Hone for the holidays: Fresh lessons on future-forward skills

During her keynote at Ragan’s 2025 Future of Communications Conference in Austin, LinkedIn B2B Institute Director Ty Heath explained that the future of learning and development for communicators is not role-based but skill-based.

“Even if you’re not switching roles, your skills need to evolve,” Heath said. “The value comes from the combination of what machines can do and what humans can uniquely provide, meaning judgment and connection.”

The ongoing automation of menial and time-consuming tasks will create more space for the judgment, connection and soft skills that communicators bring to the table. But when it comes to honing both hard and soft skills, learning does not stop simply because the work slows down.

While holidays and other breaks from work offer a much-needed opportunity to unplug, they can also leave communicators feeling stagnant. Maybe your conflict resolution skills are not landing at the Thanksgiving dinner table, or maybe a quieter schedule still will not quiet your curious mind.

In any case, the several new skills-based sessions, lessons and collections on our on-demand learning and development portal, Ragan Training, have you covered.

Fresh playlists focus on the skills you want and need most

This week, Ragan Training launches a curated collection of lessons focused on the skills learners want and need most. “I am, I want” offers easy access to lessons and courses that prepare you for both the present and the future. The initial collection includes:

• I am communicating about sensitive political or cultural issues
• I am dealing with a lot of changes at my company.
• I am leading our employee engagement strategy.
• I am navigating a new global communications role for the first time.
• I want to become a communications leader.
• I want to better understand the strategy behind employee engagement.
• I want to collaborate better across the business.
• I want to learn more about storytelling.

Rather than map learning paths to the knowledge areas of the Ragan Communications Framework, these collections give learners who already know what they need a quick way to dive in and focus only on what’s relevant.

A new lesson on building budget blueprint that hinges on your storytelling skills

Heath’s point about merging machine abilities with human-centered skills is a reminder that even tasks that seem automated still require a communicator’s judgment and connection.

Case in point: In this clip from Ragan Training’s “Building Your Budget Blueprint” module, Johnna Muscente, VP of Communications & PR at Corcoran, breaks down her simple but powerful formula for securing the resources your communications team needs to succeed.

Winning funding requires more than asking for money. It requires telling a compelling, evidence-based story to make your case for investment.

Managing the people who make the project management process work

When communicators think about which skills AI can take off their plates, project management often ranks high.

Agile frameworks like Scrum and Kanban can automate workflow visualization, and AI can suggest optimal sprint lengths, identify bottlenecks and flag scope creep.

But for communicators, the deepest value of Agile comes from decisions grounded in context, empathy, stakeholder understanding and narrative interpretation. These are the elements the comms function uniquely provides.

That’s why it’s imperative that communicators still learn the foundations of Agile. In this clip from Ragan Training’s “Activating Agile Project Management”, Lauren Modisette, a communications director in the financial services industry, explains how a simple Kanban workflow can help teams prioritize, track and deliver high-quality work even when requests arrive nonstop.

Translating messy human dynamics into the right framework choice, interpreting ambiguity and emotion, and balancing Kanban’s responsiveness with Scrum’s predictability remain areas that no automated tool or AI system can fully replace.

More skills-based training for every learning style

The clips above come from succinct lessons with knowledge checks and quizzes that can be completed in 20 minutes or less.

For those who prefer to watch passively, Ragan Training also offers a full library of Ragan conference recordings, including our 2025 Future of Communications Conference and 2025 Internal Communications Conference on demand.

Ragan Training features many short, quick learnings as well, including our recently launched Signature Voices series, topic-based explainers, tech talks and more.

Join today and keep your skills sharp on your own schedule.