A study of motivating factors in learning English for Thai employees in the information technology department (IT) at an international company in Bangkok

This study aimed to investigate the factors that motivate employees to learn English, by examining English learning motivation of Thai employees who work for an international company in Thailand including the support that employees require from an international company in order to learn English Language. The subjects of this study were 35 employees from one department which is Information Technology (IT Department) who needed to communicate in English to the foreign colleagues, foreign suppliers and foreign customers at the workplace. The instrument of this research was a questionnaire using multiple-choices questions and Likert-scales. The result of the study showed that most employees indicated their levels of English proficiency as fair overall. The study revealed factors that might effect employees’ motivation in learning English was self-improvement followed by Career Advancement and Specific Goal Achievement. It was found that the supports that employees need from the international company in English learning and improvement was Multinational Teamwork followed by Assigning English related Tasks and English Skills Training.

本研究旨在探究驱动员工学习英语的影响因素，通过调研泰国境内外资企业的泰国雇员的英语学习动机，同时考察雇员为提升英语水平所需的企业支持。本研究的受试对象为某信息技术部（IT Department）的35名员工，该部门员工需在工作场景中使用英语与外籍同事、外国供应商及海外客户开展沟通。本研究采用的调研工具为包含选择题与李克特量表（Likert-scales）的调查问卷。研究结果显示，多数雇员自评的整体英语水平为中等。本研究揭示，影响员工英语学习动机的因素依次为自我提升、职业发展与特定目标达成。调研同时发现，雇员期望外资企业提供的英语学习与提升支持，优先级从高到低依次为跨国团队协作、分配英语相关工作任务以及英语技能培训。