| Summary: | This study aims to examine what competencies are expected from a strategiccommunicator 2019, as well as how education and the work field is cooperating.Expectations on competencies regarding the strategic communication profession and thecooperation between education and work field is analyzed based upon empirical data. Thedata is conducted from a combined quantitative and qualitative online-survey withstudents at the strategic communication at Umeå University (N = 45), and semi-structuredqualitative interview with associate professor at the program for strategic communicationat Umeå University and a selection of employees from six different companies within theprivate sector. Two different Likert-scales is used for measuring collaboration andcompetencies in the online-survey. Strategic communication theory and complexity theoryare used for discussion of the analyzed data. The results show that students find the levelof collaboration between education and work field to be low (mean score falls under 3 outof 7 for all the variables). However, the majority have been in touch with companieswithin strategic communication (68 percent). Education and work field show a low levelof cooperation, but both parts want to increase the collaboration. The only competencythat is mentioned by all three parties is to be creative. Generally, for all three parties, thereis a focus on subjective characteristics rather than technical and practical ability andcompetence. There is a natural development of a higher demand on communicativeorganizations and strategic communicators must therefore practice communication in itscomplexity and leave the transmission model in order to move toward aprofessionalization. The variety of competencies required can be explained fromcomplexity theory that the strategic communicator benefits from being complex andflexible to meet the demands from a complex society. Thus, the conclusion is that theresults show a need for an increased level of communication between education and workfield.
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