Professional communication, encompasses written, oral, visual and digital communication within a workplace context. This discipline blends together pedagogical principles of rhetoric, technology, software, and learning theory to improve and deliver communication in a variety of settings ranging from technical writing to usability and digital media design to more effectively communicate in the business world. It is a new discipline that focuses on the study of information and the ways it is created, managed, distributed, and consumed. Since communications is a rapidly changing area, technological progress seems to often outpace the number of available expert practitioners. This creates a demand for skilled communicators. Communication skills are critical to a business because all businesses, to varying degrees, involve the following: writing, reading, editing, speaking, listening, software applications, computer graphics, and Internet research. Job candidates with professional communication backgrounds are more likely to bring to the organization sophisticated perspectives on society, culture, science, and technology. The field is closely related to that of technical communication, though professional communication encompasses a wider variety of skills.
Professional communication draws on theories from fields as different as rhetoric and science, psychology and philosophy, sociology and linguistics. Much of professional communication theory is a practical blend of traditional communication theory, technical writing, rhetorical theory, adult learning theory, and ethics. According to Carolyn Miller in What's Practical about Technical Writing? she refers to professional communication as not simply workplace activity and to writing that concerns "human conduct in those activities that maintain the life of a community." As Nancy Roundy Blyler discusses in her article Research as Ideology in Professional Communication researchers seek to expand professional communication theory to include concerns with praxis and social responsibility. Regarding this social aspect, in "Postmodern Practice: Perspectives and Prospects," Richard C. Freed defines professional communication as
A. discourse directed to a group, or to an individual operating as a member of the group, with the intent of affecting the group's function, and/or B. discourse directed from a group, or from an individual operating as a member of the group, with the intent of affecting the group's function, where group means an entity intentionally organized and/or run by its members to perform a certain function....Primarily excluded from this definition of group would be families, school classes, and unorganized aggregates. Primarily excluded from the definition of professional communication would be diary entries, personal correspondence, reportage or belletristic discourse, most intraclassroom communications and some technical communications....Professional communication...would seem different from discourse involving a single individual apart from a group affiliation communicating with another such person, or a single individual communicating with a large unorganized aggregate of individuals as suggested by the term mass communication.
Professional communication journals
connexions • international professional communication journal is a refereed journal published by the Department of Communication, Liberal Arts, Social Sciences, at New Mexico Tech. The journal focuses on communication in local, national, international, and global work and civic activity settings. connexions provides a forum for researchers, practitioners, students and emerging scholars from diversified backgrounds, interests, and nationalities, interested in international professional communication.
IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication
The IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication is a refereed quarterly journal published since 1957 by the Professional Communication Society of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. The readers represent engineers, technical communicators, scientists, information designers, editors, linguists, translators, managers, business professionals and others from around the globe who work as scholars, educators, and/or practitioners. The readers share a common interest in effective communication in technical workplace and academic contexts. The journal's research falls into three main categories: the communication practices of technical professionals, such as engineers and scientists, the practices of professional communicators who work in technical or business environments, and research-based methods for teaching professional communication. The Journal of Professional Communication is housed in the Department of Communication Studies & Multimedia, in the Faculty of Humanities at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. JPC is an international journal launched to explore the intersections between public relations practice, communication and new media theory, communications management, as well as digital arts and design.
Studying professional communication
The study of professional communication includes:
the study of rhetoric which serves as a theoretical basis
the study of technical writing which serves as a form of professional communication
the study of in-person and virtual training, which serves as a form of communication delivery
the study of visual communication which also uses rhetoric as a theoretical basis for various aspects of creating visuals
