This is the transcript for Interested in combining your Communication degree with the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation?
Hey, my name is Julia. I’ve always really loved English and drama growing up. So when I went to university, I really wanted to both have the opportunity to explore that further, but I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted to do. So I wanted to do as much as possible, which is why I decided to do a communications degree with a double major in PR and Media Arts Production. And then also do the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation as well.
I decided to study the BCII and combine it with my communications degree because I really wanted to add and enrich to what I was going to learn in communications plus, like having a degree in innovation sounded pretty snazzy. And also, it was a relatively new degree, when I first started it. I think they just had their first graduates cohort. And the news that was coming out of it was really cool. Like I remember my careers advisor just absolutely raving about what it could mean and the opportunities that it could give me as somebody just starting out their career.
If I had to describe BCII in three words, it would be driven, relevant and absolutely life changing.
It’s funny, even studying BCII actually helped directly with my ability to succeed in my core degree and my communications degree. I know in particular, when we were doing group assignments, and when we were having those more intricate kind of strategy and pitching presentations. Having that, again, that knowledge, that ability to think creatively, to explore that problem space and to work collaboratively in transdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary team’s totally changed the way I approached those assignments and meant that I was able to deliver a product that was above standard.
Something that really struck home for me over these past four years with BCII is that in the future, I’m not only ever going to be working with communications professionals, it’s going to be transdisciplinary. We’re going to have to work with people from other disciplines who think in different ways, and to be able to bring that knowledge together, create something new and then move forward with that. So I think without having the understanding of transdisciplinary skills, that skill set and having learned that through BCII, it just be another blocker to success. That’s why learning transdisciplinary skills I think is so important.
I was lucky enough to be part of the first honours cohort, so doing my honours in creative intelligence and innovation, which, to be very honest, is as cool as it sounds. If you think it sounds cool I do. But I was able to take my passion for theatre in the arts, and then completely explore that in this crazy cool way, with the help of the faculty, my peers, and all this transdisciplinary skill set that I just built over the past three, three and a half years. So I took that love, like brought in a bit of resilience theory, got to travel to Geelong, made a verbatim script, wrote a little thesis and then had this again, what I think was really fun, really cool and super interesting, like something that I was super passionate about body of work at the end of it, that you know, put a little bow on their’s my honours, it’s really fun.
Most interesting project that I was involved in was the industry innovation project we did in our fourth year, we were able to work with an industry partner, again, like we do for most of the schools. But instead of it being within that two week time frame, we actually were able to stretch it out for a few months, I found that really cool to be able to dive in and explore their innovation strategies, how they thought, and then how we could support that. Yeah, it was super interesting like working with my fellow BCII team, getting to completely change both our mindset and theirs and then to have this product at the end of it. Which would then help them promote and increase innovation into the future.
I’m working as a business designer for the Australian arm of a global innovation consultancy. Which is really cool, to be honest, I didn’t think this would ever be something within my career trajectory. Like especially I was working in marketing for the past three years throughout University. But the way it came about was actually through BCII. Like the company I’m working at Business Models Inc. did a workshop in class, I got a coffee with one of the facilitators because I was just really intrigued towards what they do. And yeah, kind of all flowed on from there. But it’s crazy to think about because without BCII without that innovation skill set and without that transdisciplinary understanding, where I’ve gone would be completely different. And I’m really fortunate that I did have that, and that i am on the path I’m on today
If you’re thinking of combining BCII with comms, you should definitely do it. Our future is changing so rapidly. And communications itself is in a constant state of evolution like having the opportunities, the skill sets the chance to connect industry partners and the peer group that you have in BCII will only ever enrich your understanding of communications and the possibilities that you’ll have in the future. So yeah, definitely do it would be my advice. I’m a bit biased though.