beginners Season 1 Lesson 18 - Apologies in a Business Setting. Eric Here. |
| Ofelia: Ciao, I'm Ofelia. |
| Eric: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to apologize in a business setting. The conversation takes place on the phone. |
| Ofelia: It's between Leonardi and Linda. |
| Eric: The speakers are acquaintances, so they will use formal Italian. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Leonardi: Pronto? |
| Linda: Signor Leonardi, sono Linda Baker della ABC. La volevo avvisare che arriverò in ritardo, perché sono rimasta bloccata nel traffico. |
| Linda: Mi dispiace. Spero di non causarle problemi. |
| Leonardi: Ho capito, non si preoccupi. Oggi non ho altri appuntamenti, la aspetto. |
| Linda: Grazie, cerco di fare al più presto. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Leonardi: Pronto? |
| Linda: Signor Leonardi, sono Linda Baker della ABC. La volevo avvisare che arriverò in ritardo, perché sono rimasta bloccata nel traffico. |
| Linda: Mi dispiace. Spero di non causarle problemi. |
| Leonardi: Ho capito, non si preoccupi. Oggi non ho altri appuntamenti, la aspetto. |
| Linda: Grazie, cerco di fare al più presto. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation with the English translation |
| Leonardi: Hello? |
| Linda: Mr. Leonardi, I'm Linda Baker from ABC. I wanted to let you know that I'll be late, because I got stuck in the traffic. |
| Linda: I'm sorry. I hope not to cause you problems. |
| Leonardi: I understand, don't worry. Today I don't have other appointments, I'll wait for you. |
| Linda: Thank you, I'll try to do as soon as possible. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eric: Ofelia, Italy has a reputation as a country where delays are acceptable, but is that fair? |
| Ofelia: That's true as far as private lives go; in their private lives, Italians are loose with time and they can also consider fifteen or thirty minutes’ delay reasonable and nothing to get upset about. But when it comes to business, being late is as unacceptable as in many other countries. |
| Eric: So be sure to give notice in advance if you think you can't make it on time, as your delay could mix up the other people’s highly organized schedules. |
| Ofelia: Yes, and that's because time in a business setting is valued in terms of money. In Italian we also have the saying Il tempo è denaro. |
| Eric: Meaning "Time is money." Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Ofelia: avvisare [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to warn, to let know |
| Ofelia: avvisare[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: avvisare [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: arrivare [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to arrive, to come |
| Ofelia: arrivare[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: arrivare [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: in ritardo [natural native speed] |
| Eric: late |
| Ofelia: in ritardo[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: in ritardo [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: bloccato [natural native speed] |
| Eric: stuck, stopped |
| Ofelia: bloccato[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: bloccato [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: traffico [natural native speed] |
| Eric: traffic |
| Ofelia: traffico[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: traffico [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: mi dispiace [natural native speed] |
| Eric: I am sorry, sorry |
| Ofelia: mi dispiace[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: mi dispiace [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Ofelia: causare problemi [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to cause problems |
| Ofelia: causare problemi[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: causare problemi [natural native speed] |
| Eric: And last.. |
| Ofelia: al più presto [natural native speed] |
| Eric: as soon as possible |
| Ofelia: al più presto[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Ofelia: al più presto [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Eric: Let's have a closer look at the usage of one of the phrases from this lesson. |
| Ofelia: It is al più presto |
| Eric: meaning "as soon as possible" |
| Ofelia: This phrase is made up of the preposition a, "at," combined with the article il, meaning "the," the two adverbs più, meaning "most," and presto meaning "soon," |
| Eric: so literally it means "at the soonest." |
| Ofelia: Other similar expressions are il più presto possibile or al più presto possibile. |
| Eric: You can use them whenever you need to communicate that the situation is urgent and if possible, you'd like to shorten administrative procedures and time. Can you give us an example using this phrase? |
| Ofelia: Sure. For example, you can say.. I risultati saranno consegnati al più presto. |
| Eric: ..which means "The results will be delivered as soon as possible." Okay, now onto the lesson focus. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: In this lesson, you'll learn how to apologize in a business setting. |
| Ofelia: In some circumstances it may happen that, no matter how much you tried to make everything fit, you can not arrive somewhere on time. |
| Eric:When this happens, even if the delay isn’t your fault, be sure to give notice ahead of time and to apologize. Let’s see how to do that, starting from the sentences in the dialogue. |
| Ofelia: Linda says La volevo avvisare che arriverò in ritardo, perché sono rimasta bloccata nel traffico. |
| Eric: Meaning “I wanted to let you know that I'll be late, because I got stuck in traffic.” Let’s break this down. In the sentence, first Linda states that she’d like to give notice, and to make the communication smoother, she says... |
| Ofelia: La volevo avvisare che |
| Eric: “I wanted to let you know that” or literally “I wanted to warn you that.” |
| Ofelia: Here the modal verb volere is used in the imperfect past tense. |
| Eric: That’s because sometimes in colloquial Italian, especially in the case of modal verbs, the conditional mood can be substituted by “past imperfect.” |
| Ofelia: So if Linda used the conditional, that would be La vorrei avvisare che |
| Eric: meaning “I’d like to warn you that.” |
| Ofelia: In the same vein, for example, you can also say, Volevo sapere se va tutto bene. or Vorrei sapere se va tutto bene. |
| Eric: Both meaning “I’d like to know if everything is OK.” |
| Ofelia: After La volevo avvisare che, we find the subordinate clauses, |
| ...arriverò in ritardo, perché sono rimasta bloccata nel traffico. |
| Eric: meaning “...I'll be late, because I got stuck in the traffic.” |
| Ofelia: Here we have the future tense for stating what is likely going to happen and the passato prossimo for explaining the reason. |
| Eric: Let’s see some other similar examples of how you can warn someone and explain about a delay. |
| Ofelia: La volevo avvisare che ritarderò, perché l’aereo è partito in ritardo. |
| Eric: “I wanted to warn you that I’ll be late, because the plane was delayed.” |
| Ofelia: Ti volevo avvisare che Leonardi arriverà più tardi, perché è andato a fare una commissione urgente. |
| Eric: “I wanted to warn you that Leonardi will arrive later, because he went on an urgent errand.” OK, after that, you need to apologize and try to make sure that your delay won’t cause any problems for the person you’re meant to be meeting. |
| Ofelia: We already know how to apologize, for example by saying Mi dispiace, meaning “I’m sorry” |
| Eric: let’s take a closer look at how to find out if you won’t cause issues to the other person. |
| Ofelia: for example, Linda says Spero di non causarle problemi. |
| Eric: “I hope not to cause you problems.” |
| Ofelia: Usually the verb sperare, “to hope,” is followed by the conjunction che, meaning “that,” and a verb in the subjunctive mood, but in the case of the first person (either singular or plural) which states something about oneself, you can use di followed by an infinitive verb. |
| Eric: It’s much easier, because you don’t have to conjugate the verb, so keep this little rule in mind! |
| Ofelia: Other examples are, Spero di arrivare in orario. |
| Eric: “I hope to arrive on time” or “I hope I arrive on time” |
| Ofelia: Speriamo di finire entro la scadenza. |
| Eric: “We hope to finish by the deadline.” or “We hope we finish by the deadline.” Ok, let’s wrap up the lesson with a couple of sample sentences. |
| Ofelia: Volevo avvisarvi che il direttore arriverà con un'ora di ritardo. |
| Eric: "I wanted to let you all know that the director will arrive one hour late." |
| Ofelia: Mi scusi. Spero di non disturbare arrivando tardi. |
| Eric: "I'm sorry. I hope not to bother by arriving late." |
Outro |
| Eric: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! |
| Ofelia: A presto! |
Comments
Hide