Happy Thursday! Professional Communication day. You’ve explained a decision in a meeting and someone just said “can you say more about that?” — today’s word is exactly the verb you reach for next: elaborate.

📖 Word of the Day: Elaborate

• Word: elaborate
• IPA: /ɪˈlæb.ə.reɪt/ (verb) · /ɪˈlæb.ə.rət/ (adjective)
• Vietnamese meaning: giải thích/trình bày chi tiết hơn về một điều gì đó (động từ); hoặc: công phu, chi tiết, cầu kỳ (tính từ)
• Example sentences:
  1. “Could you elaborate on why we chose Postgres over DynamoDB for this service?”
  2. “The PM asked the engineer to elaborate on the rollout risks before the launch review.”
  3. “I won’t go into an elaborate explanation now — let’s cover the details in the design doc.”

Listen and practice pronunciation:

• Cambridge Dictionary — elaborate
• YouGlish — elaborate in real videos

Vocabulary Table

Phrase	Vietnamese	Example
Walk (someone) through	hướng dẫn/giải thích từng bước cho ai đó	”Let me walk you through the deployment process step by step.”
Break it down	chia nhỏ, giải thích rõ ràng từng phần	”Can you break it down for the stakeholders who aren’t technical?”
Get into the weeds	đi sâu vào chi tiết nhỏ nhặt (đôi khi quá mức cần thiết)	“We don’t need to get into the weeds here — just give the summary.”
To be more specific	để nói cụ thể hơn	”To be more specific, the outage lasted exactly 12 minutes.”
Follow up with details	gửi thêm thông tin chi tiết sau	”I’ll follow up with details in a written doc after the call.”

🗣 Pronunciation Guide

“Elaborate” breakdown — verb: /ɪˈlæb.ə.reɪt/, adjective: /ɪˈlæb.ə.rət/:

• Four syllables: e-LAB-o-rate — stress falls on the second syllable, “LAB”
• The verb ending “-rate” is a full, clear /reɪt/ sound (rhymes with “rate”)
• The adjective ending is reduced to a soft schwa /rət/ (sounds like “-rit”) — this is the trickiest part, since the spelling looks identical to the verb
• Common mistake: stressing the first syllable (“EL-aborate”) or using the full “-rate” sound for the adjective form — listen for native speakers softening that last syllable when it means “detailed/complex” rather than “to explain”

Practice sentence (read aloud 3x):

“Before we finalize the elaborate migration plan, can you elaborate on why we need three separate rollback stages?”

✍️ Exercise 1: Fill in the Blank

Fill each blank with one word or phrase from today’s list: elaborate, walk through, break it down, to be more specific, follow up with details.

1. “I don’t fully understand the caching strategy — could you _______ on it?”
2. “Let’s _______ this into three smaller tasks so the team can estimate each one.”
3. “The architecture diagram looked very _______, with dozens of connected services.”
4. “Can you _______ me _______ the incident timeline from start to finish?”
5. “I’m short on time now, but I’ll _______ after the meeting.”

Show answers

1. elaborate
2. break it down / break this down
3. elaborate
4. walk, through
5. follow up with details

✍️ Exercise 2: Translate to English

Translate these Vietnamese sentences using today’s vocabulary.

1. “Bạn có thể giải thích chi tiết hơn về lý do tại sao chúng ta trì hoãn ra mắt không?”
2. “Hãy chia nhỏ vấn đề này ra để mọi người dễ hiểu hơn.”
3. “Tôi sẽ hướng dẫn bạn từng bước qua quy trình triển khai.”

Show answers

1. “Could you elaborate on why we delayed the launch?”
2. “Let’s break this down so everyone can understand it more easily.”
3. “I’ll walk you through the deployment process step by step.”

💬 Idiom of the Day: “Read between the lines”

• Vietnamese meaning: hiểu ý nghĩa ẩn ý, không được nói ra trực tiếp; suy luận điều thật sự được ngụ ý ngoài lời nói/văn bản
• Example 1: “The email didn’t say the project was cancelled, but if you read between the lines, that’s clearly what’s happening.”
• Example 2: “During the review, you have to read between the lines — when a senior engineer asks ‘have you considered X?’, they usually mean ‘you should do X.’”

📺 Recommended Watching

• YouGlish — search “elaborate” to hear the verb and adjective stress patterns used by native speakers in real clips
• Cambridge Dictionary — quick pronunciation and definition lookup, including audio for both word forms
• Harvard Business Review (YouTube) — short videos on explaining ideas clearly and structuring professional communication, useful vocabulary in context

🎯 Thursday Challenge

In your next meeting or Slack thread, when someone gives a short answer that needs more depth, ask “could you elaborate on that?” instead of “what do you mean?” — it’s more precise, sounds more professional, and invites a fuller explanation without sounding confused.