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The purpose of this paper is to clarify which knowledge, skills and behaviors are used to describe excellent performance in professional communication. As the demand for talented communication professionals increases, organizations and educators need an empirically defined set of performance criteria to guide the development of (potentially) excellent communication professionals (ECPs). This research aimed to render a competence profile which could assist in the development of recruitment, training and development to develop relevant programs for high-potential communication practitioners.

This mixed-method research was approached in two phases: first, a series of focus groups (n=16) were held to explore work field perspectives resulting in a concept profile, and second, a series of expert panels (n=30) following the Delphi method were conducted to determine the extent of agreement with the findings.

Participants clarified that excellent performance is characterized by competences which transcend normative technical skills or practical communication knowledge. The five domains, 16 item “SEEDS” competence profile describes that ECPs are distinguished by their compounded ability to be strategic, empathic, expressive, and decisive and to see patterns and interrelationships.

Although a broad range of relevant professionals were involved in both phases, the study could be considered limited in size and scope. Research was conducted in one national setting therefore further research would be necessary to confirm generalizability of the results to other cultural contexts.

Although many competence frameworks exist which describe normative performance in this profession, specific criteria which illustrate excellent performance have not yet been identified. This competence profile clarifies characteristics which typify excellent performance in professional communication and can be helpful to educators and employers who wish to identify and create suitable training programs for ECPs.

The creation of a Unified National System of Higher Education in Australia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawkins_Revolution) in the late 1980s resulted in many new universities and significantly increased research funding for the sector. The result was the emergence of the modern Research Management Office (RMO) and eventually the establishment of the Australian Research Management Society (ARMS) to support the development of research management professionals in the region; including Singapore, New Zealand, Pacific Islands, and Papua New Guinea. In 2013, ARMS launched an accreditation program to recognise and develop careers in research management. There are now more than 3,500 ARMS members with nearly 30% only having been in the profession for less than 5 years. The role of ARMS in helping Research Managers and Administrators (RMAs) redefine their roles and upskill is ever important in growing the profession and its leaders.

This paper aims to investigate the extent to which three subgroups – people with mental health conditions, people belonging to sexual minority and gender groups and Indigenous peoples – have been “left behind” by countries implementing the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

A general review of electronic bibliographical databases to provide an overview of smoking prevalence among the three groups and interventions designed specifically to reduce their smoking rates.

Although explanations and specific rates differ, two trends are consistent across all three groups. First, information reported in the past two decades suggests that smoking prevalence is disproportionately high among people with mental health conditions, and in the rainbow and indigenous communities. Second, most cessation programmes are targeted at majority politically dominant groups, missing opportunities to reduce smoking rates in these minority communities.

There is a general dearth of data preventing detailed analysis. Better data collection efforts are required. Trials to identify effective smoking reduction interventions for marginalised groups are needed.

It is socially unjust that these groups are being systematically ignored by tobacco control initiatives. A failure to equitably reduce tobacco harms among all groups across society has contributed to the perceived concentration of smoking in some subgroups. The increasing stigmatisation of people who smoke then adds a marginality, compounding the negative effects associated with belonging to a marginalised group. Ongoing marginalisation of these groups is an important determinant of smoking.

Cross-case analysis of neglected subgroups with disproportionately high smoking rates suggests social marginalisation is a shared and important determinant of smoking prevalence.

Tourism is one of the most notable features of the contemporary globalised world. The tourism industry is becoming increasingly vital to the economy of many developing and developed countries around the globe. The demand of the tourism industry has posed a challenge for tourism training providers to move towards a more responsive and internationalised curriculum to enhance work readiness for tourism graduates who are expected to work with an increased number of international tourists. The purpose of this paper is analyse whether and how internationalisation has been implemented in the tourism training programmes across six institutions in Vietnam.

The research deployed case studies as research strategy with interviews and document analysis as two instruments of data collection.

The major findings show that even though the tourism industry demands graduates to possess global competency, knowledge and skills, the curriculum does not prioritise the internationalisation dimensions and the faculty members are not facilitated to be internationally active in their roles. Overall, internationalisation is still fragmented and ad hoc in these institutions even though the private institutions in this research appear to be more responsive to the trend of internationalisation in education than their public counterparts.

The paper provides recommendations on how to effectively embed internationalisation components into local tourism training programs in Vietnam.

The research bridges the gap in the literature on internationalisation of the local tourism programme in non-English-speaking countries.