The four MCM pathways reflect the breadth of communication itself. Some students may want the flexibility to move more fluidly across disciplines. Others may already know they want to build global brands, guide organizations through change or help shape the future of entertainment and media.
Today’s communication professionals must work across boundaries. Marketing strategists need to understand data analytics and social media, while entertainment executives must navigate global audiences, evolving technology and a creator economy that is reshaping how content reaches consumers.
The Master of Communication Management (MCM) online program at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism is designed to address such complexities. Students develop a foundation in communication strategy, research and leadership, then can pursue their degree as a generalist or tailor their studies through one of three specialized areas of focus: marketing communication; strategic and organizational communication; or media, entertainment and creator industries.
Each pathway offers students the opportunity to shape their education around where they are — and where they want to go. Many MCM students, for instance, are working professionals who enter the program to deepen their expertise and advance their careers.
But whether established or just starting out, those pursuing the MCM hone skills that go beyond message making to prepare them as strategic thinkers who understand how communication can support organizational goals.
General Track: Building a Broad Foundation
For students who want to develop expertise across the communication landscape rather than specialize in one area, the general pathway offers maximum flexibility.
Its course plan draws from all three specialized areas, enabling students to explore such subjects as organizational strategy, integrated communication and entertainment media identities. That breadth can be especially valuable for professionals whose roles cross traditional boundaries or those with interdisciplinary interests.
Whatever pathway students select, the MCM combines academic research with practical application. Core courses build skills in communication strategy, research, leadership and crisis response. Students learn not only how to communicate effectively but also how to understand the research behind communication decisions, evaluate evidence and apply what they learn to real organizational challenges.
“We put theory into practice,” says Lecturer of Communication J.D. Schramm, an author with expertise in communication management and more than 20 years of graduate-level teaching experience.
Marketing Communication: Understanding Audiences and Driving Results
For students interested in building brands and engaging consumers, the marketing communication focus explores how to develop integrated strategies across increasingly complex mixes of platforms and markets. Courses examine online and global marketing communication, how to analyze audience behavior, and strategies for message development that can be adapted to different markets and cultural contexts. This is consistent with the program’s emphasis on integrated campaigns, audience behavior and digital and global platforms.
Adjunct Lecturer Rich Guest brings extensive experience in digital media and marketing for brands from Burger King to IMAX to his courses. In redesigning Global Marketing Communication, he paired foundational theory with current case studies and thinking from marketing leaders to give students opportunities to wrestle with questions professionals are confronting now.
One such question is how global brands balance consistency with the needs of individual markets. Should product development, branding, advertising and public relations be controlled globally? Or should decisions be made closer to consumers, whose expectations and responses may differ dramatically from one country or region to another?
Guest’s Global Marketing Communication course tackles these issues by having students select a brand and two markets. Students then research both the brand and consumer environments before recommending an international marketing strategy. They later apply that strategy to different scenarios, much as they might be expected to do as marketing leaders.
“They’re taking the facts, they’re taking the theory, they’re taking the discussion from class and applying it to hypothetical recommendations,” Guest says.
Strategic and Organizational Communication: Leading Through Change
Organizations depend on communication not only to reach customers but also to function effectively from within. The strategic and organizational communication focus examines the role communication plays in organizational life, from managing change and strengthening workplace communication to building stakeholder trust and aligning communication with broader business goals.
For Schramm, theory and practice are inseparable in preparing students for that responsibility.
Students draw on what they have learned to create a strategic communication plan for a company, nonprofit or other organization. Rather than producing a traditional academic paper, they present their work in a professional format resembling the reports and memos they could be expected to develop in the workplace. The experience gives students something tangible to discuss with prospective employers while reinforcing a larger lesson: Effective strategy must be grounded in evidence.
Schramm wants students to understand established communication theories while also recognizing the need to reconsider them as organizations and society change. Emerging technologies make that ability especially important.
Artificial intelligence, for example, has become part of discussions in nearly every class session he teaches. Students can use AI as a tool for such tasks as brainstorming and formatting, but Schramm stresses that they must retain ownership of their thinking and work.
The same principle applies more broadly to organizational leadership. Communication professionals need to assess information, exercise judgment and understand the people they are trying to reach.
“We cannot just make decisions in business based on trends we read about on LinkedIn or in social media,” Schramm says. “We have to have a deeper well to draw on as communications professionals.”
Media, Entertainment and Creator Industries: Navigating a Business in Flux
Few industries illustrate the pace of change more vividly than entertainment. Streaming, consolidation, global markets and the rise of creator culture are continually changing how content is developed, distributed and marketed.
The media, entertainment and creator industries focus area prepares students to understand that evolving ecosystem while developing skills in brand identity, audience engagement and campaign strategy.
Adjunct Lecturer Ted Skidmore spent more than two decades at Disney, where he led research and insights for the motion pictures marketing division. Now he draws on that experience in courses including International Entertainment Marketplaces.
“What’s so incredibly fascinating, I think, about the entertainment industry today, is that it’s going through such incredible flux,” Skidmore says. “Technology is driving this, economics are driving this, world events are driving this as well.”
Skidmore brings that changing landscape into the classroom through current examples ranging from mergers and acquisitions to box-office performance and the growing influence of creators moving from digital platforms into traditional entertainment.
Students also learn by doing. In one course, they develop a 360-degree theatrical release plan for a major Hollywood film entering a foreign market, identifying target audiences and competition and creating publicity, marketing and creative strategies. The project also illustrates how interconnected entertainment has become, with a film potentially part of a larger franchise spanning streaming, consumer products, video games, theme parks and other businesses across international markets.
Underlying those decisions is what Skidmore considers an essential principle: understand the consumer. He encourages students to challenge their assumptions, examine research and data, and remain receptive to what audiences are actually telling them.
“Be open to understanding change and stay curious,” he says.
Four Paths to Success
The four MCM pathways reflect the breadth of communication itself. Some students may want the flexibility to move more fluidly across disciplines. Others may already know they want to build global brands, guide organizations through change or help shape the future of entertainment and media.
That is why the MCM’s shared foundation remains important even as students tailor the degree to their interests. The program brings together scholarship and professional practice while exposing students to classmates with different careers, industries and perspectives.
As Guest observes, today’s communication professionals need both breadth and specialized expertise. “I think there’s less opportunity for true specialization and more of a requirement that professionals be T-shaped in that they are broadly aware of all marketing communication disciplines, even if they’re a specialist in one area,” he notes.
The MCM’s four pathways let students build that experiential combination for themselves, creating an education aligned with their ambitions while preparing them to adapt as communication — and their careers — continue to evolve.
Learn more about the Master of Communication Management online program.