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Accessibility statement

An image to illustrate Effective communication strategies and skills for work short course

This course, developed by experts, equips you with linguistic strategies for effective workplace communication. You’ll look at what makes a successful request, how to accept or refuse assignments, and how to discuss problems and complex communications without causing offence. While focusing on hybrid team communications, like emails and collaborative documents, the fundamental principles apply to all professional interactions. Across three units, you’ll sharpen your understanding of clarity, politeness, and relationship management, working through activities based on authentic workplace emails. Upon completion, you’ll receive a digital badge to share on social media and add to email signatures.

The course is divided into three units. Throughout the units, the emphasis is on becoming more aware of how the language we use in the workplace affects and is affected by the relationships we have with others and how we are perceived at work. There are many ways of saying the same thing: how we choose to say it will likely vary depending on the circumstances of our interaction. Through this course, you’ll tap into the implicit knowledge you already have about different ways of communicating and discover the conceptual and analytical strategies that allow you to systematise this knowledge.

Unit 1: Requesting and asking

You’ll first be introduced to the ‘thinking toolkit’ underpinning the course. These core concepts from linguistics will help you frame the ideas around your professional communication. You’ll then focus on the communicative acts of requesting and asking in workplace emails, reflecting on the features that make a request more likely to be agreed to. Using real examples from email communications between Hillary Clinton and her collaborators, you’ll explore how interlocutors balance considerations of politeness and clarity in pursuit of their professional goals.

Unit 2: Offering and refusing

You’ll consider agreeing to or offering to do something or refusing a request. Working through examples from a variety of workplaces, you’ll examine how we can limit our availability to protect our time and which linguistic strategies help us strike a balance between competence and politeness.

Unit 3: Feedback, advice, and talking about problems

In the final unit, you’ll look at how to approach ‘tricky topics’ in the workplace – discussing problems, giving advice, and providing suggestions, whether solicited or unsolicited. Using real emails exchanged between Dr Anthony Fauci and members of the public during the COVID-19 pandemic, you’ll reflect on how you can provide advice without giving offence. You’ll also consider different ways of exchanging feedback when collaborating on shared documents and how to ensure this is done efficiently and respectfully. Using emails from the Hillary Clinton database, you’ll look at the typical components of problem-oriented messages and how to present problems and solutions in the workplace while projecting professionalism and empathy.

By the end of this course, you will have enhanced your:

Learner support is available via the course forum, dedicated website and computing helpdesk.

You’ll study for around 3–4 hours per week for three weeks. In total, this course will require around 10 hours to complete.

You can begin at any time during the life of the course and study at your own pace.

All learning materials, exercises, study support and work-based activities are delivered entirely online.

As a student of The Open University, you should be aware of the content of the academic regulations, which are available on our Student Policies and Regulations website.

There are no entry requirements for this course.

The course is delivered online and makes use of a variety of online resources. If you use specialist hardware or software to assist you in using a computer or the internet you are advised to contact us about support which can be given to meet your needs.

The OU strives to make all aspects of study accessible to everyone and this Accessibility Statement outlines what studying LG009 involves. You should use this information to inform your study preparations and any discussions with us about how we can meet your needs.

Start	England fee
At anytime before 31/07/2026	£99
At anytime before 31/07/2027	Not yet available

We accept American Express, Mastercard, Visa and Visa Electron.

If this course is geared towards your job or developing your career, you could ask your employer to sponsor you by paying some or all of the fees. Your sponsor just needs to complete a simple form to confirm how much they will be paying and we will invoice them.

The fee information provided here is valid for short courses starting in the 2025/26 academic year. Fees typically increase annually. For further information about the University's fee policy, visit our

Fee Rules

You can start this course anytime.