Business Communication Instructors Research Articles

Teaching the Course of Business Communication to Large Classes in Pakistani Universities: Challenges and Suggested Strategies

The purpose of this study is to explore Pakistani ESL university teachers’ experiences of teaching Business Communication to large classes. It specifically aims to find out the issues related with teaching business communication in large classes and make some suggestions to manage these large classes. Using purposing sampling technique, researchers conducted semi-structured interviews from 10 university teachers who were teaching business communication course in eight private and public sector universities in Sindh, Pakistan. All the teachers were teaching the course to large classes where the number of students were in between 40 to 150. The findings indicated managing and controlling the class, focusing on the topic, assessing their work and providing feedback were some significant challenges for the teachers. The participants also made some suggestions such as pedagogical strategies need to be changed when there is a possibility of teaching more students in the class for better learning of students. The suggested strategies included modifying the course to the lecture/lab structure, limiting the amount of writing, separating students into different groups, encouraging peer assessment, equipping classroom with projectors and multimedia, and allowing the instructor to teach fewer courses. Keywords: Business Communication, Large class size, Lecture, Teaching

Entrepreneurial Mindsets & Rhetorical Canons: Enhancing Business Communication Pedagogy via Cross-disciplinary Theory, Praxis

Business and professional communication courses hold special opportunities to contribute to students’ development of entrepreneurial mindsets through the use and extension of classical rhetorical theory and praxis. We situate pedagogical activities within the context of the entrepreneurial venture pitch by using Rhetorical Canons of invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery to develop oral discourse while recognizing and developing entrepreneurial mindsets. We utilize elements of entrepreneurial mindset development presented by Kuratko et al. and Daspit et al. to introduce business and professional communication instructors to cognitive, behavioral, and emotional aspects contributing to the establishment of entrepreneurial mindsets.

Doing What We Do Best: Advancing Business Communication Instruction Into the Future With an Agenda for Training and Development

Instruction about teaching business communication skills has been a long-established tradition in the communication discipline. Recent trends in teaching communication training and development extend a long-held emphasis on business communication skill instruction. Given the classical roots of the communication discipline and the current focus on communication skill instruction, this article suggests that future communication theory and research should focus greater attention on behavioral learning outcomes—specifically communication training. This review identifies relevant communication theory that informs a renewed research agenda focused on enhancing behavioral learning outcomes. In proposing this research agenda, we discuss opportunities to apply our current knowledge of intrapersonal, interpersonal, group, public, organizational, mediated, and intercultural communication to advance the discipline through theoretically driven research about business communication skills.

Selections From the ABC 2022 Annual International Conference, Tampa, Florida, USA: Sharing Teaching Innovations With a Porpoise Pod’s Coordination, Speed, and Grace

Business communication teachers navigate a constantly changing pedagogical geography shaped by technology and breakthrough discoveries in linguistics, psychology, and neurobiology. My Favorite Assignment is designed to speed new teaching methods to the classroom. This article gives readers 11 teaching innovations on report writing, intercultural communication, and analysis and critical thinking debuted at the 2022 Association for Business Communication’s (ABC) 87th Annual International Conference in Tampa, Florida, USA. Additional support materials—instructions to students, stimulus materials, slides, grading rubrics, frequently asked questions, and sample student projects—are downloadable from the ABC and DePaul University Center for Sales Leadership websites.

Feature on Teaching and Technology: Teaching MBA Students Business Report Writing Using Social Media Technologies

Data-driven decision making has now moved beyond its traditional domains—operations research, business economics, computer sciences, and business statistics—to “softer subjects,” such as human resource management, organization behavior, and business communication. In this context, teaching with technology encourages students to systematically apply domain knowledge to communicate across a wide variety of stakeholders. In the era of multimodal forms of communication and multiple data sources, management students must be analytical when writing compelling reports and giving persuasive presentations. They should be well versed in using both quantitative and qualitative techniques for report writing and presentation. Drawing on authentic user-generated comments on social media, this article presents two case studies on (a) crisis communication by 30 CEOs and (b) culture shock experienced by foreign tourists sojourning in India, China, and the United Arab Emirates, to demonstrate how master’s in business administration (MBA) students could derive insights from the online comments to make strategic decisions for organizational benefit and make reports based on those findings. The article asserts that this could help to cultivate a data-analytic mindset among the students by preparing them to communicate small (and big) data-driven analysis to relevant stakeholders. It attempts to suggest ways to develop MBA students’ ability to analyze their potential audiences as well as to generate meaningful insights from the available information on social media websites. Finally, it hopes to nudge business communication instructors to embrace multidisciplinary perspectives for planning a technology-based business communication assignment involving the social media landscape. Instructors can not only use the two case studies to illustrate ways to integrate technology with teaching but also create their own mini cases to improve the decision-making, report-writing, and business report presentation skills of their students.

Cognitive and Graphic Design Principles for Creating Well-Organized, Visually Appealing Slide Decks

Slide decks are a ubiquitous form of communication in both academia and business, and business communication instructors must be able to model and teach multimedia design principles. The literature regarding multimedia design has traditionally fallen into two camps: the cognitive school, focused on designing multimedia messages that accommodate human cognitive architecture, and the graphic design school, focused on using visual appeal as a tool for conceptual organization. I synthesize representative models from each school to provide theoretically derived and empirically supported principles for designing slide decks that are both well-organized and visually appealing.

"Essence of Teaching Business Communication Skills to IT Students in ELT in Serbia"

This paper deals with the needs of IT students in ELT in the context of business communication skills. The results presented in this paper are a part of much greater research. The mix-method research was conducted at eight IT departments in five cities in Serbia during the academic year 2011/2012. The quantitative sample included 775 IT students at II and III year of their studies and 77 professors and assistants teaching domain content courses while the subsample for the structured interview included 16 students, 10 professors and 10 assistants. One of the aims of this research was to establish a detailed framework of English language courses suitable for IT students in Serbia. Among the courses that emerged, as the ones that meet the needs of IT students in ELT at tertiary level in Serbia, was the course of Business Communication. In this paper, the authors present the aims of the Business English Communication Course and elaborate on the specific activities and genres that emerged essential for this type of course. The findings may be useful for all ESP teachers teaching at Technical faculties, especially the ones teaching IT students

Using Business Cases in the Process of Teaching Business Communication in a Foreign Language

Using Business Cases in the Process of Teaching Business Communication in a Foreign Language

Designing an online business communication course in English by responding to student needs through an evidence-based approach

Abstract Communication skills are essential for the employability and academic success of business graduates. These skills are either embedded in undergraduate business management courses or taught in a separate course. Designing an English communication course for business management students is reported widely in the literature. However, research on such courses for distance education is scarce despite their increasing demand for distance courses due to an increasing globalisation of higher education and workplaces. This paper reports on the evidence-based design of an award-winning online business communication course in English which responded to changing needs of distance business management students at The Open University, UK. It draws on student needs analysis data (student surveys, online forum posts, industry skills survey reports and a content analysis of business management courses and assignments) and course evaluation surveys to investigate how the online course addressed student needs in terms of course content, teaching and learning and assessment. It argues that student needs analysis is paramount for any new course design and online delivery because the success of a course relies on meeting student needs. The paper has implications for business communication course design and business communication teachers.

Follow the Leader? The Impact of Leader Rapport Management on Social Loafing

To prepare students for the workforce, instructors of business, technical, and professional communication must incorporate team projects in their curriculum. However, both instructors and students have negative perceptions of team projects due to a variety of factors including team dysfunctions like social loafing. No prior study has examined the relationship between leader rapport management (LRM) and social loafing. LRM refers to the use of linguistic strategies to manage relationships between leaders and members. Therefore, we built and tested a model that examines the relationship between LRM and social loafing that is mediated by leader-member exchange and communication quality.

Competing Values Framework as Decoding Tool: Signature Pedagogy in Teaching Business Communication

This article explicates the operationalization of a theoretically robust framework in the teaching of business communication at an institute of higher learning. This article reimagines the design of a business communication course that focuses on the coalescence of both decoding and encoding processes of messages as a unified pedagogical approach in teaching business communication. This approach is in contrast with more conventional approaches in designing communication courses, which tend to prioritize one process over the other. Participants in the study acknowledged the instrumentality in the course design in promoting communicative values with real-world impact.

An Analysis of the Academic Environment in Business and Professional Communication

While previous research in business communication has surveyed business and professional communication instructors regarding their courses, it has not yet asked instructors about additional factors that affect their ability to teach and their students’ ability to learn. These factors include job satisfaction, institutional and collegial support, academic rank, physical teaching environment, teaching and learning resources, and student issues. This study examines the results of a survey of business and professional communication instructors regarding these factors, discusses implications for the disciplines of business and professional communication, and suggests additional avenues for advocacy and research.

Exemplary and Unacceptable Workplace Communication Skills

Thematic analysis of interviews with 22 managers highlight their perspectives on exemplary and unacceptable workplace communication skills. Exemplary skills were perceived to be relatability, documentation, and audience awareness/adaptation, while unacceptable skills were verbal aggression, deception, and defensive communication behaviors. The findings contribute to closing-the-gap research by identifying highly notable skills—both positive and negative—on typical lists of business and professional communication skills. This study also enriches anticipatory socialization scholarship by its application to vocational preparation. Business and professional communication instructors can use the findings here when deciding what topics to emphasize in a course.

Challenges in BCOM: Student and Faculty Perceptions on English as an Additional Language

Business remains a popular major for international students in the United States. Little is known, however, about how these students fare in business communication (BCOM) classes. This qualitative study evaluates the challenges and needs of English as an additional language (EAL) students in BCOM courses at a private university in the United States. We surveyed and interviewed 15 BCOM instructors and 30 students previously enrolled in BCOM. Results reveal faculty are aware of some, but not all, of the linguistic, cultural, emotional, time, and accommodation challenges EAL students face. We discuss suggestions for accommodating EAL students’ unique needs in BCOM courses.

An Updated and Expanded Nationwide Study of Business Communication Courses

This nationwide study of business communication instructors examined course delivery, course outlook, topics and depth of coverage, social media and technology coverage, diversity coverage, critical thinking, and accessibility. The outlook for the course appears positive and promising, and instructors continue to add content to the course. An important finding is that business communication instructors’ level of confidence in technology significantly affects how they cover technology-mediated communication. Therefore, we suggest professional associations and higher education institutions should provide more opportunities for voluntary training in these newer communication technologies. Further research is needed about the strain placed on business communication instructors.

Of Changing Needs and Mismatched Expectations: Teaching Business Communication in Indian Business Schools

The exploratory research uses the framework of Communication Studies and Sociology to demonstrate how restructuring of social hierarchies impacts language use in the Business Communication class of an Indian management institute. The study examines how dominant communication practices are being subverted by issues of identity, power, privilege, sociopolitical forces and technological transformation. It suggests that instructors teaching Business Communication may benefit by aligning their pedagogy to the sensibilities of the present generation of management students. The paper is premised on the interpretivist belief that meanings and identities are socially constructed through respondents’ engagement with everyday realities. Twenty-two in-depth personal interviews were conducted with participants of the postgraduate programme in management and instructors of Business Communication. Further, a questionnaire was administered to 51 participants of an executive management programme to understand attitudes towards language use at the workplace. The responses indicate that a variant of indigenised English appears to be acquiring legitimacy amongst young professionals, while instructors continue to emphasise grammatical accuracy, blindsided by their training in language and literature. Therefore, to cater to the next generation of managers, instructors may have to shed their bias against non-formal expressions in English, and consider focusing on the functional aspects more important for intra-national purposes.

Search Engine Optimization and Business Communication Instruction: Interviews With Experts

Search engine optimization (SEO), or the set of practices involved in attaining a high ranking in search engine results, is a web writing skill that requires more attention in business communication pedagogy, because SEO helps businesses attract customers. This article presents the results of interviews with seven SEO experts on SEO best practices and describes how to integrate SEO into business communication courses.

The Language of LinkedIn: Popular Publications, the Gender Gap, and Pedagogy

Business communication instructors can improve their own instruction about networking online given further understanding of the gender gap among LinkedIn users. An analysis of the rhetoric of magazine advice articles finds gendered differences in the representation of LinkedIn to readers. Examining how publications talk about LinkedIn leads to guidance on how instructors can discuss LinkedIn and gender in the classroom. The article suggests instructors can modify or create assignments to address potential gender usage patterns.

Testing ERE Cycle in Teaching Business Communication Courses: Experiential Learning Strategies

Effective communication skills demonstrate the capacity and efficacy of any business graduate; however, the business industries have continuously raised their concerns on the lack of effective business communication (BC) skills, to serve the requirements of rapidly growing communication within and outside the organizations. Among many factors, teaching methods at higher education have been identified as a major factor that does not allow working skills to be developed. Scholars and researchers have tried to explore and test Experiential Learning (EL) techniques in teaching different courses of business administration programs. EL theory presents a playfield where learners can learn the best by doing (Kolb, 1984). Although business education around the world has already inculcated EL strategies into its system, in Pakistan EL theory is at its initial stage. In this regard, the researcher developed an ERE cycle which was based on Kolb’s (1984) EL theory and tested its impact on the grades of the students of oral and written communication skills. The study was conducted using one sample t-test in the paradigm of quantitative research. Three classes of BBA and MBA from oral and written communication courses were selected for this study. This research compared mean scores of these classes with the population mean over the last three years. The results showed a significant positive difference between the sample mean scores and population mean. The study proved that EL based ERE cycle could prove very effective in the enhancement of the skills of business communication students that were reflected in their performance in exams. The study aimed to provide communication faculty, trainers and institutes the opportunity to explore and utilize the effectiveness of the ERE cycle and perform further researches to extend the utilities of EL based teaching methods.

Comparing Traditional Teaching Method and Experiential Teaching Method using Experimental Research

<p>The modern time is shaping a world of opportunities that has glorified the role<br />and functions of multinational organizations across the globe. An individual has<br />become a global citizen, who explores employment opportunities in different<br />countries of the world. This has signified the importance of interpersonal skills that allow individuals to connect with people from different cultures. As a result, the role of business communication instructors has become vital because they impart the skills of communication among their students. For this, instructors’ sensitivity towards the teaching methods used in classrooms are of prime significance. These methods determine the interest level and motivation of students towards learning and acquisition of communication skills. Therefore, this study aims to compare experiential learning method and traditional learning method to explore which method inculcates and improves the communication skills of business administration students of a private sector university. The study was conducted in a quantitative paradigm using an experimental research design. The sample size comprised 60 BBA students from two different sections of business communication courses. The data were collected using a pretest and posttest. For the pretest, communication skills were imparted to both the groups using the traditional teaching method that heavily employed lecturing. For the posttest, the controlled group was taught using the same traditional teaching method while the treatment group was taught using the experiential learning method. Mean scores 20.46 & 19.90 with a significant value of 0.375 for the pretest established identical nature of both groups. Mean scores 27.80 & 30.36 with a significant value of .002 of posttest showed that the two groups under study had different identities in scores, which proved that experiential learning method improves students’ communication skills better than traditional communication skills.</p><p><strong>Keywords:</strong> business communication, experiential learning, experimental research, traditional learning</p>