Business future discuss and agree

Business future discuss and agree

Try to find future events, feelings about the future and predictions about the future world which you share, using subjects, future forms, actions and/ or times like these:

Subjects	Future forms	Actions	Future times
accountants activists banks/ lenders bureaucrats (the) CEO(s) (my/ a) colleague(s) (my/ a) competitor(s) consultants consumers (white collar) criminals (my/ a) customer(s) entrepreneurs executives/ directors female… (local) governments graduates I innovators inventors investors minorities my boss my boss and I my department my division my section my sector older… regulators shareholders social enterprises (permanent) staff tax authorities tax havens temp staff the … economy the … sector trade associations (my/ a) vendor(s) (manual) workers young…	’m/ ’s/ are about to ’m/ ’s/ are due to have arranged to am/ is/ are …ing have decided to going to planning to plan to thinking about intend to ’ll be…ing ’ll have + PP ’ll (definitely) must ’ll almost certainly (very) likely to ’ll probably may well might well may/ might could possibly probably won’t could conceivably (definitely) won’t expecting looking forward to dreading want to would like to would love to would hope wish	accelerate acquire/ get adapt/ change add adopt avoid be …ed by borrow – lend buy/ purchase cancel continue create cut/ decrease disappear disrupt do (more/ less) expand/ grow gain – lose get rid of/ scrap go bankrupt improve influence invent invest in (re)launch merge with… quit/ stop recover/ pick up retire reverse save shrink slow down specialise spend start suffer from transform try/ attempt	after this class in an hour later (today) this evening tonight at… (o’clock) (today) tomorrow morning this time tomorrow tomorrow afternoon tomorrow evening tomorrow night the day after tomorrow in three days within 5 (working) days on Saturday on …day by the end of this week this time next week on Friday next week in two weeks next month this winter in December (this year) next year this time next year next summer the year after next in the near future before I retire in 2050 by 2050 in 20… by 21… for a long time in the distant future someday/ one day eventually never after… in… within…

 

Me too./ So… I./ Neither… I./ I think so too.

Really? I…/ That’s… but I…

 

Brainstorming stage

First of all with no help, write as many different suitable things as you can in each column below.

Compare your answers with the previous page, then share any extra ideas you had.

What are the differences between the different forms above?

Differences between future sentences presentation

The expressions on the same line below are at least slightly different from each other. With a partner, try to explain the differences in meaning.

Differences between future verb forms and adverbs to describe

• will definitely recover/ will recover
• will recover/ must recover
• will almost certainly improve/ will probably improve
• will probably improve/ is very likely to improve
• may well disappear/ may disappear
• could appear/ could possibly appear
• could possibly appear/ could conceivably appear
• am expecting to arrive/ am looking forward to arriving
• about to arrive/ due to arrive
• would like to/ would love to
• want to/ hope to
• hope I can/ wish I could
• will/ would
• will rain/ is going to rain
• am meeting him/ am going to meet him/ will meet him
• am going to change/ am planning to change
• “We need some milk” “Don’t worry, I’ll get some from the supermarket”/ “We need some milk” “Don’t worry, I’m going to get some from the supermarket”
• will have changed/ will be changing

Differences between future times to describe

• on Monday/ by Monday
• in three days/ within three days
• in three days/ in the next three days
• in a couple of weeks/ in a few weeks
• in a year/ a year later
• within five days/ within five working days
• in 2020/ by 2020
• by 2020/ before 2020
• by 2020/ until 2020
• later/ sometime
• in 2030/ in the 2030s
• this evening/ tonight

Ask about any which you couldn’t explain or aren’t sure about.