A Pioneer in Professional Communication
The Engineering Management Institute in the US recently published the results of a survey that showed that communications skills are at the top of the list for soft skills employers look for in an engineer. While that may seem obvious, yet every year John Moffatt, associate professor at the Ron and Jane Graham School of Professional Development, notes some resistance from students.
“Most of them don’t want to be here. They assumed that, when they went into engineering, they would never have to deal with ‘soft studies’ people like us again. Some imagined they would never again have to struggle to write a sentence and that they would be able to rely on spell-check for the rest of their careers. Yet, when they start to see the results, they usually come around,” Moffatt says.
History
As the name suggests, the school was founded in 2012 at the University of Saskatchewan through the sponsorship of distinguished engineering alumni Ron Graham, P.Eng. of Graham Construction and his wife Jane, who donated $3.27 million to the creation of the school. But the roots of the school go back much further, Moffatt says.
“Our unit got its impetus back in 1998 when D.K. Seaman provided funding for the D.K. Seaman Chair in Technical and Professional Communication. Dr. Jennifer MacLennan was hired as the first (and to date, only) Seaman Chair, and she created GE (General Engineering) 300 course, which subsequently became RCM 300, with a new emphasis on the persuasive and relational dimensions of professional communication practice.”
Today, the school’s entry-level class (RCM 300: Effective Professional Communication) is a required part of engineering students’ studies. Upper-level classes can be taken either as part of a student’s humanities electives or as part of the Certificate in Professional Communication.
Building Trust
The upper-level classes are capped at a class size of 25 and that they tend to fill comes as no surprise to Moffatt.
“What our program has been very successful at conveying to students is that their future jobs will not just be about transmitting data. They’re establishing their credibility. Your data, math and science are only as good as your ability to convince the audience to trust what you’re saying.”
“It’s a common misconception, even among some experienced engineers, that the audience will have to listen to you just because you’re the experts, but that isn’t necessarily true. You have to build a relationship with the audience. After all, when you are talking about infrastructure projects that cost millions or even tens of millions of dollars, the audience needs to be completely comfortable that the project is going to suit their needs. The Grahams recognized this was a skill they wanted in the people they hired – professional citizenship.”
Educating the Whole Person
The school’s courses don’t just focus on building audience trust.
“For example, I teach a course in rhetorical editing. Again, you might wonder how you get a bunch of engineering students excited about a course in grammar. Ultimately, it appeals to that most basic instinct in engineers – problem-solving. When you are communicating with different audiences, you are fighting a constant battle with ambiguity. How do you ensure that no one can possibly take a different meaning from what you are saying? By focusing on grammar as a problem-solving tool in the use of language, the students can relate to its importance in their future professional lives.”
The school also offers courses in rhetorical leadership.
“How do you develop messages to create and motivate a team? That’s obviously something that’s very useful in the workplace.”
The school has integrated into its program components of the existing Engineering Entrepreneurship Option delivered by the Edwards School of Business.
“Ron Graham has said that the courses in the school should educate the entire person and that’s something we take seriously. While we do teach good grammar and spelling, our course goes beyond simply being a ‘speak and spell’ course.”
The results of the school’s efforts have been encouraging for everyone involved.
“Anecdotally, students have told us that the courses have helped them get hired faster and that employers have indicated to them that they don’t have to train new hires on communications issues like they used to. Employers and professors alike have noted that the professionalism of fourth-year capstone projects has gone way up.”
Moving Forward
The Graham School has the distinction of being the first academic unit in Canada to offer these sorts of courses to engineering students.
“Nobody else in Canada, or anywhere else that we know of, is taking this specific approach. Engineering students at U of S are learning that workplace communication occurs across a wide range of professional, social, cultural, and interpersonal contexts. Learning to analyse communication situations and assess the relationship with an audience at any given moment is critical for effective and ethical professional practice,” Moffatt says.
The school is, therefore, looking at ways to expand its techniques beyond the University of Saskatchewan campus.
“We’re looking at branding the ‘Graham School Method’ and use that as a launching point to develop courses to train the trainers in collaboration with industry partners”
This may involve expanding the courses. Moffatt is particularly interested in seeing the methods moved out into the workplace.
“We’ve developed short courses that we can take out to companies and government agencies. We have, for example, developed some modules for the City of Saskatoon. Our main problem, to date, in delivering these modules is manpower – we don’t have enough instructors in the school to fill the demand for workplace courses while meeting the needs of our undergraduate students. We’re hoping that our ‘train the trainers’ approach will help alleviate that.
The school is also looking to expand its offerings to post-graduate students by providing communication input for master’s and Ph.D. projects. In the long run, the school also hopes to provide more coaching for working professionals coming back to the university for professional development.
“We’re looking at improving our offerings in every way we can. We want to raise both the floor and the ceiling”.