Work vocabulary in English: jobs, interviews and working conditions, with exercises

If you’ve ever tried to explain what you do for a living in English, you’ve probably hesitated at some point: is it I’m looking for a work or a job? How do you say you’ve lost your job without sounding like a film script? And what about salary, a temporary contract or the night shift? Don’t worry, it happens to almost all my students. Work vocabulary in English is some of the most useful vocabulary you’ll ever learn: you need it to introduce yourself, to look for a job, to talk about your plans for the future and, of course, for the Cambridge exams, where the world of work is one of the most frequent topics from A2 Key right up to B2 First.

In this post I’ve organised it all for you: the difference between work and job, the most common jobs and professions with their pronunciation, the vocabulary for looking for a job (the CV, the application and the interview), working conditions (pay, contracts, hours and shifts), the office, how to talk about losing or leaving a job, first jobs and summer jobs, remote working and work-life balance, the most useful collocations, idioms and phrasal verbs, typical mistakes, how all of this comes up in the exams and, at the end, exercises with answers.

Let’s get started! 🙂

Work or job? The key difference

Let’s start with the number one question. Many languages use a single word for both, but English has two and they aren’t interchangeable:

• Job /dʒɒb/ is countable: it’s a specific position, the one you have or the one you’re looking for. I’ve got a new job. She has two part-time jobs.
• Work /wɜːk/ as a noun is uncountable: it’s the activity of working, or the place you go to. I have a lot of work today. I go to work by bus. That’s why you’ll never say a work or works with this meaning.
• Work is also the verb: I work in a hospital. Job, on the other hand, is never a verb.

A tip I give my students: if you can put a or a number in front of it (a job, two jobs), it’s job. If you’re talking about work in general, tasks, or the place you go every morning, it’s work.

To ask someone what their job is, the most natural question is What do you do? (or What do you do for a living?), and the answer takes a/an before the job: I’m a nurse. She’s an engineer. You can also say I work as a nurse or I work in marketing.

Be careful with career: it isn’t your university course (that’s a degree), but your working life as a whole. She wants a career in medicine.

Jobs and professions in English

Here are the most common jobs, grouped by sector. These are the ones that come up most in A2 and B1 exams and in everyday conversation.

Health, education and public services

Office, business and technology

Trades, hospitality and transport

Watch the pronunciation of plumber: the b is silent, just like in climb. And in chef the ch sounds like sh, because the word comes from French.

Looking for a job: the CV, the application and the interview

If you ever have to look for a job in English (or write a job application email in the exam), this is the vocabulary you need. The key verb is apply for: I’m going to apply for the job. Note that you apply for a position (apply for a job) but you send your application to a company (apply to a company).

And here are some typical job interview questions, with a simple way to start your answer:

• Tell me about yourself. → I’m a hard-working person and I’ve got two years’ experience in…
• Why do you want this job? → Because I’m really interested in… and I’d like to…
• What are your strengths and weaknesses? → I’m very organised, but sometimes I…
• Where do you see yourself in five years? → I’d like to have more responsibility and…
• Do you have any questions for us? → Yes, what would a typical day be like?

Working conditions: pay, contracts and hours

This is the section you’ll need most when you talk about a real job: how much you earn, what kind of contract you have and what hours you work. Let’s start with money, because English has several words for what you get paid:

• Salary /ˈsæləri/: fixed pay, usually yearly or monthly, for a professional job. She earns a good salary.
• Wage(s) /weɪdʒ/: pay by the hour, day or week. The minimum wage is the lowest legal pay.
• Pay /peɪ/: the general word for what you get. The pay is good, but the hours are long.

And notice the verb: you earn a salary, you don’t win it. He earns £1,800 a month. If you’d like more vocabulary like this, have a look at my post on money vocabulary in English.

Notice that full-time and part-time take a hyphen before a noun (a full-time job) and can drop it when they work as adverbs (I work part time, although the hyphen is very common there too).

At the office: colleagues, bosses and meetings

Whether or not you work in an office, these words come up all the time in series, films and exam texts:

One important detail: staff is a collective noun, so it has no plural with -s. For one person you say a member of staff: The hotel has 80 members of staff.

Losing or leaving a job: fired, redundant, resign and retire

This is where my students make the most mistakes, because English chooses the word depending on why you no longer have a job:

The key difference: if you lose your job because you did something wrong (always arriving late, for example), you get fired or sacked. If the company closes or cuts staff and it isn’t your fault, you are made redundant or they lay you off. Saying you were fired when the company closed suggests you did something wrong, so be careful. 😅

First jobs and summer jobs

If you’re at secondary school or preparing for A2 Key for Schools or B1 Preliminary for Schools, this is the vocabulary you’ll use most, because questions about summer jobs and future plans come up all the time:

Here’s how you might talk about it: Last summer I worked as a waiter in a beach bar. The hours were long, but I saved up enough money to buy a new laptop. And remember that you do work experience, not make it: do work experience, do an internship. If these two verbs confuse you, you’ll find the full explanation in my post on do and make.

Remote working and work-life balance: work as an opinion topic

In recent years, remote working and the balance between work and personal life have become star topics in the exams. They’re perfect for opinion questions, so it’s worth having this vocabulary ready:

Notice that commute is both a verb and a noun: I commute to Madrid every day and My commute takes an hour. Spanish has no single word that does both jobs so neatly, which makes it one of the most useful words in this post.

Collocations, idioms and phrasal verbs about work

Key collocations

Collocations are the word combinations that sound natural to a native speaker. These are the most useful ones for the world of work (and if you want many more, there’s a whole post on collocations with WORK):

Idioms about work

Phrasal verbs about work

• take on: employ. The shop is taking on extra staff for Christmas.
• lay off: dismiss because there isn’t enough work. The company laid off 200 workers.
• fill in: complete (a form). Please fill in the application form.
• turn down: refuse. She turned down the job because the pay was too low.
• carry on: continue. Carry on with your work, I’ll be back in five minutes.
• step down: leave an important position. The director stepped down after ten years.

Typical mistakes made by Spanish speakers

• Counting «work»: I’m looking for a work ❌, I’m looking for a job or I’m looking for work ✅.
• Leaving out the article with jobs: She is teacher ❌, She is a teacher ✅.
• Working «of» something: He works of mechanic ❌, He works as a mechanic ✅.
• «Winning» a salary: She wins £2,000 a month ❌, She earns £2,000 a month ✅.
• «Temporal» for «temporary»: a temporal contract ❌, a temporary contract ✅.
• «Companion» for «colleague»: my work companions ❌, my colleagues or my co-workers ✅.
• «Ambient» for «atmosphere»: a good ambient ❌, a good atmosphere ✅.
• «Enterprise» for «company»: enterprise exists, but it’s formal and not very common. In everyday English, say company or firm.
• «Making» an internship: make an internship ❌, do an internship ✅.
• Using «fired» when a company closes: say I was made redundant or I lost my job, not I was fired.

Several of these mistakes are textbook false friends. If you want to revise the most dangerous ones, there’s a list of more than 60 in my post on Spanish-English false friends.

How to talk about work in the Cambridge exams

In my experience as an exam trainer, work is one of the most rewarding topics to prepare, because it comes up at every level:

• A2 Key and B1 Preliminary: in Speaking Part 1 you’ll be asked whether you study or work, and Reading and Listening texts include adverts for summer jobs, timetables and descriptions of jobs.
• B2 First: the world of work is a common topic for essays (for example, whether remote working is good for companies) and for Speaking Part 4. I explain how to organise a good essay in my guide to the B2 First essay.

And if you’re preparing for the Spanish university entrance exam, you’ll be glad to know that work, summer jobs and remote working often come up in the texts and writing tasks of the PAU, as I explain in my guide to the PAU English exam in Andalusia.

Typical Speaking questions

Part 1 (personal questions, A2 to B2):

• Do you work or are you a student?
• What job would you like to do in the future? Why?
• Have you ever had a summer job?
• What do the people in your family do?

Part 4 (opinion questions, B1 and B2):

• Is it a good idea for teenagers to have a part-time job?
• Do you think it’s better to work from home or in an office?
• Is a high salary the most important thing about a job?
• Why do some people find it difficult to have a good work-life balance?

Sample Speaking answer

Here’s an answer to Do you think it’s better to work from home or in an office? written to simulate a B2 level, without reaching C1:

Well, I think it depends on the job and on the person. On the one hand, working from home saves a lot of time, because you don’t have to commute, and you can organise your day in a more flexible way. On the other hand, some people feel lonely at home and they miss their colleagues. In my opinion, the best option is hybrid working: two or three days in the office and the rest at home. That way you can have a better work-life balance and still feel part of the team.

Look at what makes it work: it opens with a nuanced idea (it depends on…), presents both sides with On the one hand… On the other hand, uses precise topic vocabulary (commute, colleagues, hybrid working, work-life balance), gives reasons with because and finishes with a clear, justified opinion (That way…). That’s exactly what’s expected at B2: well-connected ideas and varied vocabulary, without overly complex structures or C1-level expressions.

Useful vocabulary for Writing

If you get an essay, an article or an email about work, these expressions will help you sound more natural:

• job security: knowing your job is safe. Many young people value job security more than a high salary.
• career prospects: chances of progressing in your career. This job offers good career prospects.
• the job market: the jobs available and the people looking for them. The job market is very competitive.
• youth unemployment: unemployment among young people. Youth unemployment is a serious problem in many countries.
• to be well paid / badly paid: Some important jobs are badly paid.
• to gain work experience: A part-time job helps students gain work experience.

Tips for learning and practising this vocabulary

• Prepare your own introduction: write five or six sentences about what you do (or would like to do) using the vocabulary in this post. That’s exactly what you’ll be asked in Speaking Part 1.
• Learn words in families: employ, employer, employee, employment, unemployed. That way you won’t get stuck when you need a different form.
• Read real job adverts in English: they’re short and full of the words in this post (full-time, salary, experience, apply).
• Describe your working or school day: combine it with the vocabulary for daily routines in English and you’ll have a complete answer to any question about your life.
• If you’re a student, revise the school vocabulary too, because the examiner may ask about your studies and your future career at the same time.

Work vocabulary exercises

Time to practise. Below you have three interactive exercises that mark themselves, so you’ll know straight away how you’ve done. Try to do them without looking back at the post.

And if you prefer a version in text that you can copy and paste, you have it down here 👇

Exercise 1. Choose the correct option

Choose the correct word or expression in each sentence.

Exercise 2. Complete with the correct word

Complete each sentence with one of these words: apply, boss, commute, deadline, full-time, interview, promotion, shift, staff, unemployed.

Exercise 3. Correct the mistake

Each sentence has one mistake. Rewrite it correctly.

Conclusion

To sum up: a job is a specific position and it’s countable (a job), while work is work in general and uncountable; jobs take a/an (I’m a nurse); you apply for a position; you earn a salary; and losing your job because you’re fired isn’t the same as being made redundant. With this vocabulary you can talk about your job, your plans and opinion topics like remote working, which is exactly what the exam will ask you to do.

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See you in the next post. Until then, don’t forget to keep smiling! 🙂