[Note: This post originally appeared on IABC's Communications World blog.]

One of the questions at last month’s IABC/Washington panel discussion on 2010 trends was on core competencies. What skills do communicators need to have today?

Panelists cited several, including:

• the ability to identify influencers
• knowing how to tell a story
• tech skills and proficiency (including a working knowledge of WordPress)
• thinking more like journalists (accountability and transparency)

And, of course, writing skills.

But are writing skills still important? In an age of fragmented attention spans and 140-character tweets, there’s a battle going on between communicators who believe the AP Stylebook still has its place and those who think grammar rules and style points are so 20th century.

What’s your take? Is writing a core competency? And what other skills must communicators have to succeed?

Photo by karindalziel (Flickr).

©2010 Independent Thinking. All Rights Reserved.

Eleven months. Eleven months, which equals a cautionary tale about good intentions. As in mine, and my time and ability to brand a Web site.

When I migrated SteigmanCommunications.com onto a self-hosted WordPress platform in January (or, more accurately, when my friend and uber-trainer Lee Watts did this for me), I had every intention of adding design elements quickly. The problem: I thought I could do it myself. And that, at the time, meant learning hooks and understanding CSS style sheets–not my forte.

Not my forte, as in: smart business owner, take your own advice and farm out the tasks that aren’t your specialty (like accounting and Web design). So eventually I figured out that I wasn’t going to do it (and certainly wasn’t going to do it well), and hired someone who actually gets this design stuff.

If you’re reading this post via feed reader or e-mail, pop over to the site and check out the new design. It was 11 months in the making.

©2010 Independent Thinking. All Rights Reserved.

Each week I’m highlighting 3 or 4 posts, surveys, and other news that I have read and/or tweeted about that you may not have seen. As the name implies, I think they deserve a second look.

Here’s your second look for this week:

• Step 2: Fix the Problem: The Joint Commission, which assesses hospitals on their success in meeting patient safety standards, has decided to help solve the problems it identifies. As the Wall Street Journal health blog points out, the Joint Commission decided to launch its new Center for Transforming Healthcare after hearing hospital executives say, “You need to stop telling us only about the problems and start telling us how to fix them.”
• Leadership Blind Spots: Good article from Business Week about recognizing three key leadership blind spots–going it alone, situational cluelessness, and silence.
• Spellcheck Your Blog: From Download Squad, an announcement that WordPress has acquired a new, much improved spellchecker. Self-hosted blogs can download it as a plug-in.

©2010 Independent Thinking. All Rights Reserved.