The Competency Pivot

Abstract

In this article, we outline a competency-based approach to teaching business communication. At the heart of this approach, classroom instruction, assignments, and evaluation center on a goals-oriented and receiver-centric understanding of communication in which students are taught strategies for meeting five core competencies of business communication: professional, clear, concise, evidence driven, and persuasive. This is not a reinvention of the curriculum but instead a pivot that positions existing disciplinary knowledge and best practices into a clear, memorable, and professionally oriented framework to help students build critical communication skills that can be applied strategically across a range of business situations.

Do Interns Know What They Think They Know? Assessing Business Communication Skills in Interns and Recent Graduates

“…Brink and Costigan (2015) also noted the distinction between communication skills and interpersonal skills. This is somewhat in line with what business communication courses have traditionally focused on-message creation, PowerPoints, bad and good news messages, emails, and so on (Lucas & Rawlins, 2015;Russ, 2009). The focus on document creation and written communication skills in business communication courses, rather than on interpersonal skill development, perpetuates the notion that the two concepts-interpersonal and communication-are distinct in the minds of business professionals and business school leaders (DeKay, 2012).…”

“…Business communication is continuously evolving due to technological advancements and the introduction of unique evaluation methods. Of particular interest would be to evaluate students' perceptions of communication importance in programs that implement new business communication teaching methods, such as evaluating the core competencies proposed by Lucas and Rawlins (2015). Though our survey did not have any respondents younger than junior class standing, there is certainly a push for younger students to take on internships earlier and more frequently throughout their college tenure.…”

Teams That Innovate: The Language of Difference-Driven Inquiry at the Workplace

“…Students can be taught each strategy and given examples of how workplace professionals enact those strategies through language. Showing students how language intersects with productivity, including the ability to innovate, responds directly to recent calls in business communication scholarship asking for more instruction that applies theory (Cyphert et al, 2019, p. 183) and builds upon genre-based pedagogy to focus more on rhetorical competencies (Lucas & Rawlins, 2015;Rawlins, 2018;Schartel Dunn & Lane, 2019).…”

Exemplary and Unacceptable Workplace Communication Skills

“…In this way, business and professional communication instructors-regardless of disciplinary focus-have precise skills to emphasize in their courses. Lucas and Rawlins (2015) pivot toward this approach in their argument for competency-based curricular revisions. Shrivastava's (2012) conceptual framework for business communication includes building relationships, building rapport, and listening, among others, as skills that coalesce around interpersonal, organizational, and leadership communication.…”