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The success of an engineer depends on a diverse skill set comprising technical and soft skills. Effective communication is crucial in the engineering field, as engineers must convey complex technical information to different stakeholders. Indeed, many engineering students and specialists still struggle with communication complexities and other soft skills, which can directly influence their career development and operation in the 'real world" environment. Increasing students" soft skills will allow them to eliminate internal and external barriers that interfere with their future career growth. For many engineering students, time is very valuable, and soft skills development can be left behind if it is not included in their curricula. As for development of effective communication skills, practice, feedback, and clear patterns will allow a person to feel more confident, increasing their overall performance and, in this case, willingness to share their technical knowledge with others in a clear, professional and efficient manner. This descriptive research studies the current state of the subject, aims to give a realistic description of the current situation in the post-pandemic period, studies and identifies effective strategies to improve engineering students' awareness of the communication skills as well as digital communication skills and train them to advance these essential skills as a means to adapt to a continuously fluctuating job market. The article employs a mixed-method approach, including results of student surveys, as well as literature review.
The success of an engineer depends on a diverse skill set comprising technical and soft skills. Effective communication is crucial in the engineering field, as engineers must convey complex technical information to different stakeholders. Indeed, many engineering students and specialists still struggle with communication complexities and other soft skills, which can directly influence their career development and operation in the 'real world" environment. Increasing students" soft skills will allow them to eliminate internal and external barriers that interfere with their future career growth. For many engineering students, time is very valuable, and soft skills development can be left behind if it is not included in their curricula. As for development of effective communication skills, practice, feedback, and clear patterns will allow a person to feel more confident, increasing their overall performance and, in this case, willingness to share their technical knowledge with others in a clear, professional and efficient manner. This descriptive research studies the current state of the subject, aims to give a realistic description of the current situation in the post-pandemic period, studies and identifies effective strategies to improve engineering students' awareness of the communication skills as well as digital communication skills and train them to advance these essential skills as a means to adapt to a continuously fluctuating job market. The article employs a mixed-method approach, including results of student surveys, as well as literature review.
Keywords: Engineering students, Soft skills, Effective communication, Digital communication.
Abstract
INTRODUCTION
These days the success of an engineer depends on a diverse skill set comprising both technical and soft skills or many authors are applying such terms as cross-cutting competencies (life skills). Technical skills, such as mathematical and scientific proficiency, are essential for engineers to design and create innovative solutions to complex problems. However, soft skills or cross-cutting skills, such as effective communication, teamwork, and problem-solving, even leadership are also crucial to be successful in the engineering field. In many cases, students can feel comfortable working online, however, offline communication is still a struggle if communication skills are lacking. Thus, developing soft skills, including effective communication and digital communication skills, is essential for engineering students to succeed in their future careers. In the post-pandemic period, digital communication skills have become more important than ever before. The global pandemic has forced many companies and industries to incorporate remote working, and engineering is no exception. The shift of remote working has made it more challenging for engineering students and specialists to communicate effectively, particularly if they lack communication skills. Therefore, it is important to study the current state of soft skills development among engineering students and identify effective strategies to improve their general communication skills, including digital communication in particular. For the last three years the authors have been analyzing the communication development progress of the engineering students in the university. Engineering education focuses on the acquisition of hard skills mainly, and often neglects the integration of soft skills into curricula, which has always been critical and expanded even more after the pandemic.
To ensure effective communication and prepare high-quality specialists whose academic skillset is accompanied by various essential soft skills required by employers, it is crucial to integrate a balanced proportion of multiple soft skills into curricula and/or the content of each separate subject. The objective of this research is to identify the problem, analyze the specific communication competencies and awareness of the students and specialists to adapt to the ever-changing labor market requirements. Having analyzed the soft skills integration into the curricula within this article will assist the authors in creating the first results towards developing a virtual lab for engineers within the strategic partnership project the authors are working on during the period from November 2021 till November 2024.
I. LITERATURE REVIEW
Effective communication skills are needed for engineers to present and communicate technical information to different stakeholders. Several studies have identified communication skills as a crucial component of soft skills development for engineering students [1]. Effective communication skills can be developed through various strategies, including training, practical classes, feedback, and clear patterns developed by instructors. However, one of the predominant components for soft skill development is feedback, which in turn forces individuals to identify areas for improvement and implement precise actions.
With the outbreak of COVID-19, the importance of digital communication skills has become even more evident, as many engineering students and professionals have been forced to work and learn remotely. Several studies have identified the importance of digital communication skills for engineering students [2; 3]. Thus, integrating digital communication skills into engineering curricula is essential for engineering students' future success in the highly changing world. Digital communication skills include video conferencing, virtual cooperation and conversation activities, messaging, email writing and online presentation skills. According to research by Abdullah, М. 1.& Yasin, В. M., digital communication skills are essential for individuals to communicate effectively in the digital age [4]. Therefore, engineering students must develop their digital communication skills to succeed in their careers. Increasingly, in person offline communication is an essential skill for engineers as well after the pandemic. It allows engineers to convey complex technical information to different stakeholders, including colleagues, team members, management and, of course, clients. Therefore, engineers must use appropriate communication techniques, approaches to communication and tailor their message to the audience. Soft skills usually refer to personal attributes that enable individuals to interact effectively with others. According to research by Kaur, M., & Sidhu, G. K. (2015) [5], soft skills development is critical for engineering students to succeed in their careers. The study found that engineering students must develop their soft skills, including communication, teamwork, leadership, and problem-solving, to succeed in their careers. Soft skills development enables engineering students to eliminate internal and external barriers that interfere with their future career growth. Digital communication skills include video conferencing, virtual collaboration (instant messaging, email) and online presentation skills. According to research, digital communication skills are essential for individuals to communicate effectively in the digital age [4]. Both digital and offline communication involves several factors, including the message, the sender, the receiver, and the context. The message must be clear, concise, and accurate. The sender must use appropriate language and tone, and the receiver must be able to understand the message. All these attributes could be trained and developed. The context must also be considered, as different stakeholders may require different communication approaches. According to research by Barchitta, M., effective communication is essential for engineering students to succeed in their careers. The study found that communication skills are critical for engineers to work collaboratively, develop interpersonal relationships, and communicate effectively with clients and colleagues [6]. According to Bucking L., in a highly digitalized and interconnected world, engineers work across the boundaries of disciplines, countries and cultures [7]. Recently, the Covid19 pandemic has advanced this development. Thus, acquiring 21st century skills, including both effective communication and digital communication is crucial for the employability of engineers and becomes increasingly important for engineering students. As a result, engineering education is facing the huge demand to develop both effective and productive offline communication as well as digital communication competencies and attitudes to students, among them teamwork and communication skills.
Il. METHODOLOGY
This study employs a mixed-method approach, including results of students' surveys and literature review. The student surveys were conducted at a multidisciplinary engineering university and research center Riga Technical University (RTU), Latvia. The survey aimed to identify engineering students" as well as mentors and researchers' awareness of the importance of soft skills, particularly effective communication and digital communication skills, and their proficiency in these skills. The survey also aimed to identify effective strategies for developing these skills. The literature review aimed to identify recent research on the importance of soft skills, particularly effective communication and digital communication skills, for engineering students.
Online survey has been distributed among students from Riga Technical University who are full-time degree students in one of the faculties, in the Faculty of Electronics and Telecommunication. There are three bachelor level study programmes:
* Telecommunication Technologies and Data Transmission Engineering (3 years; 180 ECTS);
* Smart Electronic Systems (4 years; 240 ECTS);
* Transport Electronics and Telematics (4 years; 240 ECTS); Three master level study programmes:
* Telecommunication Technologies and Network Management (2 years; 120 ECTS);
* Transport Electronics and Telematics (1,5 or 2 years; 90 or 120 ECTS);
* Smart Electronic Systems (1,5, 2 or 2,5 years; 90, 120 or 150 ECTS);
Two PhD study programmes:
* Telecommunication (4 years; 288 ECTS);
* Electronics (4 years; 288 ECTS).
In the academic year 2022/2023, Spring semester, the Faculty of Electronics and Telecommunications has 450 students, studying in two flows, in English and Latvian. In the academic year 2021/2022 there were around 280 students, and in 2020/2021 around 630 students at all levels. Analyzing the curricula of each Faculty programmes the authors summarized that in the Bachelor level study programme Telecommunication Technologies and Data Transmission Engineering there are no soft skills related subjects; students should make a choice and choose 1 out of 6 study subjects from humanities and social sciences study courses, where one of the options is study course called Basics of Communication and it is worth only 3 ECTS. As a result, during their studies students have almost no academic assistance on how to improve existing or develop communication skills or any other soft skills. Similar situation has been identified in the rest of the bachelor level study programmes - Smart Electronic Systems Telematics has the same 3 ECTS study course as optional during their four-year studies, but students from the Transport Electronics study programme can select study course Sociology of Management. There are no subjects related to soft skills in master and PhD level study programmes. Thus, the authors can conclude that study courses related to soft skills within bachelor, master or PhD level programmes are almost non-existent within bachelor, master or PhD level engineering programmes.
RTU is executing an Erasmus+ strategic partnership project SUCCESS - Solutions for Unified Communication Competences for Engineering Students and Specialists!. One of the main goals of the SUCCESS project is to encourage the use of creative learning and teaching methods by offering student-centered curricula that will meet learning needs, eliminating communication ability mismatches in English, and providing complete coverage of communication skills needed by the labor market for technical communication. During this three-year project various student training programs and activities have been implementing - multiple day long training programs, such as "Digital Communication in 21st century", "English for Engineers", "Career Panel", "Communication Lab - Simulation Environment Creation Programme" and "Communication Deployment Hackathon". All of these activities are intended to enhance communication competences in English, enabling students and specialists to be engaged with future students, colleagues and customers more effectively and efficiently. Each partner institution selects five students who participate in these training programs. Three out of five main training programs have been already implemented and the results revealed:
1) digital tools (such as mobile applications, online simulations, virtual avatars, etc.) are great instruments for training and improving communication competences during everyday life;
2) tests show that regular training considerably improves student communication skills;
3) training revealed that the best way to improve engineering students' communication skills is still active listening, utilizing feedback, two-way communication and record-reflection.
To summarize the aforementioned, it is essential to highlight that continuous improvement, analysis and introduction of training programmes under the project or outside the project can reap longer-term benefits to universities' curricula, engineering students and at the end of the day to the labor market and employers.
III. SURVEY RESULTS
The student surveys were conducted at a multidisciplinary engineering university and research center, RTU, Latvia. Among respondents there were 138 students and 24 field specialists from RTU Faculty of Electronics and Telecommunications. Questions were coded in the following 4 different question formats: open question (short answers), a five-point scale, multiple-choice, or a checkbox form. On average, the online survey took around 10-15 minutes to complete. Students and specialists used online platforms (ZOOM, MS Teams) for their classes during the pandemic, however, survey results show that, if digital communication skills have increased, then the real-life presentation skills and confidence level has decreased. The Fig. 1. data shows that students did not improve their offline presentation and communication skills during these last three academic years.
If digital communication skills have increased (see Fig.3), then real-life presentation skills and confidence level depicted in Fig. 1. has decreased. Data shows that student comfortability while presenting in real-life has dropped in the last three study years due to the large number of online presentations. In 2020/2021 - 56% of respondents replied that they feel comfortable presenting content in person, in 2021/2022 the number of respondents that felt comfortable presenting offline dropped by 8% to 48%, and in 2022/2023 the percentage dropped to only 37% of all respondents. In the Fig. 2 data shows that specialists' comfortability while presenting in the offline form has dropped has dropped as well in the last three academic years. In 2020/2021 - 86% of respondents replied that they feel comfortable presenting content offline, in 2021/2022 the number of respondents that felt comfortable presenting offline slightly dropped by 4% to 84% and in 2022/2023 the percentage dropped to 79% of all respondents among university specialists.
Respondents acknowledge that problem-based and student-centered learning is crucial to ensure students' success after graduation. In order to implement this kind of teaching method students need to develop critical thinking skills, problem-solving abilities, and most of all, increase their communication skills. This can only be achieved by implementation of soft skills into already existing course curricula and additional course development throughout the academic year.
Meanwhile, comfortability while presenting online has sharply increased in the last 3 study years. In 2020/2021 only 53% of all respondents felt comfortable while presenting online, in the following study year 2021/2022 the percentage increased to 62% and in 2022/2023 it sharply increased to 82% of all respondents.
Additionally, it is possible to observe the same trends among the researchers and instructors of engineering subjecta. In the study year 2020/2021 only 34% of respondents felt comfortable presenting online. The following study year 2021/2022 the figures had risen to 52% percent and in study year 2022/2023 to 79%.
Students believe that the best way to develop communication skills and implement acquired techniques of learning is through practical activities (exercises, activities, training) 39%, moderate feedback (acknowledging competencies in addition to areas for improvement) 35% and clear patterns (based on feedback provided) 26%.
Data shows that just selecting one of these methods may not be enough to achieve the desired result. As the pandemic restricted some communication modules and forced everyone to adapt their learning, teaching, and work environment, many skills that were not that visible before, became obvious and more relevant. This change allows new skills to become more advanced, however, this meant that these skills will still be in demand for some time.
The rapid rise of digitization and remote work placed a new set of demands on students and employees. Processes that were set in motion in order to adapt and maintain a stable study and work environment are still being in place and remain relevant in the post-pandemic period. Even before the pandemic critical thinking, team building, prioritization, public speaking, active listening, and self-motivation were recognized as valuable, and soft skill gaps were a pressing and critical issue for engineering students.
While both types of respondents experienced a decline in comfortability presenting in real-life students suffered a harsher decline than their specialist counterparts. In 2020/2021 just over a half of all student respondents felt comfortable presenting in real-life at 56%. During the examined study years this number had decreased by 19% to 37% in 2022/2023. Meanwhile, specialists only experienced a minor decrease of 7% from 86% in 2020/2021 to 79% 2022/2023. The drastic decrease in student comfortability could be caused by inexperience and sudden seclusion from social life during the pandemic.
Although both types of respondents experienced comfortability growth from study year 2020/2021 to 2022/2023, the authors can see a sharper growth among specialists. In 2020/2021 only 34% of specialists felt comfortable presenting online while 53% of students did. In 2022/2023 approximately 80% of both respondents felt comfortable while presenting online. The sharp growth among specialists' comfortability could be linked to their expansive prior experience in presenting face-to-face, but this is just an assumption. Further research is necessary to conclude the root cause of this phenomenon.
IV. RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS
The survey results and literature review has shown that while engineering students acknowledged the importance of communication skills, they struggled to apply them in practice, especially offline. Additionally, many students lacked proficiency in digital communication skills, particularly video conferencing and online presentation skills. Students reported that integrating communication training into engineering curricula, providing opportunities for various applied practical activities as well as feedback would be effective strategies for developing effective communication and digital communication skills. The results revealed the importance of developing soft skills, particularly effective communication skills, in engineering education to ensure graduates are well-equipped for success in the continuously evolving job market. The study suggests that integrating communication training into engineering curricula and providing opportunities for applied practical activities, feedback, and clear patterns can help students to feel more confident and increase their overall performance in communicating technical knowledge and information to others in put forward integrating digital communication skills, including video conferencing, virtual collaboration, and online presentation skills, into engineering curricula to enhance students' proficiency in digital communication, which has become increasingly important in the post-pandemic period. Several strategies can be employed to improve soft skills development among engineering students, including effective communication and digital communication skills. For example, one of the most effective strategies to improve soft skills development among engineering students is to integrate soft skills development into the curricula. Soft skills development should be incorporated into the engineering curricula to ensure that students receive comprehensive training in both technical and soft skills. However, it might take time to integrate it into the curricula, therefore, the first starting point to improve soft skills among engineering students is to provide soft skills training workshops. Soft skills training workshops provide students with practical skills and knowledge that they can apply in their everyday university life and future careers. Besides, it is essential to implement projects that should provide soft skills training workshops to larger groups of engineering students and specialists to ensure that they are adequately prepared for their ongoing development. Interactive learning methods are another effective strategy to improve soft skills development among engineering students. Interactive learning methods, such as group discussions, role-playing, and case studies, allow students to apply their knowledge and skills in a practical setting. All the aforementioned strategies can be firstly implemented by the academic staff teaching the hard skills, however, they have to be trained how to make it in an appropriate and clear way using specific consultants and analyzing the content and structure of each and every lecture. Therefore, engineering programs should provide opportunities for practice and feedback not only for students, but for academic personnel of the university as well.
In conclusion, this study highlights the importance of soft skills and effective communication for the success of engineers and identifies strategies that can be used to improve these skills among engineering students. Firstly, the study highlights the need for engineering programs to incorporate soft skills training into their curricula. This can be achieved through the development of soft skills courses or workshops, as well as the integration of soft skills into existing engineering courses. Secondly, the study suggests that engineering programs should use interactive teaching methods and project-based learning to enhance students' soft skills. This can involve the use of simulations, case studies, and group projects to give students opportunities to practice and receive feedback on their communication skills. Finally, the study suggests that engineering programs should develop partnerships with industry and employers to ensure that students are equipped with the soft skills that are in demand in the job market.
! Project code: 2021-1-LV01-KA220-HED-000031178; Webpage: https://project-success.org/
Reference Text and Citations
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