The book offers authentic materials drawn from the worlds of business, academia, and current affairs. Tasks cover a range from role-play simulations, analyzing complex case studies, and planning academic essays to debating ideas like perpetual growth and corporate responsibility. Learners will tackle rhetorical skills in all four domains: reading, writing, listening, and speaking — and hone skills such as negotiating, summarizing, data commentary, intercultural communication, and applying AI responsibly. Specialized topics include the financial crisis, the digital economy, green business, innovation and startups, corporate social responsibility, human resources management, and more. But more importantly, these topics are not treated as static vocabulary lists: they serve as entry points for learners to develop, among other things, critical thinking, complex argumentation, intercultural awareness and the communication skills that will serve them throughout their career and academic journey.

This book exists because my students inspired me to write it. They asked for real texts, real debates, and real opportunities to think deeply — to move beyond the “absurd dialogues” of rote language learning. I hope it helps other learners do the same: to communicate clearly, think critically, and connect meaningfully in the global business world and in the world in general. After all, communication is key if we are to “learn how to live together as brothers” and “not perish like fools”, like a certain Martin Luther King used to say. Word.