Professional and business communication in the world of work: how do we help students to prepare for their careers in the new ‘era of AI’?

The third version of our text for students on Professional and Business Communication (Hartley, Knapton and Marriott, 2023) was published by Routledge in May 2023 from the manuscript we delivered in December 2022. Because of this timescale, we could not feature some of the post-ChatGPT developments that have become important, such as Microsoft Copilot or recent changes in patterns of hybrid working. This raises important questions:
• how much has changed in the worlds of business and the professions now that we are living in the ‘era of AI’ with the various (and some very different) predictions of likely futures? (e.g. Hobsbawm, 2022; Myerson and Ross, 2022; Susskind and Susskind, 2022; Suleyman, 2023).
• what implications do these changes have for the educational experience we offer our students? (e.g. Beckingham et al, 2024)
In this workshop we will discuss the implications of recent developments in the world of work for our curriculum.
We will focus on key questions, including the following:
• How and where will our students be working in the future?
• Are we best preparing them for this range of futures?
• How could/should we modify our curriculum to help students make the necessary transitions?
The workshop will generate ideas and resources which will be collated and distributed after the conference.
References
Beckingham, S., Lawrence, J., Powell, S. and Hartley, P. (eds.) (2024, in press). Using Generative AI Effectively in Higher Education. SEDA Focus/Routledge.
Hartley, P., Knapton, H. and Marriott, S. (2023) Professional and Business Communication. 3rd edition. Routledge.
Hobsbawm, J. (2022) The Nowhere Office. Basic Books.
Myerson, J. and Ross, P. (2022) Unworking. Reaktion Books.
Susskind, R. and Susskind, D. (2022) The Future of the Professions. Oxford University Press.
Suleyman, M. (2023) The Coming Wave. London: The Bodley Head.