Keeping up with Industry: Understanding the Evolving Professional Communication Needs in Asia

Abstract

The Asian workplace is a dynamic environment with ever-evolving contexts and fast-paced changes (Du-Babcock & Bhatia, 2013; Tonby et al., 2020). Asia has also been mistakenly viewed as one market with one context and culture when in fact it is diverse and distinct in each country an region (McCorkindale et al., 2021; Du-Babcock, 2018). Professional communication in these Asia markets should not only be personalised but also localised and constantly updated. This creates an exciting opportunity for educators designing and teaching professional communication courses to consider the most relevant and important principles during the curriculum design and for faculty to consider how they would facilitate discussions that stimulate active learning and critical thinking (Boyer, 1990). There is, hence, a need to consider how professional communication specialists can keep up with industry changes, shifting communication needs and evolving expectations of the Asian workplace to inform curriculum design and teaching (Al-Musalli, 2019; Winchester-Seeto & Piggott, 2020) and how professional communication faculty can deepen and refresh their disciplinary, subdisciplinary and interdisciplinary understanding in the backdrop of evolving Asian business contexts. This conceptual paper uses the scholarship of discovery, integration, application and teaching (Boyer, 1990) as a framework to suggests ways in which professional communication specialists can continually develop their understanding of the professional communication discipline in the context of Asia. Insights drawn could potentially contribute to the professional development of faculty which will in turn have an impact on curricula that prepare students for communication at the workplace.

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