Appendix 1. Role Plays

Unit 1. Employment Issues.

Role play “At a business meeting” Exercise 17, page 11.

1. Read the situation:

Women from a social party come to a meeting with the state officials of the Russian Federation to discuss the problems they face combining their careers and child caring.

2. Choose your role:

Role 1. Health and Social Development Minister and the Chairperson of the meeting.

Role 2. Head of the Women’s Social Party.

Role 3. Deputy Minister of Finance.

Roles 4, 5, 6. Members of the Women’s Social Party.

3. Study your role and get ready to present it:

Role 1. You are Health and Social Development Minister and the Chairperson of the meeting. The objective of the meeting is to agree on possible future changes. Give the floor to the Head of the Women’s Social Party (Role 2) to get to know their claims. Then give the floor to Deputy Minister of Finance (Role 3) to know his opinion and then listen to the members of the Women’s Social Party (Roles 4, 5, 6). In the end of the meeting make conclusions and make a list of some amendments to labour legislation concerning women’s labour and rights.

Notice: Phrases to be used by Chairperson when conducting a meeting.

I declare the meeting open.

So I’ll give the floor to…

Could we have your views on this?

Could you expand on that a little?

Can I assume agreement on that?

I do see your point, however…

I declare the meeting closed.

Role 2. You are the Head of the Women’s Social Party. Start your speech by mentioning the most important problems women face such as less paid jobs, little free time to spend on their children, little-paid maternity leave, no childcare facilities, no flexible working hours. Set up your claims:

• the possibility of part-time work for women with children;

• high-paid jobs for women;

• high-paid maternal leave;

• equal promotion opportunities for men, childless women and women with children.

Role 3. You are Deputy Minister of Finance

You are AGAINST the women’s claims.

Your reasons:

• the possibility of part-time work for women already exists;

• high-paid maternity leave and new high-paid jobs for women would demand much money from the state budget;

• you think that cleverer and more competent people are promoted, and usually they are men.

Roles 4, 5, 6. You are members of the Women’s Social Party. You support your Head and demand more attention from the Government to women’s problems. Give examples from your life experience (real or fiction) about an effective balance of a woman’s business career and her mother’s career.

Unit 2. Public Relations

Role play “Setting up a PR Agency” Exercise 14, page 18

1. Read the situation:

A businessman wants to explore a new business area, namely, PR. In order to set up a PR-agency he needs investments, so he goes to a bank where he talks with the bank managers, trying to convince them that the deal is safe.

2. Choose your role:

Roles 1, 2. A businessman and his partner.

Roles 3, 4. PR consultants.

Roles 5, 6. Bank Executive and Credit Manager of the Bank.