How to deal with the quality of English my coworkers use?

Question

I work in an international company in a non-English speaking country. There are certain tasks that we are required to do in English in writing. The tasks aren't the real outcome of our work, but they are supposed to help us plan our job more efficiently.

Right now we are in training so no-one except for us sees document that is written in English. But we are going to start doing real work soon.

The document is written by one of my colleagues during our meetings. Here are the problems:

1. He doesn't use any articles. There are no articles in my mother tongue, so the sentences are perfectly clear to me. However, it bugs me when I see it.
2. He doesn't use the words correctly. Let's say, there is a word in my mother tongue which has two meanings in English. He doesn't care which meaning he should use, since he can guess the right meaning out of the context (and so can I).

I have some issues with that:

1. I'd be embarassed if our manager or someone else saw that document. And, at some point, it's going to happen.
2. I think that if a native English speaker saw it, he wouldn't like to work with us because of our command of language. Again, I'd be ashamed.
3. I think it's unprofessional and just not right. I'm a perfectionist.

How should I deal with this problem?

1. I could talk to the colleague who is charge of preparing the document in private. I think he'll get my point, but he'll forget about using articles again.
2. I could add the articles afterwards, but I shouldn't change any words which are used incorrectly since this is a document prepared by our team.
3. I could ask my manager for some extra English lessons - especially about articles, but I don't think he would agree.
4. I could ignore that. But, again, this is unprofessional.
5. I could every time point out that there is an article missing. But the reaction would be that nobody cares, since we understand the sentences.

Answer 1

Using the wrong English word is the worse problem of the two, as it can look like your team does not fully understand the problem you are trying to solve. If people outside of the team are going to see the document, they are going to find it to be nonsense and will act accordingly depending on their role. This could be very negative for your team.

Discuss it with him in private. Once he is in agreement that it would be negative for someone outside of the team to view this, then come up with an action plan together.

Answer 2

The bottom line: the point of the document is to communicate information. If it does that successfully, then it's fulfilled it's purpose and you shouldn't spend any more time on it. Not every document needs to be a finely crafted masterpiece, and it's a waste of time and money to insist that every document is.

If you actually have evidence that the poor English in the document is going to cause issues, then of course this is something you should bring up but until then, this isn't a fight you should be picking. Work on stuff that will make a difference to the company, not micro-editing a document for no benefit.

Answer 3

Since this is a document that is prepared by your team and not just the member of your team then you should correct word choice, and poor grammar/spelling as appropriate. If you see the same mistake being repeated by a team member taking a few moments to discuss that mistake and inform them of the proper way to write it is advisable since it will reduce the amount of editing you need to do later, and reduce the chance of something like that making it through to your customers.

Generally when I prepare a team document, even if I am the final editor, I will send a copy out to the team for approval before I submit it to the client. This may result in several iterations of the document being sent out, and being reviewed. This is a good thing and should help your team develop better English language skills.