Skip to 0 minutes and 5 secondsNICK PATTERSON: Communication is fundamental to the world of work. Communication can be written, verbal, or visual. It occurs inter-personally, either one on one, or two, and between groups of people. More and more, communication now takes place in digital spaces. In the workplace, the purpose of communication is to inform, motivate, and effect change. This includes communicating to consult or engage with individuals and groups both inside and outside of organisations.
Skip to 0 minutes and 35 secondsWelcome to Career Credentials: Evidence Your Expertise in Communication. I'm Dr. Nick Patterson, Lecturer, and Director of the Professional Practise Programme in IT at Deakin University. I hold academic qualifications at bachelor, honours, and Ph.D. Level, as well as several professional Practise credentials, including one in communication. In addition to technical skills, discipline knowledge, and industry experience, employers are increasingly looking to fill roles with individuals who possess a range of employability skills, sometimes referred to as soft or enterprise skills, such as teamwork, problem-solving, and critical thinking. These skills are transferable between industries and occupations, and one of the most in-demand employability skills is communication. In this course, the big questions we are looking at
Skip to 1 minute and 23 secondsare: What is communication and why does it matter for my employability? What communication skills do I have and how can I most effectively demonstrate these to employers? To answer those questions, in week one, we'll explore what good communication looks like, its relationship to employability, and practical tips for improving some of your key communication skills. In week two, we'll examine how in the face of globalisation and technological advancement the world of work is changing and what this means for you. You'll have the opportunity to benchmark your communication skills against formal qualification frameworks and criteria before discovering what evidence you can use to demonstrate your communication capabilities to employers.
Skip to 2 minutes and 8 secondsAs you work through this course, keep in mind that the activities were designed for you and about teaching you to be a better communicator. Although you will find lots of tips and learn new techniques, rather they're about encouraging you to reflect on your existing skills, knowledge, and experience. Finally, as the name of this course suggests, they are about supporting you to evidence your communication expertise to employers. We have a lot of great material and activities that I look forward to over the next two weeks. So without further ado, let's get started.
Let's get started
Good communication skills – whether interpersonal, oral, written, digital or visual – are in high demand across all industries and employment sectors.
But what does good communication look like? What communication skills do you have and how would you go about benchmarking and demonstrating these to benefit you career goals?
Setting the scene for your learning
Have you ever applied for a job that didn’t emphasise communication skills?
Communication is essential to engaging others, sharing ideas and building understanding within your team, across an organisation, or with external stakeholders, customers and clients.
It’s a vital skill that we often take for granted by failing to appreciate the complexity of all the elements associated with effective communication, especially within a professional context.
Your ability to articulate and evidence your communication capabilities is critical to gaining employment opportunities, whether in terms of changing jobs, applying for a promotion, re-entering the workforce, gaining access to the resources required to start your own business, or pursuing further education and training.
However, many of us find it difficult to evaluate and market our own communication skills, knowledge and experiences.
What will you be learning?
In this course you’ll:
- investigate the role of communication in both jobs of today and in the future
- explore what communication skills employers are looking for
- discover practical tips and strategies for improving your interpersonal, verbal, written and digital communication skills
- benchmark your own capability in communication against Deakin’s Professional Practice framework
- discover how to apply for an internationally recognised, university-level credential.
Your learning outcomes
By completing this course, you should be able to:
- define communication and its importance to the workplace
- describe the behaviours, skills and knowledge that exemplify good communication
- assess your current communication skills against a qualifications framework
- collect evidence of your capability to demonstrate to employers and/or apply for a communication credential.
Meet the team
Your Lead Educator for this course is Dr Nick Patterson.
You’ll also be hearing from senior industry leaders and holders of employability credentials in communication who’ll provide you with personal insights and perspectives about the role – and importance – of communication.
Watch the video to hear more from Nick about communication and the big questions you’ll be addressing throughout this course.
When you’re done, use the comments to introduce yourself, why you’re taking this course and what you hope to get out of it.
Next, select the ‘mark as complete’ button and move to the next step.
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