Introduction

Due to the noteworthy changes that have been recently taking place in the organization of Algerian economic growth, the English language has become a necessary tool for communication. Accordingly, the professional profile of a modern qualified employee should include appropriate communication skills and acceptable English language proficiency to cope with the modern competitive global work arena. In the process of educating future employees, special emphasis on English for Specific Purposes (ESP), henceforth becomes necessary. Given the prevalent importance of Business English (BE) communication, its learning and teaching seem to be a challenging task for Algerian learners whose goal is effective communication. In the same concern, business students, specifically management students need a specific set of communicative language skills for their success in education and career. Due to globalization, international organizations are voicing their concerns about the need for better communication skills among students of Business. Therefore, English for Business Purposes courses should be tailored to suit the requirements of the evolving needs of the workplace.

1.1. Statement of the Problem

Algeria is trying to integrate ESP courses into tertiary studies to respond to the growing demand for English. However, business students consider the English course as necessary but not linked to what they believe to be their genuine study program. Furthermore, the latter is still teacher centred limited to teaching subject related lexis and language structure ignoring the specific needs and interests of learners. This often leads to low and poor learners’ performance when they use English in their future profession. In response to this situation, ESP teachers should take into considerations learners’ needs. Besides, they should apply innovative approaches which help to develop not only students’ ability to communicate properly in English but also to promote their professional skills. To meet these expectations, NA henceforth aims to gather sufficient factual information about the students’ perceived English-language needs prior to the start of an English course. According to Kennedy and Bolitho (1984, p.2),  “once a learner’s needs have been defined, in terms of why he wishes to learn English and the kind of English he will have to use, this information can be used as a guideline for the content of a course suited to his particular interests and needs”. Therefore, NA for business students is expected at the beginning of the ESP course to be ready to function effectively in their future workplaces technically and linguistically. 

1.2.Aims of Research

The present study aims at analysing the English language needs of Master’s students in the Department of Management Sciences at Farhat Abbes -Setif 1- University, Algeria, in order to investigate students’ perceptions of the current ESP course and to identify the students’ perceptions of their academic and future work needs as regards English language learning. This is done in order to help teachers to design an appropriate ESP course and raise awareness of educationalists in Algeria to draw a clear policy to ensure successful implementation of ESP courses. The main enquiries that were addressed in the present investigation are as follow:

1.3. Research Questions

1)What are the difficulties facing Master’s students regarding the learning of English?

2)  What are Management students’ perceptions regarding their English language needs?

3) Is the ESP course delivered in Management Department at Sétif-1- University adequate to satisfy the Master students’ needs?

4)Based on Needs Analysis results, what type of ESP course might fit these students’ requirements?

2. Literature Review

2.1.English for Specific Purposes

ESP emerged as an answer to the social demand associated with prosperous business environment. From the early 1960's, ESP has grown to become one of the main areas of English language Teaching (ELT, henceforth), especially at tertiary education, since it is directed towards meeting specific needs of the particular learners. Accordingly, Hutchinson and Waters (1987) define ESP as an approach to language teaching in which all decisions concerning the content and method are principally based on the learner’s reasons for learning. In fact, ESP movement has shown a slow but steady growth over the past decades. According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987, p.6): “ESP was not a planned and coherent movement, but rather a phenomenon that grew out of a number of converging trends.”   

The emergence and growth of ESP then was brought about by a combination of three main factors: the demands of a brave new world, a revolution in linguistics, and focus on the learner.  Therefore, the reason that led to the emergence of ESP was the development in language theory which put much emphasis on learner’s specific needs (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987, p. 8). ESP refers to “the area of inquiry and practice in the development of language programs for people who need a language to meet a predictable range of communicative needs” (Swales, 1992, p. 300). That is to say, ESP has been developed in response to learners’ communicative needs in specific scientific fields in academic or professional settings. The dominant areas in ESP are Business English (BE) and English for Academic Purposes (EAP, henceforth) and course design issues need to take into account the target learning needs of ESP students. In the same line of thought, Zhang (2013, p.72) states: “ESP is a goal-oriented and well targeted instruction system, which stresses the combination of English language learning and specific purposes of professional learning.”

2.2.Needs Analysis and Business English

As the main focus of ESP is the learner and his needs, the importance of NA in any ESP course is undoubtedly undisputable (Songhori, 2008). It is considered as a prerequisite in any course design (Richterich & Chancerel, 1980). Needs analysis is part of main four absolute characteristics of ESP and is referred to as “needs assessment”. In Strevens's definition (Johns & Dudley-Evans, 1991, p. 116), NA refers to a set of activities involved in gathering information that will serve as the basis for developing an ESP course that will meet the learning needs of a particular group of learners. According to West (1994, p.1), NA is a process to identify “what learners will be required to do with the foreign language in the target situation and how learners might best master the target language during the period of training”.

Concerning Business English (BE), the identification of needs is a prerequisite for the BE course designers. In this respect, Dudley-Evans & St John (1998, p.2) note that “Needs Analysis may indeed be even more fundamental to Business English than to English for Science and Technology, as the learners’ needs may vary much more.” Likewise, in ESP, rigorous analysis of the linguistic features of the designated situation should be carried out in BE. The identified features, accordingly, will form the BE course. Brieger (1997, cited in Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998, p.58) claims that: “Needs analysis for Business English will set out to identify the range of general and specialist language knowledge required, together with general and professional communication skills.” In other words, the data collected include the language application information, communicative skills, and the cognition of the teaching objectives of the learners, working institutions and societies.

2.3.Models of Needs Analyses

According to Long (2005, p.1), ‘just as no medical intervention would be prescribed before a thorough diagnosis of what ails the patient, so no language teaching program should be designed without thorough needs analysis’. NA is considered as one of the key stages in ESP since it provides relevancy for ESP course design process (Jackson, 2004; John, 1991; Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998).  Richterich and Chancerell (1980) put forward some significant aims of NA: to identify elements which will lend themselves to training, to establish the relative importance, and to find out what is indispensable, necessary, or just desirable. NA aims at clearly demonstrating the objectives, goal, content, teaching learning methods and evaluation procedures for designing the syllabus of the course (Cowling, 2007; St. John, 1996).  According to Dudley-Evans and St John (1998), needs were seen as a distinct language item of grammar and vocabulary. At its earlier stage, NA was mainly concerned with linguistic and register analysis (Songhori, 2008). Despite of the various models of NA, only four models are gaining much recognition by scholars. Each model can identify language needs from a particular perspective. The four models are Munby’s Target Situation Analysis (1978), Allwright’s Present Situation Analysis (1982), Hutchinson and Waters’ model (1987) and Dudley-Evans and St. John’s Model (1998). The present study follows Dudley-Evan and St John’s model since it combines many approaches. Besides, it is appropriate for the objectives of this study which sheds light on every aspect that is relevant to Master’s Management students’ needs. This model can be viewed as the most comprehensive model for an investigation of ESP needs.

2.3.1.Dudley-Evans and St John's Model of Needs Analysis

Dudley-Evans and St John (1998) established a model for Business English courses which contain a number of aspects illustrated in the following:

Figure 1:Model of Needs Analysis

 

 

Dudley-Evans and St John's Model of Needs Analysis 1998, p.125

The model, developed by Dudley-Evans & St John (1998) on language needs, is practical and pragmatically covering all aspects of language, such as TSA (Target Situation Analysis), PSA (Present Situation Analysis), LSA (Learning Situation Analysis) and other important considerations.  In the model, professional information includes the tasks and activities in which learners are using or will be using English for. This is the Target Situation Analysis and the objective needs of the learners. However, personal information includes concerns about the factors that might affect the way in which learners approach learning tasks, cultural background, attitude to English, or even their reasons and expectations for taking the course. this can be considered as the learners' subjective needs, that include learners' wants, means and strategies. The English language information about the learners’ proficiency in language skills and language use which characterize learners is their current skills and language uses; this part belongs to the Present Situation Analysis. This analysis is the effective way to assess the learners' lack, which is the gap between "the English language information about the learner's" and "professional information about the learners".

The main concern of the Present Situation Analysis is the current language proficiency of the learners. Learning needs Analysis seeks to find out the effective ways of learning the language and skills providing remedy for the lacks. Professional communication information concerns the way how the language and skills are used in the target situation. As the learners’ needs and attitudes may change during the course, NA is recommended to be conducted all along the process of the course.

2.4. Procedures of Needs Analysis

Needs analysis is a useful tool to investigate learner's needs, but it is not an easy task. As Hyland (2007) argued the use of systematic means to define the specific sets of skills, texts, linguistic forms, and communicative practices that a particular group of learners must acquire is central to ESP. Thus, NA results help in designing syllabi and materials and underlining their pragmatic engagement with occupational, academic, and professional realities. When conducting NA, a variety of procedures can be used and the type of selected procedures will determine the required information (Richards, 2001).

According to Mohammadi and Nacer (2013, p.1016), in order to conduct Needs Analysis, a comprehensive framework has been proposed by Brown (2009) who explains the stages of a Needs Analysis. His framework consists of three major stages with ten steps:

A. Get ready to do NA

1. Define the purpose of the NA

2. Delimit the student population

3. Decide upon approach (es) and syllabus (es)

4. Recognize constraints

5. Select data collection procedures

B.  Do the NA research

6. Collect data

7. Analyse data

 8. Interpret results

C. Use the NA results

9. Determine objectives

10. Evaluate the report on the NA project

From the overall findings of the analysis, the researcher attempts to draw implications about the learners' language needs, and finally explains the limitations of the study.

2.5.Previous Studies on Needs Analysis

As mastery of English has become an essential requirement for communication in professional settings, ESP courses have been essentially approved worldwide to satisfy the specific needs of the learners in both academic and professional contexts. A plethora of research in NA that has been undertaken in different disciplines with different frameworks; in the present study, some key studies in Business English context are reviewed and discussed.

Zughoul and Hussein (1985) conducted a Needs Analysis study as an attempt to examine the perceptions of both students and staff members in different disciplines. The findings indicated that the students stressed developing the ability to communicate in various forms includes written, oral, audio-visual and graphic presentations. In the same vein, Basturkmen (1998) carried out NA research to identify students’ needs, in seven departments at Kuwait University. The obtained results revealed that engineering students gave great importance to English academic needs.

Besides, Taillefer (2007)conducted a research in which he investigated the professionalEnglish language needs of French economics students intending to pursue different professions in the future. Despite their different professional aims, the findings of skills-based questionnaire revealed that an overall high level of English language proficiency was required, mainly in oral communication. Likewise, Kim (2006) carried out a NA study for non-science and non-engineering East Asian graduate students. The results identified individual, small group discussions and whole class discussions as the most frequently required oral classroom tasks for developing listening and speaking skills. Concerning writing skills, Bacha and Bahous (2008) conducted a research to investigate the business students' writing needs at the Lebanese American University. The obtained results indicated the written language ability of the business students and stressed on the improvement of the writing proficiency level in order to cope with the different writing types needed in various target situations. 

In professional settings, Cowling (2007) conducted a NA research on a large Japanese heavy-industry company and found content, skills, topic and task based syllabus as the immediate requirement to design a course for intensive workplace course. Furthermore, Crosling and Ward (2002) in their study aimed to determine the importance and frequency of oral communication in the workplace. The obtained results revealed that oral communication in the workplace was highly frequent and important within a company’s own department such as work-related discussion. Consequently, participants recommended that the teaching of presentation skills at tertiary level was important in order to equip the students with the oral communicative demands of the workplace.

The major findings of these studies revealed that the majority of the offered BE courses may have not been implemented based on Need Analysis; thus, there would be a gap between the teaching of Business English and the actual communicative target needs. Finally, the process of Needs Analysis may help to contextualize ESP courses according to participants’ needs in terms of appropriateness and effectiveness in different settings.

3.Research Design and Methodology

3.1.Participants

The participants in this study were 45first year Master’s students from the Department of Management Sciences in Commerce, Economics and Management Faculty at Farhat Abbes University of Sétif 1. They enrolled in their academic programmes during the first semester of the 2017-2018academic year, and specializing in “Human Resources Management”. They were divided in two groups that consisted of (23) and (22) students respectively.

3.2.Data Collection Tool

There is a shared agreement on the variety of the methods used to collect data in NA. For example, Basturkmen (2010), Chen (2009), Brown (2009), Long (2005), Richards (2002), Graves (2000), and Dudley-Evans and St John (1998) agreed that NA can be conducted using questionnaires, observations, interviews, and tests. The necessary collection procedure tool for the present study is the one through which the research questions can be answered, and it can give a full description and deep understanding of the phenomenon of ESP in the Algerian context. Therefore, questionnaire seems to be the appropriate means for such examination because they are used to gather information on a larger scale (Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998; Graves, 2000). Moreover, questionnaires are useful in collecting data from a large number of people. They can cover questions, which interviews and meetings cannot.

3.2.1.Design of the Questionnaire

The students’ questionnaire aims at eliciting information on students’ perceptions concerning their language needs, their current language difficulties and competencies, and their language competencies in particular skill related to the target situation with a view to giving implication to Business English course design. The questionnaire is designed according toDudley-Evans and St John’s model (1998) for needs analysis. Before distributing the questionnaire, a focus group discussion was done with participants, who were asked about their opinions about the current ESP course and their expectations from it. In addition to some information about the teaching materials, teaching methods and classroom activities in the courses had been obtained and the information is very important for the design of the questionnaire and was paid special attention to. An adapted needs analysis questionnaire was distributed to the students to investigate the student’s situational needs. It was consisted of four sections: personal information, Present Situation Analysis (PSA), Target Situation Analysis (TSA), and Learning Situation Analysis (LSA). Personal information section seeks students’ age, gender and learning background. PSA seeks students’ current language proficiency level, deficiencies and strengths as well appropriateness of current English course. TSA aims to find out about the learners’ needs at the end of a language course and the target level performance. LSA investigates preferred learning styles and strategies of learners, assessment methods as well as the applied teaching and learning methods. The questionnaire consists of a set of multiple choices and an open-ended question to be answered by the participants. In an Attempt to guarantee the reliability of the findings and insure the validity of the results, the questionnaire was pilot-tested with 12students and the final version was distributed to whole sample.

3.3.Data Collection and Analysis

All the participants were given a brief overview of the objectives of the study, the way of answering and the length of time given for answering the questionnaire. The students were assured that their answers would be kept confidential and their grades would not be affected by their answers in any way. Furthermore, they were informed that they were not compelled to participate in the research or to declare their names. After the administration of the questionnaire, the collected data were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). For answering the research questions of the study the results were compared and contrasted. Having collected the responses of the participants, the analyses consisted of descriptive statistics including frequencies and percentages. A process of analysing and interpreting the results is to be conducted in the following section to depict the present status of ESP course in Management Department at -1- university and the English language needs that students are aiming to meet.

4.Data Analysis and Interpretation

4.1.Personal Information

In the survey questionnaire, (45) Human Recourses Management (HRM) Master Students participated. There were (12) male and (33) female students ranging in age from (23) to (35) years old. All participants’ mother language is Arabic, the majority of the participants (77,77%) studied English over than (10) years. The majority (86,66%) of the participants are still students, while (13.33%) of the participants work in private and public companies as managers or assistant managers.

4.2. Present Situation Analysis (PSA)

PSA explores to find out the current language proficiency of the students when the language course begins and their strengths and weakness (Robinson, 1991; Songhori, 2008).

4..2.1. The Status of English in the Current Course

The first question in this part was about the overall level of proficiency in English; the results indicated that there was a significant number of students, with a percentage of (57,77%), who claimed to have medium level and have an “Average” capacity at English language skills.

	Very weak		Weak		Acceptable		Good		Very good
	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%
Speaking	16	35,55	19	42,22	06	13,33	04	08,88	00	00,00
Writing	11	24,44	09	20,0	15	33,33	10	22,22	00	00,00
Reading	00	00,00	05	11,11	22	48,88	11	24,44	07	15,55
Listening	02	04,44	13	28,88	18	40,00	08	17,77	04	08,88
Grammar	06	13,33	07	15,55	17	37,77	11	24,44	04	08,88
Pronunciation	06	13,33	10	22,22	22	48,88	07	15,55	00	00,00
Vocabulary	04	08,88	09	20,0	19	42,22	07	15,55	06	13,33

The fourth question aimed to explore students’ proficiency level in different language areas as shown in table (1). Accordingly, findings indicated that participants reported an acceptable (average) English proficiency level in different language skills (48,88%) in reading, (42,22%) in vocabulary, (40,0%) in listening, (37,77%) in grammar. Results also indicated that the top three language areas students reported to have low (weak or very weak) proficiency level were speaking (77,77%) in the first rank, then Writing (44,44%) and finally pronunciation in the third rank (35,55%). However, the skills in which participants claimed high proficiency level (good and very good) were: reading (40%), followed by grammar (33,33%) and then listening (28,88%).

4.2.2.Students’ Attitudes towards the Present ESP Course

Question (5) in the students’ questionnaire sought to determine learners’ attitudes towards the present ESP course and its components.

Concerning the ESP course satisfaction, table (1) shows that (24) (53.33%) out of (45), participants were not satisfied with the current English course at the department of Management which was possibly due to the absence of language needs identification right from the beginning and the lack of clear course objectives. Besides, (22) participants (48,88%) showed dissatisfaction with the amount of lessons and (23) participants (51,11%) were not satisfied with the course quality and level.   Furthermore, learners’ attitude towards students’ participation was fairly the same as number and level of activities. (20) participants (44,44%) were not satisfied with the classroom participation which was the outcome of the lack of motivation on the one hand and the low level of students on the other hand.

Course Components	Very satisfied		Satisfied		Partially satisfied		Not Satisfied		Undecided
	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%
I am satisfied with the current English course	00	00,00	07	15,55	12	26,66	24	53,33	02	04,44
Quantity of lessons	00	00,00	08	17,77	15	33,33	22	48,88	00	00,00
Quality of lessons	00	00,00	06	13,33	13	28,88	23	51,11	03	06,66
Students’ participation	03	06,66	08	17,77	12	26,66	20	44,44	02	04,44
Number and level of activities	02	04,44	06	13,33	13	28,88	20	44,44	04	08,88
Schedule (class time and duration)	03	06,66	10	22,22	09	20,00	22	48,88	01	02,22
Productive skills are stressed in this course	00	00,00	07	15,55	13	28,88	25	55,55	00	00,00
Receptive skills are stressed in this course	06	00,00	26	57,77	07	15,55	03	6,66	02	04,44
Materials used (printed, audio, video, internet)	03	06,66	07	15,55	12	26,66	13	28,88	00	00,00
Teacher’s method and style of teaching	05	11,11	05	11,11	10	22,22	21	46,66	03	06,66

As well as the number and the level of activities, participants reported their dissatisfaction about the quantity as well as the quality of language activities and tasks; this was probably due to the fact that these activities did not match their requirements.

 Another cause of the participants’ dissatisfaction about the English teaching at the department of Management was the time allocated for the course which was one hour and a half, only, per week. About (48,88%) of the respondents claimed that it was the real reason of their disappointment, and the main obstacle to reach a considerable level in the foreign language.

The only satisfying English course component was the emphasis on the receptive skills (reading and listening) where (26) (57,77%) participants reported their satisfaction about the current course in terms of developing reading and listening skills abilities. However, (25) (55,55%) respondents were displeased with the emphasis on the productive skills (writing and speaking), the latter were seemingly neglected due to the nature of teaching methodology where the teacher played the main role in the classroom.

 As far as the materials used in the current English course is concerned, (28,88%) of participants demonstrated dissatisfaction that may be because they do not reflect their needs or they are not updated and most often printed based materials that did not motivate them. While (12) (26,66%) participants were fairly satisfied about the used materials and that may be due to the link between their field of speciality with the content of materials. Finally, the teaching methodology remained one of the major problems for about (46,66%) of the students, who expressed their dissatisfaction with the teacher centeredness and their desire  for teaching methodology that should take into account their needs and learning styles.

	Strongly Agree		Agree		Neutral		Disagree		Strongly Disagree
	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%	F	%
To use  correct grammar	15	33,33	18	40	05	11,11	09	20,00	00	00,00
To expand my vocabulary	08	17,77	17	37,77	05	11,11	09	20,00	06	13,33
To improve my pronunciation	16	35,55	21	46,66	04	08,88	04	08,88	00	00,00
To improve my reading skill	12	26,66	13	28,88	03	06,66	17	37,77	00	00,00
To improve my writing skill	12	26,66	19	42,22	06	13,33	05	11,11	00	00,00
To become a fluent speaker	30	66,66	13	28,88	00	00,00	02	04,44	00	00,00
To improve my listening skill	11	24,44	14	31,11	06	13,33	10	17,77	04	08,88