Corporate communication plays today a key role in the management of organizations, by helping them project who they are and what they do and by participating in the decision making process. In charge of managing relationships with the organization’s stakeholders, corporate communication contributes to enhance the quality of corporate and business decisions. It also steers the organizational identity processes at the heart of corporate branding. It therefore contributes to the management of the organization’s reputation capital, a key factor influencing the ability of an organization to attract strategic resources. In this it is a strategic partner of other corporate functions: for instance in managing relationships with investors, it interacts with financial managers; in dealing with public authorities and regulators, it collaborates with legal services; in addressing issues of identity and corporate culture, it partners with human resources specialists; in communicating with customers, it collaborates with marketers, etc. Corporate communication specialists therefore need to acquire solid general management skills in order to carry out their roles effectively.
To this purpose, the programme develops analytical and decision making abilities for corporate communication, grounded in a sound knowledge of organisation, business economics and management. In order to help develop these analytical students are required to choose courses for 24 ECTS among a wide range of elective courses or among core courses offered in other USI’s Master programmes and decision making skills, lectures are integrated with more active teaching methods, consisting of discussion of case histories, role-playing, business games, individual and group projects, etc.
Graduates from the programme will be ready to enter the corporate communication profession at a management level. The skills acquired meet the requirements for professional careers in organisations of different kinds as well as in corporate communication agencies and consulting firms. Graduates will also be able to undertake specialised roles, in areas such as internal communication, media, financial relations, public affairs or marketing communication management.
The programme stretches over two years (120 ECTS credits) and is structured to allow the students to personalise their study curricula according to their individual interests. Typically, in the first semester students attend the general management classes in order to acquire the basics of management. The second and third semesters are dedicated to core courses and electives. Students are required to take core courses that regard specific communication management topics and methodology and to complete their curriculum with elective courses. They can also acquire minors in four areas: Digital Marketing, Digital Communication, Content Design, Public Communication and Corporate Social Responsibility. During the last semester students work in teams on a field project and individually write up their master’s thesis.