Using the Results from Needs Analysis Surveys to Boost Student Engineers' Language and Communication Skills

Workshop Recommended citation: Rinder, J. M. (2025). Using the Results from Needs Analysis Surveys to Boost Student Engineers’ Language and Communication Skills. In Kangaslampi, R., Langie, G., Järvinen, H.-M., & Nagy, B. (Eds.), SEFI 53rd Annual Conference. European Society for Engineering Education (SEFI), Tampere, Finland. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17631452. This Conference Paper is brought to you for open access by the 53rd Annual Conference of the European Society for Engineering Education (SEFI) at Tampere University in Tampere, Finland. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License. USING THE RESULTS FROM NEEDS ANALYSIS SURVEYS TO BOOST STUDENT ENGINEERS’ LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION SKILLS J M Rinder a, 1 a KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, 0000-0002-1254-9629 Conference Key Areas: 1 and 10 Keywords: Engineering communication, language, needs analysis, VUCA. ABSTRACT This workshop explores how findings from needs analysis surveys can enhance the teaching of discipline-specific language and communication skills for engineering students. The workshop draws on insights from two surveys. The first survey, conducted in 2015, has informed the development of a framework of engineering communication skills and a catalogue of teaching and learning activities. The second survey is currently underway and aims to respond to new demands placed on engineers in a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) world. Through interactive activities, workshop participants will examine key survey results, map the communication needs highlighted in the surveys to practical teaching approaches, and design a teaching and learning activity relevant to their disciplinary context. The session explicitly engages with SEFI’s (2025) position paper on the evolving skillsets of engineers, encouraging participants to reflect on how engineering communication is changing in response to social, technological, and educational shifts. By linking needs analysis to pedagogical design, the workshop aims to encourage both teachers and managers (including both language and communication specialists and engineering specialists) to respond proactively to the growing emphasis on transferable and transdisciplinary skills in engineering education and to recognise the opportunities related to teaching and learning discipline-specific literacy skills to engineers throughout their studies. 1 Corresponding Author J M Rinder jami[email protected] 1 BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE 1.1 The concept of discipline-specific language and communication skills A discipline is a structured field of work with its own methods and epistemologies, which are often shaped by long-standing academic and professional traditions. In Becher and Trowler’s (2001) framework, disciplines are categorised into four broad types based on their epistemological characteristics (see Table 1). Table 1. A summary of Becher and Trowler’s (2001) framework for discipline categorisation. The descriptions are based on Neumann and Becher (2002: 406). ‘Pure hard’ disciplines, such as physics, are characterised by a cumulative knowledge structure, where inquiry tends to be objective and focused on simplification and universal principles. ‘Pure soft’ disciplines like history are more holistic, interpretative, and qualitative, with a focus on individual perspectives and expression. In ‘hard applied’ disciplines such as engineering, the focus is on pragmatic and context-specific problem solving based on factual and empirical understanding. ‘Soft applied’ disciplines such as education, though also practical, draw from interpretive traditions and aim at personal or professional development. These characteristics shape a discipline’s language and communication practices. If we take the language of scientific writing in English as an example, we can see how its typical features are formed by the aforementioned epistemological characteristics and research structures of STEM disciplines: • Impersonal language, which helps writers express objectivity in their descriptions and understanding of facts, methods, and results (Bellquist, 2022). • An established set of domain-specific terminology, whose terms are so specific that they often have no direct synonym (Norman, 2003). • A discourse that is straightforward and serves as a direct link between between words and concepts (Bernstein, 1999). One example of this feature is the high frequency of distinctive lexical bundles (e.g. the figure shows). • A greater use of noun phrases rather than clauses, e.g. the consequence of inaction is sea level rise. Such nominalisations enable scientific writers to express complex information economically (Parkinson, 2013). However, as global challenges grow in complexity and scope, the expectations placed on engineers and their language and communication skills are evolving. The rapid pace of technological change, combined with the need to navigate climate, energy, and societal transitions, demands a redefinition of the competencies required for success in engineering (Auffret et al., 2021). Increasingly, cognitive, social, and emotional skills such as clear and adaptive communication, collaborative problem-solving, and effective project management are viewed as essential to the work of engineers (SEFI, 2025). The question is, how will these changes to engineering affect its language and communication practices? 1.2 The study of engineers’ communication needs and its role in the teaching and learning of Languages for Specific Purposes (LSP) Language for Specific Purposes (LSP) courses are designed to equip learners with the discipline-specific language and communication skills necessary to operate effectively in specific contexts, usually professional contexts (Wozniak & Millot, 2016). As the name Language for Specific Purposes suggests, it is the purposes of the learners that are specific, not necessarily the language. This means that that “general language” also plays a significant part in LSP courses (Tual et al., 2018). To ensure content that is relevant to the learners’ purposes, LSP teaching is shaped by a detailed assessment and evaluation of the specific language and communication needs of individuals in the relevant workplaces (Rinder & Hurdelbrink, 2022). This assessment is often called ‘needs analysis’, and it should be central to both the creation and development of LSP syllabuses. Needs analysis is widely regarded as the core feature that distinguishes LSP from other types of language and communication instruction (Basturkman, 2018). In 2015, language and communication teachers from the Global Engineers Languages and Skills (GELS) network carried out a needs analysis survey with the aim of better preparing their engineering students for international study and future employment. Surveys were completed by over 200 professional engineers from about 30 countries, and the responses inspired several international studies and collaborative projects, including the following: • the development of a progressive framework of communication skills for engineers (the GELS framework) (Rinder et al., 2016; Rinder et al., 2019) • the creation of teaching and learning materials as part of a three-year Erasmus+ funded project Becoming a Digital Global Engineer (BADGE, n.d.) • a study of the perceived writing needs of students in specific STEM disciplines (Freddi & Tlukova, 2022) • a reflection on the suitability of the GELS framework for Japanese teaching and learning (Sugie et al., forthcoming) Another group of GELS network members has recently launched TECHTALK, a new needs analysis survey with the aim of charting more systematically engineers’ typical communication activities, especially in response to calls for engineers to prepare for a "volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous" (VUCA) world (SEFI, 2025). Initial analysis of the survey has focused on the frequency and perceived difficulty of various language and communication activities, which are categorised into six groups: interpersonal communication, listening and reading comprehension, writing, oral communication, collaborative communication, technical and project-specific communication, and career and professional development (Labetoulle et al., forthcoming). 2 WORKSHOP OBJECTIVES 2.1 Target audience Anybody interested in the teaching and learning of language (any language) and communication skills for student engineers. The workshop aims to encourage both teaching and learning managers and educators (including both language and communication specialists and engineering specialists) to respond proactively to the growing emphasis on transferable and transdisciplinary skills in engineering education. 2.2 Expected learning outcomes By completing the following tasks, participants will see the positive role that focused language and communication teaching can play in an engineering education: 1) Consider the implications of results from two communication-focused needsanalysis surveys among professional engineers 2) Plan a teaching and learning activity to improve student engineers’ disciplinespecific language and communication skills (in any language) 3) Respond to SEFI’s (2025) position paper on engineering competencies and skills for an uncertain future Participants will also learn how LSP for engineers can be incorporated in engineering degree programmes without detracting from important technical and other disciplinefocused content and skills. 3 WORKSHOP DESIGN 3.1 Time plan Table 2. Time plan Brief description of the stage Time (mins) Notes 1 Welcome and introduction. 5 Reference to the SEFI (2025). 2 Discuss the results of the 2015 GELS network survey in Rinder et al. (2019). Guiding questions: What results surprise you? Does your engineering course or programme help students to develop these skills? 5 The results are projected on a screen for the participants to see. 3 Participate in a “find and share” activity based on the GELS framework and the BADGE project’s catalogue of teaching and learning activities for engineering communication (BADGE, n.d.). 10 “Find”: Participants find skills relevant to their specific discipline and see how these skills are represented in the framework and catalogue (available online and in paper format). “Share”: Tell a partner about an activity you have found that you find interesting. 4 Listen to a brief presentation of the results of the TECHTALK survey (Labetoulle et al., 2025). 5 The results are projected on a screen for the participants to see. 5 Plan a teaching and learning activity that responds to at least one result that you have learnt about today that is relevant to your engineering discipline. 10 Participants are provided with a template to complete. The template includes an opportunity for participants to consider how their activity responds to SEFI (2025). 6 Present your plan to a partner or a small group. 15 Some questions to encourage feedback and discussion are projected on a screen. 7 Conclusion and thanks. 5 3.2 Interactivity Stages 2, 3, 4, and 6 include opportunities for structured discussion (see Table 1). 4 WORKSHOP RESULTS After an introductory presentation, workshop participants discussed the implications of the survey results in small groups. The focus of this discussion was the extent to which SEFI’s (2025) position paper aligns with the survey results that highlighted the importance of spoken interaction skills. As the workshop participants planned their teaching and learning activities, a discussion arose in a small group about the specific words and phrases used by engineers. This led to the realisation that specific domains of engineering also have their own specific language and communicative norms. I called this ‘professional literacy’. Two other groups questioned the role of language in the engineering skills we were discussing. For them, student engineers need communication training, not language. This led to a discussion about the differences and the interconnections between language and communication. I tried to explain that communication relates to context, purpose, and audience. However, skills such as persuading and negotiating in an academic or professional context require the purposeful choice of words, structure, and style. This is language. What can also be considered “language”, of course, is the fact that many engineers use more than one language in their work. The workshop ended with the distribution of materials and contact details to facilitate further discussion. 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