Five PR skills you do learn at Centennial

Recently Gini Dietrich, one of the smartest PR practitioners working in the business, wrote a post for PR Daily called “5 PR skills you won’t learn in a classroom.”  The post looks at five specific skill sets that are essential for communicators, though often overlooked, or according to Gini, not taught. On a broader level, they reflect the growing importance of ensuring students studying PR and corporate communications understand business operations and how PR fits into the broader marketing spectrum within organizations.

Gini’s post made me stop and reflect on whether we’re teaching these skills in Centennial’s Corporate Communications & Public Relations program.  We are, in fact, and continue to strengthen these important areas both inside and outside the classroom.

The Business Dashboard.  Business for Corporate Communicators is a first semester course that ensures students understand how business operate and the role strategic communications places in its success.  We look at balance sheets when we talk about investor relations and make sure students understand the bottom line.  Looking to the future, we’re looking at partnerships with Centennial’s School of Business to complement what we’re teaching.

Traditional Marketing.  Centennial’s Corporate Communications & Public Relations program is part of an integrated Advertising and PR unit in the School of Communications, Media & Design at the Centre for Creative Communications.  We look at the interrelationship between marketing and PR, and how they work together.  Currently we’ve got post-grad advertising students working with CC&PR students in our Event Management class.

Budgeting and Forecasting.  In our Project Management and Communications Management courses, we look at budget management from several different perspectives.  Students forecast and build budgets from scratch in Event Management, part of our commitment to hands-on learning.  In Fall 2012 CC&PR students planned and executed nine special events that raised close to $13,000 – effective budgeting was key to their success.

Management and Leadership.  Centennial’s program works to create the confidence and leadership skills new communicators need.  From working in cross-functional teams to taking lead roles on projects, students get multiple opportunities to put what they’re learning to work.  We mandate all our students join CPRS or IABC and encourage them to volunteer so they can begin exercising management skills in the real world.  Plus, we have opportunities like our interactive marketing agency, TILT, where students get real agency experience and the opportunity to lead projects.

Willingness to Learn New Things. Can we teach this in a classroom? I think we can and do – by encouraging our students to stretch themselves beyond what they think is possible.  By encouraging them to learn new skills. To take risks. And to commit themselves to lifelong learning.   It’s reflected in the work our students do and the discussions we have in class everyday.