BE 574: Given the Circumstances, We Think You Should Listen Today

This is the Business English Podcast, episode 574. Given the circumstances, we think you should listen today. Welcome to the Business English Podcast from All Ears English. Get the English skills you need to achieve your dreams in global business.

For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Michelle, coming to you from New York City and Colorado, USA.

Are you still translating from your native language into English in your head? Are you always getting confused between the different grammar tenses? Let's figure out what you need to work on. Find your current English level with our five-minute quiz at allearsenglish.com slash fluency score.

Hey, Michelle. How are you today? I'm doing well, Lindsay. Lindsay, have you ever felt like you couldn't do your best or you had to kind of lower your standards because of something going on in your life or in the outside world?

Yeah. I mean, for sure. Because we have our work lives and then we have our other things going on in our lives. There was a period of time where I had to travel back and forth to California pretty frequently to deal with family stuff.

Always on a plane, always working from hotels, not really working during the day, instead dealing with family stuff all day long and then coming home to the hotel room and trying to get work done. That's just one example. Often it's family stuff. Yeah.

Yeah. Right. Yes. I agree with you. I mean, yeah, for me, sometimes as a mom, I just have to be easier on myself and what I can accomplish. Right. So the circumstances here being, you know, me being a mom and having kids at home and, you know, like Lindsay and I have dealt with everything from sick days to snow days and

Everything in between. And, you know, we always, you know, somehow pull it together. But sometimes the circumstances make you wonder, okay, are we going to make it this week? I know, I know.

It's really, it's crazy what we do here for these shows at All Our English. So, but I heard you say a really useful phrase here, Michelle. And you said, given the circumstances, given the circumstances, right? Yeah.

That sounds very fancy and high level. Very fancy, very high level. So this is a really good one. That's what we're going to be talking about today. Lindsay, what does this mean?

It basically means due to certain conditions. So there are conditions that have made things more challenging, more limited. This could be used when you're giving an explanation, when you're making someone feel better or encouraging someone. I think the explanation piece when you're saying like, I can't do something and here's why.

Right. Right. So we're going to talk about this more in just a second, but we want to remind you guys to hit follow wherever you are listening to the Business English Podcast. Let us drop right into your queue.

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Yes. Easy breezy. All right. So let's give some examples, Michelle. For example, conferences. The conference went great considering the circumstances.

Who would have thought we would get a snowstorm in April? Okay. So it sounds like we were hosting the conference and there was a big snowstorm, but everything turned out okay. Right.

Given the circumstances. And actually here we said considering. So you can really say either, right? Yeah. Yes, totally. Or you did such a great job given the circumstances.

I mean, the mic went out, the technology was down. You did great, right? Yeah. So there was some sort of situation that occurred and you're saying, even though this happened...

this other thing happened. And that's really a sign of a true performer or true experience that someone's able to work through adversity of technology failing, all these other things being hard. You still could give a great presentation, right? Yeah, right.

Exactly. How does this sound to you, Lindsay? Would you say, I mean, would you say this outside of the business world in your daily life, or would you say it's really mostly a business sounding expression? I

I don't think it would be a horrible thing to say it outside of business. I think it would be okay. It does sound a little on the formal side, a little on the distant side. It feels a little distant, a little more corporate.

Yeah. Right, a little more corporate. Yeah. And then later, we're going to talk about, I think I'm looking ahead, and I'm saying, you know, there's another expression that I think would be better for, you know, a little less formal situation, a little less corporate-y.

Yeah. Right. So, yeah, you know, and again, it's very professional. So you also might hear, like we said, considering the circumstances, you also might hear under the circumstances or in view of the circumstances in light of the circumstances.

Yeah, in light of I've definitely I've heard that a lot. Yeah. In light of something. Yeah. I mean, Lindsay, what circumstances may limit us at Allers English?

We already talked about some of them, but anything else that may limit us? I mean, I can think of things. Let me see. So family, for sure. Let's see. Snow days, like if people's kids are having something going on, that can happen.

Internet connections. That That's what I was going to say. Technology. Technology. We rely... We don't record in the same room, right? We rely on the internet working for us every week when we sit down to record.

Yes. And if for some reason it's out one given day, it could set us back by weeks, a couple of weeks. Right. Exactly. So that's exactly what I was thinking.

Technology, our recording system, just something breaking down. Yeah. That can all... You know, we definitely we've had to rerecord episodes if something doesn't record correctly.

Yeah. So, yeah, it doesn't happen as often as we think it. No, no, no. Now we're making it sound like every day is a scramble. It's not. We get into a pretty good rhythm here and just.

Yeah. Everything just flows out of us. You know, it's just it's great. But there are certain things that have to come together. We have to be on time for recording.

Right. We both have to take that seriously. The scheduling, that kind of thing. So there's a lot that goes into making the show. Yeah. So I mean, sometimes we just have to look at the whole picture and all the circumstances to get the full idea of something went or how something is going.

So, you know, especially when you say given the circumstances, you're kind of acknowledging like, oh, we know everything wasn't perfect. Like things were kind of crazy. Something happened. Yeah.

And it's just acknowledging that. So I think in that way, it can be very good for connection because it's the elephant in the room. And you're just saying, yeah, we know that there was an issue with the technology. We know that there was a snowstorm, things like that.

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All right. So Michelle, other ways we could say this. What could we say? So given the situation, you mentioned this earlier, you took us through this briefly, but given the situation, right?

So given the situation our team was in, I think we did an excellent job. We just didn't give up. So there was some sort of hardship. There was some sort of situation.

We don't know what it was, but we're saying even with that, we did a great job. Yes. And then this one I think is really good for just daily life with everything that's going on or with everything you could even put it at a bin. You could say with everything that's been going on or everything that has happened.

Right. Yeah. With everything that's been going on, we have decided to put a pause on this project. But you could also, you know, I mean, could you think of when you might use this just in a situation for outside the business world?

Yeah. Oh, that's a good question. I mean, I'm having my kitchen redesigned right now and it's kind of a disaster, but I hope we don't put a pause on it because that would be bad.

Maybe renovations that are not totally crucial for your house. Maybe little hobbies you're working on, little things you're building at home maybe could be. Yep. I mean, but even if you're not pausing something, you're just using with everything that's been going on.

You could say like, you know, I mean, for family, like the winter getting sick, everybody's family's getting sick the whole winter and passing it, you know. So you might say like, oh, my God, with everything that's been going on, I feel like I haven't had a chance to talk to you or we haven't had a chance to catch up. So even something that's a little less formal. I like that.

Yeah, that's a little less formal. So that one translates over into your personal life. And then taking everything into account, for example, it seemed bad, but taking everything into account, I actually think it went better than we thought. Yeah.

So sometimes everything seems bad at first, but then, you know, you look at the numbers at the end of the month and it's actually not that bad. Yeah. Yeah. Yes.

I can all see if something goes wrong, it can feel like, oh no, everything's going to be ruined. But then when you look at the big picture, everything's kind of okay. Kind of okay. Kind of like things tend to bounce back to where they were a lot of times in terms of business.

You know, one thing goes down, something else comes back up. Right. So it's just kind of rolling with things and not having panic attacks all the time. Yeah.

Right. Yeah, exactly. So let's do a role play. We're going to use some of these today. Here we are supervisors making decisions about an upcoming meeting.

Okay, here we go. All right. So given the circumstances, maybe we should have the team bring their own lunch. We don't want to risk anyone's allergies again.

Yeah, that's a good idea. With everything that's happened, I don't even know if we should have this meeting during lunch. That's an interesting point. Yeah, taking everything into account, I think it would be fine, but maybe we would have better focus at a different time of day.

Yeah. This is something companies have to deal with now. I mean, especially for as the younger generation gets older and moves into the corporate world, there's a lot of allergies, right? For kids now.

Sensitivities. Teenagers. Wow. I heard that egg allergies is a new and evolving thing. Have you heard about that, Michelle? Egg allergies? I actually just heard of someone having an egg allergy.

So yeah. Yeah. Oh God. Yeah. And then of course, nuts. That's a big one. Because eggs are in everything. Yeah. Yeah. Eggs are in everything. So it's like the corporate world, it wants kids that have these allergies end up aging into while their careers.

Yeah. I don't know if there's going to be as much around food, as many events around food, right? Yeah. Well, I mean, even for my son's school, I mean, it used to be, you know, growing up, it would be like, oh, you have your holiday party at school and you have all this food or Halloween.

Now there's like no food allowed. Oh, that is so sad. Oh, my God. It's very sad. no it's very sad i'm the party now i mean i know and i'm a class mom i'm one of the class moms and so we plan these parties and it's like oh but no food and like with valentine's day you know we give they give out their valentine's and it's like no food and that none of those little those little heart candy heart no no that's oh yeah yeah it feels so

yeah i don't like it i don't know epidemic is about it's yeah but they still eat at school so i don't understand i don't really understand and they have then they have vending machines at school with oh really junk in them you know so it just it doesn't make any sense and i don't think anybody knows why but it's you know there's all this you know the all this politics involved and you know having to follow rules and yeah yeah yeah Yeah, it's tough. So anyways, those problems are coming for the corporate world soon enough, right? Yeah, that's true.

That's true. And this is an example. There's some kind of allergy issue in the company. And so given the circumstances, right, they're thinking maybe they should have the team bring their own lunch is the first thing you said.

And it sounds like something happened because I said, we just don't want to risk anyone's allergies again. So maybe somebody had something last time and I gave them...

allergic reaction i have a friend who's so allergic to seafood that she can't even like go into a seafood restaurant oh wow yeah and she can't have someone who's like put their fork in a plate with seafood and then try that her food it's like it's really really intense that's hard yeah these allergies are really hard i really feel for people who have these big allergies yeah for sure all right what else did i say you said yeah good idea with everything that's happened i don't even know if we should have this meeting during lunch Yeah. And then you said, that's an interesting point, taking everything into account.

I think it would be fine, but maybe we would have better focus at a different time of day. So I'm kind of disagreeing with you a little bit here in a very indirect way, right? Right. But then I'm saying maybe we should do it at a different time because maybe it's a good point.

Maybe we could focus better before lunch or after lunch. Right. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Lindsay, do you have any allergies? I don't. I feel very lucky. I don't have...

I mean, scallops. I have weird issues with scallops, but there's not scallops and school parties and company parties. So I don't have to worry about that. It's a very easy allergy to have, to be honest.

What about you? Cats. Oh, you're allergic to cats. Okay. Yeah, I'm allergic to cats. That's funny. Do you ever... You know, when you're at the doctor and it's like, oh, allergies.

And it's so funny because I know they're talking about medicine. But for some reason, I feel the need to write cats and then like usually a smiley face. Yeah, I never know whether to put scallops in there. Right.

Do I put that? Do they care? I'm like, is there a chance there's a piece of scallop in that vaccine? That's hilarious. I love that. Oh, man. Yeah. I wonder if these allergy issues are quite so widespread as they are around the world as they are here.

Yeah. Yeah. Curious. Yeah. I did not see the episode going in this direction so much about allergies, but it's interesting. Yep. Guys, go and check out Business English 561.

Do you make mistakes at work? Five adverbs to articulate what happens. Perfect. Perfect. All right. Takeaway for today. Yeah. Takeaway is, you know, when you are making a statement, it's good to be able to summarize what you're thinking.

Essentially, that's what you're doing. You're considering the current circumstances, what's happened before, what could happen in the future, what's happening now. So you're showing that verbally. Okay.

Exactly. So yeah, this is a really great way to do it. And yeah, really interesting stuff here today. All right, Michelle, talk to you very soon. Have a good rest of your day.

All right. Bye. Okay, bye. Thank you for listening to Business English, a podcast just for you, the high achieving global professional. Want more from All Ears English?

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