What language will kickstart your career?

Fluency in a second language can help you be successful in business, government, academia, and much more. But you probably already knew that.

So, the question is: what language should you learn to give you the best chance at success?

There are a few things you might consider before diving in: 

• the number of speakers globally

• your home country’s trading partners

• your home country’s neighbours and rivals

• the influence of the language, and

• the difficulty of the language

But in our opinion (and you can trust the Intrigue team because between us we speak five languages!) the most important thing to consider is your interest in learning the language. It’s a process that takes time (and potentially money), so you’ll want to enjoy the ride.

English takes the cake for the most widely spoken language. That’s unsurprising because we’re including both native speakers and those who’ve learned English as an additional language. There are plenty of those folks because English is a mandatory subject in many non-native countries. 

Other widely spoken languages include Chinese, Hindi, and Spanish, and all can help you maximise your opportunities to land your dream job.

With that said, you might want to zig when others are zagging and consider going more niche. This is about making yourself a bit of a unicorn – how many people have your skillset and speak… say, Portuguese? Plus, who wouldn’t want to be able to charm their way through the streets of Lisbon and the beaches of Copacabana!

Number of countries

If you’re looking to really travel the world, you might like to consider how many countries speak each language. Setting aside diaspora communities, some of the most popular languages above are really only spoken in one or two countries.

So while it can be super rewarding to develop deep expertise in a single place, think whether you’d also value the ability to move around a bit. If so, consider one of the languages with more geographic coverage, like French (spoken in 29 countries), Arabic (23), Spanish (20), and Portuguese (20).

Trading partners 

Learning about your home country’s trading partners can be a great way to choose a language to study. If you’re doing billions in business with a country, it’s a safe bet there are a lot of opportunities for folks who speak both languages. Who else is going to find those customers or resolve those disputes?

If you’re American, consider that the US is the top importer in the world, and in 2023 these imports were predominantly from Mexico, China, Canada, Germany and Japan. Each of those countries’ native languages would make a ton of sense as a second language (and before you say Canadians speak English, watch this).

Rivals and neighbours

If you’ve been reading our daily briefings, you might’ve picked up on the fact that, um, not all countries get along. Where there’s a tricky relationship to manage, governments place a real premium on the relevant language skills. In the US, for instance, it might be Farsi, Mandarin, or Russian.

There are also neighbourly relationships out there that are really quite friendly, but still complex. In Australia, for example, it makes a lot of sense to learn Bahasa Indonesia.

Either way, this kind of path – should you choose to accept it – can open all kinds of intriguing doors 🕵️.

Influence of the language 

Influence depends on how you measure it, but a great starting point is the official languages of the United Nations: English, French, Chinese, Russian, Arabic, and Spanish.

But before you rush off and learn Spanish to get your dream diplomatic gig (like our Managing Editor Jeremy did), know that only English and French are working languages of the UN.

What’s the difference? All official UN documents are available and translated in official languages, whereas working languages are those used by UN employees for their day-to-day work.

The other thing to consider is what exactly you’re hoping to influence. Learning Japanese might give you an edge in (say) finance; French would be an asset in cultural and luxury sectors; and Arabic might turbo-charge your career in energy.

Difficulty of learning

The difficulty will vary depending on your native tongue, but since you’re reading this, we’ll assume your English language skills are pretty top-notch!

The Foreign Service Institute at the US State Department categorises languages into four categories, with 1 being the easiest to learn for an English speaker, and 4 being exceptionally difficult. 

The greatest number of languages fall into Category 3: “Languages with significant linguistic and/or cultural differences from English.”

You’ll see below that the easier languages can theoretically be learned in 24 weeks, while the tough ones will take up to 88. But even after 88 weeks, you’re still on a journey: for some languages, diplomats often joke that the first 20 years are usually the hardest.

For those with their hearts set on working and living in China, the key Chinese languages (Mandarin and Cantonese) are classified as “super-hard languages” for native English speakers.

(Side note: If you’re interested in learning Mandarin, our co-founders Helen and John are fluent and would be happy to give you some tips!)

*Please note that this diagram is not a complete list of all languages. 

But, at the end of the day… learn the language you really want to

The absolute key to learning a new language is consistency. You have to be learning something new, however small, every day.

For that reason, you need to want to learn the language, so you’re motivated to push through the difficult moments. And trust us, there’ll be plenty of tedious, frustrating, and just downright embarrassing days when you’re learning a language (fun fact: every diplomat has a portfolio of true tales where they made an absolute ass of themselves while learning a foreign language).

Oh, and if you’re pretty happy in your career but have just always wanted to be multi-lingual, know that the process of language-learning has been shown to enhance cognitive functions such as memory, attention, and problem-solving, as well as delay the onset of cognitive decline.

And to boot, tech is making it easier to learn and practice languages every day. Friends of ours are already using ChatGPT as a personal tutor.

So if all that doesn’t convince you to give a new language a shot, then nothing will!