Case study · Pharmaceuticals & life sciences

How AbbVie built a language program that travels with its people — and their families

Five years, 25 languages, 41,000 hours of instruction — and a 75% participation rate across a globally mobile workforce.

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800

Participants trained since 2021, including spouses and children

41,000+

Instruction hours delivered

25

Languages taught

75%

Participation rate

53 h

Average completed per learner

The client

A research-driven biopharmaceutical company operating in more than 70 countries

AbbVie develops and delivers medicines and therapies across immunology, oncology, neuroscience, eye care and aesthetics. Its scientists, commercial teams and manufacturing specialists work in dozens of markets, and careers frequently cross borders — from a research site in one country to a regional headquarters in another.

That mobility is what makes language a business issue rather than a benefit. Regulatory submissions, clinical collaboration and commercial negotiation all happen in the local language. And every relocation moves a household, not just an employee.

ELT has supported AbbVie’s global population since 2021 with one-to-one and small-group programs delivered in 25 languages, virtually and in person, on the schedules real work allows.

Sector

Pharmaceuticals & life sciences

Footprint

Operations in 70+ countries

Partnership

With ELT since 2021

Services

Language training, cultural training, family programs

Delivery

Virtual, in person and hybrid

The challenge

One program, many very different learners

AbbVie needed a single provider able to serve an executive preparing for a board presentation in Portuguese, a lab scientist arriving in Germany, and that scientist’s partner and children starting school the same month.

Uptake was the real test. Voluntary training programs typically stall at low double-digit participation; anything less than genuine adoption makes the investment hard to defend.

Many languages, few overlaps

Demand spread across 25 languages instead of concentrating in two or three.

Calendars that do not cooperate

Clinical, commercial and manufacturing schedules rarely align with fixed class times.

Families left out

Partners and children had needs no employee-only program addressed.

Proving it was used

HR needed participation and progress data, not just enrolment numbers.

The program

Built per learner, governed centrally

Every participant gets their own program. HR and Global Mobility get one point of contact, one set of reporting, and one contract.

Level assessment first

Every learner starts with a benchmarked level and a target tied to their role, so progress is measurable from day one.

Instructors matched to context

Trainers with pharmaceutical, regulatory or commercial backgrounds — not generalists working from a coursebook.

Scheduling that survives reality

Sessions rebooked around trials, launches and travel, across time zones, without losing the program thread.

Family programs as standard

Spouses and children join the same program with everyday language and local orientation.

Cultural training alongside

Working norms, feedback styles and negotiation habits for the destination market, paired with the language.

Reporting HR can present

Hours, attendance, level movement and participation by population, in one dashboard per cycle.

Families included

The 800 participants are not all employees

Spouses, partners and children are counted in the same program, with the same instructors and the same quality standard. When a family can shop, see a doctor and make friends in the local language, the assignment holds.

It is the single most common reason AbbVie participants tell us the move worked.

The results

Five years of measured delivery

800

Participants reached

Employees plus spouses and children, across five years of continuous delivery.

75%

Participation rate

Far above the double-digit uptake typical of voluntary corporate training.

53 h

Average per learner

Enough sustained study to move a full CEFR level for most participants.

Languages delivered

From a single contract, with one coordinator and one reporting standard.

“The program works because it bends to our people instead of the other way around — and because nobody had to argue about whether their family counted.”

Global Mobility lead

Pharmaceuticals sector

How it grew

From a first cohort to a standing program

2021

Program launches with an initial cohort of assignees and their families.

2022–23

Scope widens to commercial and regulatory teams; cultural training added.

2024–25

Participation passes 75%; reporting consolidated into a single quarterly cycle.

2026

Standing program across 25 languages, now the default for new relocations.

Could this work for your organization?

Tell us the roles, the destinations and the timeline — we will come back with levels, formats and cost.

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