Between pandemic-related changes in the way we all work and the evolving influence of technology, professional communicators are doing more and more project management. Project management programs and designations are growing out of this need, and are equipping professionals to move up the ranks as they can handle more responsibility. The Managing Major Projects course aims to fill that gap for professional communicators in the Communication Management program.

While programs like RRC Polytech’s Creative Communications equip their graduates for the communications side of their roles, they don’t have enough time to develop extensive project management practices and skills.

Enter Managing Major Projects, a course in RRC Polytech’s new post-graduate diploma in Communication Management.

“The fact is, you can’t possibly learn everything you need to manage communications for an organization in a two-year program,” says Rose Regier (CreComm 2015), who has managed major projects for clients, including the Canada Summer Games, and will be teaching the evening course in the Winter 2023 term. “And besides that, you really need to have experience in an organization before you can really understand how project management should properly work.”

“This course was designed for people who are working as professional communicators. We build on what they already know and do, to develop high-level project management skills that will help them successfully play more important roles,” says Regier.

Like all courses in the new Communication Management program, the Managing Major Projects course develops related professional project management skills and picks up at the skill level its students achieved in a communications-related diploma or degree program. The students learn principles and best practices and then apply them to real-life client situations, in their own workplaces where possible.

“[Communication Management] is an innovative, industry-driven program,” says Joey Pothe, Communications Officer, Association of Employees Supporting Education Services (AESES), who is pursuing the post-graduate diploma in Communication Management and took Managing Major Projects in the Winter 2022 term. “It has small, flexible online classes; instructors are knowledgeable industry experts, and the real-world assignments can benefit your current employer.”

Managing Major Projects classes begin the evening of January 3, 2023, online, and are open to anyone with a diploma or degree in business communications, advertising, marketing communications, public relations, or communication management, or who has worked as a professional communicator.