Organizational & Political Communication :: Communication Management

MA in Communication Management

The Master of Arts in Communication Management prepares students for roles as leaders and change agents in the public and private sectors. Students learn to use communication to achieve organizational goals in business, government, and non-profit arenas.

Students gain expertise in identifying, analyzing and communicating with an organization’s internal and external stakeholders. They learn to create and implement communication campaigns based on an understanding of the changing global technological and media landscape. The Communication Management program stresses the ability to develop and communicate an organization’s goals. Students learn to create ethical, effective, and efficient communication strategies to affect stakeholder behavior.

With close mentoring by a faculty of accomplished academics and experienced practitioners, students learn how to manage the communication functions of an organization. Our curriculum combines strategic communication, leadership development, public affairs, organizational communication theory and research, and management and strategic planning. Our courses include the development and implementation of communication strategies in addition to refinement of speaking, writing, listening, and negotiating skills. Students develop the media expertise necessary to create campaigns utilizing both traditional and new media in a rapidly changing technological environment.

The CM degree prepares students for leadership positions in both public and private sectors, including director of corporate communication or public affairs in the business sector; communications director or press secretary in the political and governmental arena; director of public advocacy campaigns for a non-profit or non-governmental organization; or independent consultant or trainer. In addition, this program puts graduates on the career track to become a senior executive in business and government such as vice president or senior vice president of corporate communication and public affairs; director of a government agency; a campaign manager or candidate for public office; or executive director of a non-profit or non-governmental organization.

Program Requirements

Course Code	Course Information
OP601	Organizational Communication: Theory and Application 4.00 Credits This course is designed to present a survey of organizational communication theories along with the knowledge and skills necessary for effective applications. Students gain the ability to recognize, assess, and, when necessary, improve communication within and organization. Special emphasis is given to both the individual as a communicator and the entire organization as a communicating entity.
OP604	Strategic Planning and the Managerial Process 4.00 Credits This course focuses on how organizations function as systems with special emphases placed on the basic principles of management, strategic planning, decision making, and implementation. Concepts covered include vision, mission, goals, objectives, strategies, tactics, and operations. Organizational communication, the humanistic perspective, ethics, and productivity, in both profit and non-profit environments, are continuing themes throughout this course.
OP606	Strategic Communication and Leadership Development 4.00 Credits This course emphasizes the skills leaders need to be successful persuaders. Students will learn how to build credibility within organizations and exert influence with external audiences, and to apply techniques of strategic communication in such areas as employee relations, managerial innovation, speechwriting, and external fundraising. They will learn to identify and appraise audiences, craft messages appropriately and strategically, and evaluate the effectiveness of the messages they produce.
OP608	Public Affairs: the Interplay of Influence in a Networked World 4.00 Credits Students gain the knowledge and skills necessary to identify, analyze and communicate with internal and external stakeholder groups for the purpose of persuasion. Rhetorical strategies are developed for ethical, effective issue advocacy campaigns and campaigns to build identity, enhance and protect reputation of individuals and organizations. New media developments, diverse and global stakeholder groups, and the 24/7 media environment will be addressed. Students design and produce at least one original communication campaign for a client in the private or public sector.
OP645	Organizational Communication Research 4.00 Credits In this course, research is conceived within the context of organizational dynamics and objectives. Students develop skills in assessing and formulating problems, designing research, gathering and synthesizing data, analyzing and interpreting information, and applying results to comprehensive communication strategies. Students also gain experience in designing and conducting surveys, questionnaires, focus groups, interviews, and communication audits and learn how to optimize research conducted through the Internet.

Choose one of the following:

OP692	Capstone Course in Communication Management 4.00 Credits Students synthesize prior coursework and new learnings to address an important need in public or organizational life. Calling upon competencies in strategic communication planning and design, students produce and present a final professional-level project as the culmination of their course of study. Readings, case studies, and in-class activities support continued inquiry into the most current theoretical dimensions of the discipline. Must be taken in the student's final year.
OP699	Master's Thesis 0.00 Credits Students must identify full-time faculty members in the Department of Organizational and Political Communication to serve on their thesis committees. The committee and the Graduate Program Director must approve a research prospectus before a student may enroll for thesis credit.

OP692

Capstone Course in Communication Management

OP699

Master's Thesis

Elective Courses

Course Code	Course Information
OP626	Crisis Communication 4.00 Credits Students learn about the development of organizational and marketing communication strategies in crisis situations. Using case studies and fieldwork, students focus on the importance of internal communication and media relations during a crisis. Students also investigate preventive strategies that organizations should employ to avoid crises.
OP628	Entrepreneurship and Creative Problem Solving 4.00 Credits Entrepreneurship is the process of creating value by bringing together a unique package of resources to exploit an opportunity. Students learn about the concepts and characteristics of entrepreneurship. Students will investigate the key dimensions of entrepreneurial attitudes and behaviors that include: innovativeness, risk-taking, and proactiveness. Case studies are utilized to help students employ concepts from the course and develop their own creative and critical thinking, as well as problem solving skills.
OP634	Leadership and Social Corporate Responsibility 4.00 Credits Based on the premise that a leader cannot delegate the reputation of the organization, this course explores the role the leader must play for public affairs and stakeholder relations to be successful. Students will role play both the leader and the communication advisor in a series of simulations that highlight the difference in public and private institutions in society, as well as the leader's responsibility to balance stakeholders with competing needs. Case studies will highlight leadership in public-private partnerships to address community, national, and global issues. Students will produce and present at least one communication strategy for a specific leader and will develop at least one public-private partnership proposal.
OP638	Human Resources, Employee Communication, Diversity and Culture 4.00 Credits This course explores employee communication and diversity issues in the context of strategic communication in organizations. Emphasis is placed on understanding organizations and their multiple internal constituencies from the perspective of the human resources professional. Issues addressed include internal communication message development and delivery including best practices in the use of technology and in workplace diversity initiatives. Students will learn to design and implement communication strategies that recognize and adapt to diverse stakeholder groups.
OP643	Global Communications: Organizations Operating Across Dissolving Boundaries 4.00 Credits This course focuses on the management of communication with stakeholders in a world defined by globalization. Case studies, role-play workshops and ethnographic inquiry are employed to enhance and update the student's knowledge and awareness of best-practices in contemporary business negotiations and transactions, public diplomacy initiatives, and cross-sector partnerships. Examples from small business to multinationals and from local non-profits to global NGO's will be used.
OP648	Stakeholder Relations and Communication: Public Sector 4.00 Credits This course will address in depth the development of stakeholder relations and communication in the public sector. Topics covered will include grassroots organizing, public policy and the media, political communication, social advocacy campaigns and public diplomacy. Case studies of communication campaigns at the local, state, regional, national and international levels will be used. Students will produce and present at least one communication campaign to affect behavior in diverse stakeholder groups.
OP649	Stakeholder Relations and Communication: Private Sector 4.00 Credits This course will address in depth the development of stakeholder relations and communication in the private sector with an emphasis on reputation management. Topics covered will be corporate relations with community, government, regulatory, and activist groups; media relations, public affairs, and investor relations to advance the corporation's goals; and philanthropy. Case studies will demonstrate the communication challenges for businesses of every scale, from small businesses to multinationals. Students will produce and present at least one communication campaign to affect behavior in diverse stakeholder groups.
OP652	Organizational and Political Culture in a Networked Society 4.00 Credits This course surveys the political, social and economic trends of the 21st century with an eye on the effects and uses of information technology in the shaping and reshaping of institutions. Students develop a media literacy that informs their own consumption of mediated content. Through a series of exercises and collaborative projects, they use this literacy to guide their strategic use of media formats, applications, and technology in developing every aspect of organizational communication-- from the narrowest internal communication to the broadest public communication campaigns.
OP690	Internship in Communication Management 0.00 Credits This internship requires students to secure positions in organizations where they will be gaining experience in Communication Management. Students must meet with site supervisors and internship coordinators throughout their internships and complete reports regarding their experiences during and at the completion of their internships. All students must participate through the Career Services Office in a mandatory internship orientation the semester before the internship. Students may take up to 8 internship credits.
OP695	Seminar in Organizational Communication 4.00 Credits Students have the opportunity to enroll in special topics courses that are offered by the Department of Organizational and Political Communication when contemporary ideas or new research findings in a chosen area of program study emerge in the field of communication. This course number represents a new course offering that, if successful, will become a permanent course in the course roster
OP697	Directed Study 0.00 Credits Students interested in completing independent projects in their areas of study can do so under this option. Students must collaborate with a full-time faculty member in the Department of Organizational and Political Communication on their study proposals. These proposals must identify learning objectives, learning outcomes, a justification for taking the directed study, design of instruction, and a bibliography. Proposals must be submitted by the end of the semester preceding the semester in which the students want to complete directed studies. Directed studies cannot be used to fulfill a course requirement that is offered by the Department of Organizational and Political Communication. Students must secure the commitment of a full-time faculty member and his/her signature along with the approvals and signatures of the Graduate Program Director and Chair of the Department.