What exactly can you do with a communication degree?
I'm a full-time college professor.
This is the most common question I hear
from students in my classes,
and their parents, when they visit campus.
So this video is for all of the
students, teachers, and parents who watch my channel.
In fact, this past year,
my students and I developed a free PDF download
to answer this question once and for all.
There's a link in the description to find that download.
You don't even need to enter your email address to get it.
You just click, scroll down to the bottom of the page,
and download it instantly.
It shows statistics about communication careers
and lists over 100 job titles that are all a great fit
for students who study communication.
Almost everything I mention in this video
is going to come from that download.
Communication is a huge field.
I mention that because communication is not a major
that sets you up for one specific type of job.
If you were an accounting major, for example,
you'd likely go into some type of accounting position.
If your major is computer programming,
your career path is pretty specific.
In contrast to that, communication is a major
that equips you with skills that cut across
lots of different industries, and job titles,
that are multiplying by the day.
It's a degree that gives you maximum flexibility
in industries that focus on people,
but that's part of the challenge.
It's so wide open that we need some guidance
by talking through some specific options.
Big picture, maybe 10 years ago,
people might joke that communication
was not a very good college major,
but that's outdated thinking.
We live in the communication age.
That's why communication is now
the number one skill employers are looking for,
ahead of computer skills, math skills, and many others.
According to the career and professional website indeed.com,
employers consistently include communication skills
as the most commonly requested skillset
across almost all professions.
You'll now see communication
in the number one or number two position
on almost every list of career skills
employers want nowadays.
Communication is also the number one
most portable or transferable skill.
You can take your communication skills
from one job to another,
and even from one career
to a completely different career or industry.
You can use communication skills virtually anywhere,
in other words.
That's not the case with most areas
of technical expertise.
Communication majors also earn
more money than similar majors.
The average salary for a communication major
is almost $66,000, as of the making of this video.
Communication centric jobs are also projected to grow
at an above average rate for the next decade.
To inspire you, let's get into some of the top jobs first
that a communication education sets you up for.
These jobs all range from about $125,000 a year
to above $200,000 a year.
Now remember, these are not entry level positions.
We'll talk more about that in a minute.
Some of these jobs are director of public relations,
corporate communication manager,
chief communication officer,
director of strategic communication,
director of internal communication,
and Vice President of Corporate Communication.
If you are still a student,
or new to full-time work,
those are career positions you might aspire to reach
in the long run.
Now let's talk about the types of jobs
communication majors do across various industries.
The PDF I mentioned lists them all.
I'm just gonna hit some of the highlights
in each of the areas,
but please keep in mind,
you're going to see similar job titles
in different industries.
To decode these, if you see words like representative,
analyst, specialist, coordinator,
those are often entry level or frontline positions.
We call those roles individual contributors.
If you see titles with manager or director in them,
those are higher level positions
that come with leadership responsibilities,
and that would require at least a few years of experience.
But when I look at these job titles right now with you,
I'm not going to list them in order of
where they are in the hierarchy.
I'm just gonna call some of them out as we go.
Not surprisingly, marketing and advertising
is a huge industry for a communication major,
so you can be an account coordinator, account executive,
a booking agent, a marketing research analyst,
a marketing specialist, coordinator, or director,
and plenty of other positions like those.
You'll see positions like this in a smaller marketing firm,
or you might see them in a marketing department
in larger companies across almost any industry.
There are also lots of jobs in the general category
of business, corporate, and sales positions.
You'll see positions like this in most large companies.
You could be a client services representative,
a corporate trainer, customer service rep,
various types of sales positions like insurance sales,
medical sales rep, pharmaceutical sales,
and real estate is another huge area
for communication majors.
The healthcare industry is one of the largest growth areas
for communication students, not as a nurse or a physician,
but you could be a medical writer,
a health communication specialist, healthcare recruiter,
education content manager
that specializes in health information.
We'll look at more jobs in a moment, but I mentioned,
you may notice some of these job titles are similar
across industries.
So how do you know what industry to aim for?
Or here's the way I've seen it play out.
Some of my undergraduate students
already have experience working,
let's say in a hospital setting,
or a doctor's office or a nursing home.
That may develop into a deeper interest
in helping people in healthcare settings,
that they then combine with their communication degree.
That could lead to a full-time position,
when they graduate, into one of those kinds of positions.
Alternatively, some of my students enjoy sales
and customer service,
and many of them already have experience working,
at least part-time, in that area.
Again, they would combine that interest
with their communication degree,
and find a full-time position in sales and customer service.
The same goes for all the industries we're gonna talk about,
so be on the lookout for the type of work or industry
you already enjoy,
and you'll likely see full-time positions
that are looking for the key communication skills
that you have.
For example, another big industry,
is government and politics.
In this area, you'll see jobs like campaign manager,
director, communication representative,
community relations, crisis negotiator,
debate moderator, perhaps.
You'll see lobbyist, speech writer,
or maybe you could be just an actual politician
giving those speeches.
And of course you'll see lots of public relations positions
in the area of government and politics.
So if you're interested in politics,
you may want to take your career in that direction,
maybe start by getting some experience
working on a local political campaign to try it out.
The education industry is another huge area
for communication majors.
This could be high school,
but you'll especially see this on college campuses.
About half the jobs on every college campus
are positions other than teachers.
If you enjoy the college campus vibe,
you could work as an academic advisor,
an alumni and development officer,
which is basically fundraising.
You could be a student success professional
or a study abroad coordinator.
In fact, many of these positions
on the campus where I currently work
are filled with our own former communication graduates
that I've taught in my classes over the years.
In the overall area of management, generally,
you see lots of communication majors,
because a big part of management is dealing with people,
and you need those communication skills.
You could be a brand manager, or a brand strategist,
because that involves messaging.
You could work on compensation and benefits
in a human resources department.
You could be a human resources manager or director.
You could go into a training and development position.
A good friend of mine, and a communication major,
worked her way up to be the director of training
over several years of doing excellent work.
You'll get a lot of writing experience
in your communication classes, too.
So if you enjoy writing, you could go into copy editing,
or copywriting or publishing.
You could work your way up to managing editor.
You could also be an author, for example, of some sort.
You could be a grant writer, a proposal writer,
a speech writer.
If you're comfortable using technology, media,
and other broadcasting channels,
you could be an audio or a visual content expert.
You'd be creating content, in other words.
You could be on-air talent,
which means someone in front of the camera
or in front of the microphone.
In this role as YouTube creator,
you could say I'm doing a version of on-air talent,
and I was a communication major.
And there are lots of positions in social media, of course.
Like advertising and marketing,
these social media positions
could be in a really small firm,
or within a department in a larger company,
in almost any industry.
There are lots of miscellaneous positions as well.
If you have a good speaking voice,
you could be an announcer or do voiceover work.
You could even be a police dispatcher,
an event planner or coordinator,
a librarian, a nonprofit professional manager or director.
The bottom line is that we live in a communication age.
Communication skills can certainly benefit any career,
and as you can see,
there are now literally hundreds of job positions
that are ready-made and asking
for communication majors to apply.
Be sure to download that free PDF.
There's a link in the description below,
and in the top comment section as well.
In fact, there are so many jobs in the free download,
you may feel overwhelmed at first.
As mentioned, you may wanna start by looking
at the areas where you already have an interest,
or you have some professional experience.
Chances are you'll be able to find
a position that sounds like a good fit for you,
if you go in a professional direction you already enjoy.
Until next time, thanks,
god bless, and I'll see you soon.