SUNDAY, JUNE 04, 2006 12:00 AM
Accent reduction course helps eliminate career hurdle
By Margarita Bauza
Detroit Free Press
DETROIT - When Xiaoyun Shen's boss asked her to take an accent reduction class, she was a little flustered.
"I didn't know I had a problem," said Shen, a 43-year-old senior scientist at biotech company Asterand Inc.
Shen's arsenal of degrees includes an M.D. and a master's degree from Chinese universities, a Ph.D. from a British university and three post-doctorates from universities in Britain, Canada and the United States.
But when it came to communicating, the degrees lost some of their luster. Colleagues and supervisors asked her to repeat repeatedly and strained to understand her.
At the conclusion of her first week of a 10-week course with Ann Arbor, Mich.-based Accent Reduction Institute, Shen realized she had a problem.
"I couldn't do an R or an L at all," said Shen, who supervises three scientists who perform research on human tissue. Before she took the course, her pronunciation of the word "heart" sounded like "hat" and "car pool" like "cah-poo."
Asterand runs a human tissue bank for research on the genetic causes of diseases such as cancer and operates a 55-person lab in Detroit and one in Britain. It has 100 employees worldwide. The company paid $1,800 for the 10-week course to teach Shen and her colleague Philip Saywrayne Jr., an accountant from Liberia, to soften their accents.
Asterand CEO Randal Charlton said he heard about the course and didn't hesitate to offer it even though he was concerned initially about hurting his employees' feelings.
"I was a bit worried," Charlton said. "There could be an implied criticism. Good diction is critical. Both of these individuals are very talented and this will help them advance their careers."
The class is a step beyond courses that teach English as a second language and focuses on teaching tongues, lips and teeth how to form the closest thing to an American sound.
In a recent class, Accent Reduction President and instructor Judy Ravin helped students pronounce the letter R by mimicking the sounds of an angry dog. "ARRR!" she snarled, and they growled back.
Ravin's company, which she created in 1999 after leaving her job teaching accent reduction at Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, grew slowly in the early years. She made $8,000 her first year. But in 2005, with four part-time employees, earnings of $70,000, 10 corporate clients and 50 individual clients, Ravin sold her company to Ann Arbor-based software developer Menlo Associates for an undisclosed sum.
Nine months later, the company has 12 full- and part-time employees, projected earnings of $500,000, 27 corporate clients and 75 individual clients.
Since the purchase, Accent Reduction Institute has developed a program that promises to get rid of accents in 28 days. The company has a line of software that has been adopted by more than 30 businesses and universities across the country, including General Motors, DaimlerChrysler, Daewoo Heavy Industries America, Cisco Systems and Federal Mogul.
Ravin also has contracts with dozens of universities to certify instructors in teaching accent reduction. The institute charges $1,500 to certify teachers using the Ravin method. To enroll in her course, candidates must be licensed language teachers or certified speech pathologists.
"It's not about removing the accent," said Ravin. "It's about eliminating a language barrier."
An accent that is too hard to understand often presents a real hurdle in a person's career, holding a person back from promotions, projects or opportunities to lead, Ravin said.
"If people have to keep telling you 'what?,' 'excuse me?,' forget it. You won't get the job or promotion," Ravin said.
Saywrayne says the course has helped his job performance. Like Shen, he has trouble pronouncing the R sound.
"It's improved my confidence," Saywrayne said. "People are not asking me 'what?' all the time. I just have to put my point out once."
eh?
