Let´s Kick Off With Some Handy Phrases For Business!
Let´s Kick Off With A Few Handy Phrases!
Business English vocabulary often calls upon sports to add a little flavour to its expression and why not. We enjoy making comparisons between sports and life and often the battling, winning and unfortunately the losses in a sporting contest emulate the experiences in the working world. Here are 10 of the best sports idioms to kick off!
Get the ball rolling - start
´Let´s get the ball rolling with a little story about the origins of our product…´
This expression, as you may have guest, comes from football and means to start a conversation or an activity.
A ball park figure – an approximate estimate
´Off the top of my head, a ball park figure for our profits this year would be around 3 million dollars…´
This, often used in American English, comes from baseball and means that the ball is in the park, that your guess is close enough, though approximate.
On the ropes – struggling, having real difficulty
´Since the Coronavirus, many businesses in our sector are on the ropes due to the lack of income´
This comes from boxing, when a boxer is against the ropes and getting punches thrown – he´s at the point of being knocked out and falling – so if you´re business is on the ropes then it´s in trouble!
Get the finish line – get to the end
´This has been a tough project but we´ve finally got to the finish line!´
From athletics, this one is obvious! The athlete gets to the finish line after a sprint or a run.
Jump the gun – act too soon, act too hastily
´We jumped the gun in that bidding war, this product is not worth what we paid for it!´
Again, this one comes from athletics. The gun goes off to signify a start, but occasionally the runners go to soon and they can end up being disqualified for this. If you jumped the gun, you acted too soon and probably had to pay the price!
May 7, 2020
