Kirthana Shankar,
Center for Urban Earthquake Engineering

　 Success today is linked to People Communication. The clarion is to develop human capital for extraordinary gains.In such a turbulent, ever-changing global economy, one must be as adept at understanding the significance of Communication Management.

The growth and survival of modern industrial organizations is greatly dependent on communication. With this notion, the Advanced Technical Communication Skills course was specially customized for the Center of Urban Earthquake Engineering (CUEE) Doctoral students to embed them with the essential communication and management skills. When I left the position as a Soft-Skill Training Consultant in a local consulting firm in Singapore to put my hands to the plough and brave the storms of an elite Educational Institutional enterprise, I found myself inspired and uplifted by a host of professors and staff at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. Many of them have shared their views with me and have taught me by the way they live and work. With the coordination, guidance and input from Tokimatsu sensei and Kusakabe sensei the Advanced Technical Communication Skills course was implanted into the CUEE program from April 2004.

Back Row: K. Hashimoto, K Shankar(lecture), V.T. Hung, J.R. Dungca, K. Kinoshita Front Row: H. Suzuki, B.Amatya, M. Ida, H. Murata, Absentees: L. Manakan, K. Chung, A. Tanabe, P.W. Ryong, L. Sasikorn.

The course has provided a springboard into the areas of communication skills and management. A draw card of the course was the variety of topics across a dynamic field that was addressed. Topics range from Presentation Skills, Stress Management, to Leadership Training and Personality Profiling, and Creative Problem Solving to Power Talk.

The primary goal of the course was to develop the skills necessary for the doctoral students to Peak Conquer in both their work and personal life. This was achieved by creating awareness for the need to understand one’s potential through personality profiling and how best this potential could be brought to light. Students were taught on how they can over come their weaknesses and improvise and manage them. Students were also exposed to delivering confidently impressive presentations to the audience.

The course provided a forum for Interactive Learning. It demands a high level of person-to person communication and interaction that centers on the challenges of real-life contextual communication.