Business Writing and Communication Certificate | Northwestern SPS - Northwestern School of Professional Studies

Discover and improve upon your own communication style and, through practice, learn how to hone that style for academic success and professional development within the vast and diverse forum of public speaking. This course is a laboratory in which you will be encouraged to speak publicly about issues that concern you, to share information that interests you and has relevance to a larger audience, and to translate the public speaking forum in terms of your own professional pursuits. Through short speeches, engaging lectures, personalized coaching sessions, and team-building group projects, each student will receive personalized attention tailored to the realities of academic success. Students will leave the course with increased technical and soft skills in effective communication: non-verbal body language, critical listening, storytelling, leadership presence, managing anxiety, and structuring a clear message through visual design. May not be audited.

Public relations is a core management function for every type of organization, whether public or private. Public relations spans a wide range of marketing disciplines including media relations, corporate reputation, community affairs, issues/crisis management, investor relations, and government affairs. PR is one of the primary tools used to reinforce a company's brand and support its competitive position. Students learn the essential components of an effective PR strategy; how to evaluate and manage outside PR counsel; essentials of media relations and crisis management; and how to draft PR messages. Students select a "beat" or coverage area to investigate as part of the class homework projects. This course involves heavy writing; it may not be audited.This course is cross-listed as MKTG 390-CN.

This course provides an overview of the role communication plays in the social influence process. The primary goal of this course is to help students understand the techniques and factors that lead to changes in knowledge, attitudes, and behavior. To reach this goal, in the course, we will (1) define key terms used by social influence researchers and practitioners, (2) explain major classic and contemporary social influence theories and models, (3) identify common heuristics, or simple decision rules, that guide the decision making process, (4) review how various source, receiver, situation, and message characteristics impact the social influence process, (5) demonstrate how to use and defend against the various social influence techniques discussed in class, and (6) discuss the ethical implications involved in the social influence process.

Acts of persuasion influence us in all aspects of our lives. This course will examine the different ways in which we utilize persuasion in the communication we have with our families and friends, our workplace, and the general public. How effective are we? How are we affected? This will culminate in assessments of how persuasion impacts us, as individuals and as a society.

The course is conducted completely online. A technology fee will be added to tuition.

Acts of persuasion influence us in all aspects of our lives. This course will examine the different ways in which we utilize persuasion in the communication we have with our families and friends, our workplace, and the general public. How effective are we? How are we affected? This will culminate in assessments of how persuasion impacts us, as individuals and as a society. This course is part of the Business Leadership Program (BLP) cohort program. 

This course is conducted completely online. A technology fee will be added to tuition.

This course is designed to explore the various processes of professional-client communications, including organizational theory, social, and managerial activities. Special emphasis is given to areas of interpersonal and intergroup conflict as well as ethics and its links to decision-making in business contexts. In addition, specific business frameworks are used to show practical applications of professional-client theory, including sales, consulting, and legal perspectives, among others. The primary purpose of the course is for each participant to gain insight into his or her own communication style and to become a more effective communicator, especially in the professional world where most people spend a major portion of their lives. The course involves extensive use of self-evaluation methodologies and participative activities, enhanced by cases, rigorous self-review and introspection.

As of 7/3/24, this course has been cancelled.

This course is designed to explore the processes of bargaining and negotiation as theoretical, social, and managerial activities. It provides an overview of the basic theoretical approaches, concepts, processes, and research in bargaining and negotiation. Special emphasis is given in the areas of interpersonal and intergroup conflict as well as language bias and its links to negotiating. In addition, interpersonal influence techniques and the tactics and strategies involved with improved bargaining and negotiation are covered. The major purpose of the course is for each participant to gain insight into his or her own negotiating style and to become a more effective negotiator, as well as a more astute observer of social processes. The course involves extensive use of cases, role-plays, and related participative activities, enhanced by rigorous self-review and introspection.

As of 3/22/23, this course has been cancelled.

This course examines collective decision-making and communication in organizations through a survey of research surrounding group decision-making, while also considering organizational culture and organizational change. The course has strong participation and experiential components, including working on a team for a variety of projects to process, utilize, analyze, and appraise the research that we discuss and read. This course is based on experiential learning, a process that incorporates prior and new knowledge with activities, ending with a reflection which leads to new knowledge.

This course is designed for students who have experience with college-level writing but who want to sharpen their writing and communication skills. Students learn to apply measures of excellence in business writing and communication. Assignments relate to business environments, including audience analysis, persuasive writing, verbal and interpersonal communication, and document design and graphics. Writers gain experience writing in collaborative environments, producing multiple drafts and receive feedback from their peers and the instructor. This course combines in-class lecture and discussion on campus with online sessions. Attendance is strongly encouraged for all sessions. Homework will be due in class and online.

Carries business credit.

Schedule Note: Fall 2022 in-class meetings on campus will be 9/22, 9/29, 10/13, 10/27, 11/10, and 12/1. Online/remote meetings will be 10/6, 10/20, 11/3, 11/17, and 12/8.

This course is designed for students who have experience with college-level writing but who want to sharpen their writing and communication skills. Students learn to apply measures of excellence in business writing and communication. Assignments relate to business environments, including audience analysis, persuasive writing, verbal and interpersonal communication, and document design and graphics. Writers gain experience writing in collaborative environments. Students produce multiple drafts and receive feedback from their peers and the instructor. Carries business credit.

As the information ecosystem evolves, so must consumers and producers of information adjust their evaluative, research, and writing strategies. This writing course focuses on learning to: recognize how technologies affect the production and consumption of information and misinformation; locate information using well-designed search strategies and the most appropriate sources; evaluate information and its sources critically; access and use information ethically and legally; demonstrate an understanding of context, audience, and purpose in writing tasks; create compelling written content to illustrate mastery of a topic; use graceful language that is virtually error-free.

The course is conducted completely online. A technology fee will be added to tuition.

Note: This course is limited to School of Professional Studies students only. Undergraduate students in other schools at Northwestern are not permitted to enroll in this course.

This course helps students improve their basic writing skills. It emphasizes clarity and conciseness in expressing thoughts and facts. Through readings, discussion, writing exercises and rewrites, along with remote-site interactive instruction, students gain confidence and demonstrate improvement in written expression each week. By the end of the term, students can write clear, logical and accurate stories within the assigned deadline. We will practice writing: on assigned topics; on space requirements; on deadlines. While this is not a writing course exclusively for those who wish to pursue journalism, it nonetheless places heavy emphasis on news. Specifically, the course intends to clear up problems with grammar; sharpen word selection and usage; clean up sentence structure; introduce the basic discipline of journalism; increase writing speed; make stories both accurate and appealing to the intended audience. The skills developed in the course provide solid techniques to apply toward future course work at NU in most other disciplines and at work. Several assignments will concentrate on these three primary writing techniques: narration, description, and exposition.

Public relations is a core management function for every type of organization, whether public or private. Public relations spans a wide range of marketing disciplines including media relations, corporate reputation, community affairs, issues/crisis management, investor relations, and government affairs. PR is one of the primary tools used to reinforce a company's brand and support its competitive position. Students learn the essential components of an effective PR strategy; how to evaluate and manage outside PR counsel; essentials of media relations and crisis management; and how to draft PR messages.

This course is conducted completely online. A technology fee will be added to tuition.

This course was formerly MKTG 390-CN / ADVT 370-CN Introduction to Public Relations.