In the July 6, 2026 episode of the WRKdefined podcast "You Should Know," communications coach Peter Novak, founder of Strictly Speaking Group and a former professor at the University of San Francisco, challenges the notion that flawless English is the key to effective global business communication. Instead, Novak emphasizes clarity, confidence, and trust as the true drivers of success in increasingly distributed, multilingual teams.
Novak, who trained as a Jesuit and holds an MFA in acting and a doctorate in dramaturgy, argues that unconscious bias—specifically the well-documented like-me bias—shapes who gets promoted and believed at work. He points out that phrasal verbs such as "take off," "take up," "take over," and "take down" can quietly derail non-native English speakers, and suggests using AI prompts to swap them for clearer verbs.
The conversation also touches on a McGill University study on foreign accents, which reveals how trust and credibility are affected by confident delivery. Novak notes that investor relations teams now run CEO earnings calls through AI to score language choice and tone of voice, underscoring the business impact of communication style.
Novak repeatedly frames inclusive communication as a bottom-line issue. "The best way to position it is that this is a business issue, that you need your communication to be as clear as possible to everyone, not just to a select few," he tells host William. He pushes back on the idea that non-native speakers are the ones who must adapt, using a Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers analogy: "Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in high heels." Non-native colleagues, he argues, are translating, interpreting, and vocabulary-hunting in real time while native speakers barrel ahead.
Novak offers concrete tactics, including building executive voiceprints by feeding hundreds of hours of transcripts into AI so leaders can deliver scripts that sound authentic. He also shares a 20-question intake he uses to help executives communicate their preferences to their teams, from pre-reads to agenda formats. References to Yakov Smirnoff on the absurdity of English, Ernest Hemingway's accessibility versus Oscar Wilde writing "for about 6 people," and observations about Latin American teams operating trilingually until a monolingual American enters the room illustrate the complexities of global communication.
Novak also flags cultural intelligence lessons from his preparation for business in Tokyo and Dubai. The episode is available now wherever podcasts are heard.
