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Business fluency is essential today for effective strategic communication. To fulfill the mandate of trusted counselors and advisors to executives and the C-suite, communication professionals must no longer just have excellent communication skills, but they must understand and speak the language of the business world. The challenge is that many communication graduates and professionals did not go to business school and do not hold an MBA.
Business Acumen for Strategic Communicators: The Workbook provides the essential practical learning needed to help upskill communication professionals into bona fide business leaders and advisors. Through briefs, exercises and discussion activities, readers will learn to analyze and interpret key business materials produced by companies and nonprofit organizations, including CEO letters, annual reports, financial statements, earnings releases, CSR, DEI and ESG reports, and more. A revised and expanded glossary is provided, as are answer keys for the exercises.
Drawing on the success of Ragas and Culp’s prior books, this innovative workbook offers hands-on learning opportunities to help put newly acquired business acumen knowledge into practice.
Kudos to Matt and Ron for writing a workbook that focuses on strategic communicators to think and operate as business leaders. There is no doubt that the business side of the craft is directly proportional to the impact of the enterprise. The workbook will provide a guide to the profession that truly wants to understand how the CEO and the board of directors, in particular, thinks and how she or he makes decisions. This will only make CCOs more valuable to all stakeholders.
Matthew W. Ragas, Ph.D. is Professor, College of Communication, DePaul University, USA. An award-winning teacher, researcher and adviser, he was the founding director of the DePaul Master’s in Professional Communication program and served as the academic director of the Master’s in Public Relations and Advertising program during which it was named the PRWeek Awards PR Education Program of the Year.
Ron Culp is Professional-in-Residence, College of Communication, DePaul University, USA. Before joining DePaul, he served as a managing director and partner at global public relations firms Ketchum and Sard Verbinnen (now FGS Global). Earlier in his career, Ron held senior communications positions at four Fortune 500 corporations. He has received numerous professional awards, including the Gold Anvil for lifetime achievement from the Public Relations Society of America.
Part I. Introduction
Chapter 1. Defining ‘Business Acumen’: A Delphi Study of Corporate Communication Leaders
Chapter 2. Developing Business Literacy in the Classroom and the Workplace: A Delphi Study of Corporate Communication Leaders
Part II. Financial Statements and Valuation Essentials
Chapter 3. Income Statement: Public Companies
Chapter 4. Income Statement: Nonprofit Organizations
Chapter 5. Balance Sheet: Public Companies
Chapter 6. Balance Sheet: Nonprofit Organizations
Chapter 7. Financial Valuation Essentials: Public Companies
Part III. The CEO Letter and the Annual Report
Chapter 8. CEO Letter: Public and Private Companies
Chapter 9. Executive Director Letter: Nonprofit Organizations
Chapter 10. Annual Report: Private Companies
Chapter 11. Annual Report and 10-K Filing: Public Companies
Part IV. Quarterly Earnings Reports
Chapter 12. Quarterly Earnings Release: Public Companies
Chapter 13. Quarterly Earnings Call: Public Companies
Part V. ESG, DEI and EEO-1 Reports
Chapter 14. ESG Report: Public and Private Companies
Chapter 15. DEI Report: Public and Private Companies
Chapter 16. EEO-1 Report: Public and Private Companies
Part VI. Corporate and Organizational Governance Information
Chapter 17. The C-suite and the Board – Governance Information: Private Companies
Chapter 18. The C-suite and the Board – Governance Information: Nonprofit Organizations
Chapter 19. Annual Proxy Statement (DEF 14A Filing): Public Companies
Part VII. Leveling Up: Professional Development
Chapter 20. Business Acumen and Professional Development