by Olivia Augustin | May 6, 2023 | Solo Session
You can hold a technical conversation, defend your work in a meeting, and handle the hard parts of your job in a second language. And then a blank email opens, the cursor blinks, and a two-minute task turns into twenty. If that’s the thing that quietly eats your...
by Olivia Augustin | Apr 14, 2023 | Guest Interview
Highly educated, highly capable professionals still freeze up mid-sentence in a foreign language. That’s the starting point for this episode with Candice Lee — realtor, relocation specialist, and my friend of almost 20 years — who’s spent over a decade...
by Olivia Augustin | Feb 20, 2023 | Cross Over
Engineers are trained to communicate in steps. Step 1, step 2, step 3. Read the diagram, follow the procedure, done. But the moment a project manager asks you to cut a 4-hour safety orientation down to 20 minutes, or a client asks you to sign off on something outside...
by Olivia Augustin | Jan 9, 2023 | Technical English
Everything can sound new and confusing when you’re learning a new language, especially when it comes to a language like English, which very often does not follow its own rules. Luckily, for us engineers, there are systems. Four of them, and they are called the...
by Olivia Augustin | Jan 9, 2023 | Engineering & Career
Speaking with people from other cultures can be difficult, but working in engineering as a woman can be even more overwhelming. Women are still a minority in STEM, and we can find it difficult to communicate our needs and find a job that respects and elevates us. My...
