S¡, no, ou¡, non, ja, nein.

Those are the kind of contradictory answers two career placement officers give about the value of knowing a foreign language in today’s job market.

Beverly Madden, director of Career Planning and Placement Services, said it is essential.

Steven Kravinsky, director of Career Services for the Colleges of Business and Liberal Arts and Sciences, believes it is relatively unimportant.

While Madden and Kravinsky are at odds over the value of learning languages as a job tool, they do agree on the importance of developing sensitivity to other cultures. At least one college – the College of Engineering – has adopted the goal of encouraging broader intercultural work experiences.

Madden said corporate leaders may want people who can work internationally and have global experience, but haven’t always equated that to language skills.

“I would be hard-pressed to find where languages wouldn’t be useful,” Madden said.

A foreign language is something to add to a r‚sum‚. It could be the “one factor that that person has that the competition doesn’t,” Madden said.

This enthusiasm for languages is not shared by Kravinsky. He believes that while knowing another language can be useful down the road, it won’t get a new graduate a job.

“Fifty percent of why or why not a student is hired is because of functional reasons,” Kravinsky said, “Employers don’t need to look for foreign language, because English is the language of business.”

He does admit foreign language skills are an important secondary skill for moving up in a company.

He breaks down what employers are looking for into two kinds of skills – technical and non-technical.

He defines technical skills as the basic skills required to do a job.

Non-technical skills he defined as functional skills needed for success in the workplace. He listed 12 qualities including communication, human relations and time management.

“[Knowledge of a foreign language] is the one good thing to have. It can only be a bonus,” said Elizabeth Rectanus, advising coordinator for the foreign languages and literatures.

While Spanish is the secondary language of the United States and the most studied at Iowa State, Rectanus said German and French are equally important languages because of the “globalization of business.” Currently, 160 ISU students are majoring in foreign languages.

Pam White, manager of the Student & Alumni Program at Engineering Career Services, details the importance of another language.

“The College of Engineering at ISU has set a performance objective that 33 percent of bachelor’s graduates will have engineering-related work or educational experience in another country,” she said.

White said an engineering student from Indonesia who worked for an American company in Singapore, worked on a German-designed product that was used on a car manufactured in Australia. Thus, five separate cultures and at least two languages were a part of this student’s experience.

Overseas assignments are usually for experienced people who have proven themselves and know the product, Kravinsky said.

Kravinsky said that having an international job doesn’t necessarily entail living or working overseas. He said that a person can work in America, but still deal with several different companies from different countries in one work day.

He agrees that fluency in another language is always a plus, but says only a small percentage of international positions among American companies require it.

Kravinsky said companies actively seeking a graduate with foreign language background are rare.

In his 30 years of experience at six universities, only one graduate got a job abroad. This student was already there working on a specialized project as part of an internship.

While foreign language is not a requirement in the College of Engineering, White believes language skills can enhance the experience of internships and cooperative education.

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences is the only one of seven colleges on campus to require a foreign language to graduate.

No language is preferred over another when it comes to job recruiting, Madden said.

Kravinsky said people going abroad for corporations may not speak the language, but must have cultural sensitivity.

White agrees that adapting to a variety of cultural settings is vitally important.

“The ability to speak another language should be compared with cultural sensitivity,” White said.