By Dr. Craig Baehr | Intercom Executive Editor
Happy New Year! Typically, the first issue of each new year focuses on a particular aspect of professional development, and this one fits the theme quite nicely. Our January/February 2024 special issue on Training and Development, provides a broad discussion of educational and training perspectives on professional development, which provides useful, practical takeaways and guidance in building successful careers and skill sets in technical communication. Special issue editors Art Berger and Dr. Nupoor Ranade have curated a collection of features that explore training and development from a wide range of perspectives, including the value of academic and industry partnerships, pathfinding programs, research as lifelong learning, storytelling, student perspectives, and an interview with two training professionals.
This issue also includes two columns and a feature related to professional development, including our Careers column, Technical Communication Body of Knowledge (TCBOK) column, and a feature on STC's Education Program. The Careers column in this issue focuses on the notion of “sending out ships” to cultivate opportunities in career development. Our second, and newly curated column in Intercom, focuses on content and topics of interest from STC’s TCBOK project, http://www.tcbok.org, presented by various members of the TCBOK Committee. We hope this new column will spark your interest in reading more about the wide range of topics in the TCBOK to expand your knowledge and research in technical communication. You’ll also find a feature on STC’s Education Program in this issue, providing an overview of its offerings and potential benefits to professional training and development.
We’ve also recently published the 2024 Editorial Calendar on the Intercom Magazine home page, so you can check out a preview of our exciting and upcoming topics. You can view the complete list at https://www.stc.org/intercom/editorial-calendar/ to see what lies ahead in the coming year. If you’re interested in contributing an article these topics, or any other technical communication related subject, email your idea or draft manuscript to us at intercom-editor@stc.org for consideration. Check out our updated author submission guidelines at https://www.stc.org/intercom/author-guidelines/ when preparing your manuscript. We hope to hear from you soon!
