Strategic Communication Management in Times of Automation and Artificial Intelligence (AI)

In this session we discuss the implications of AI for professional roles and responsibilities in strategic communication. We explore AI and related phenomena and showcase examples of how AI is currently being used in the field.

Further we discuss what current trends in AI mean for the structure of the profession, including how the role of the communication function and professional will be re-shaped as many of the operational tasks in communication are automated and ‘infused’ with AI.

Finally, we delve into the active ethical guardian role that communicators need to take at an organizational level, serving as the conscience of the wider organization in an age of AI.

Speaker

Anne Gregory is Professor emerita at the University of Huddersfield (UK). Formerly she was Director of the Centre for Public Relations Studies at the University from Leeds Beckett University, an internationally recognized research center and think tank on public relations and communication. While at Leeds Beckett, she also completed a three-year term as Pro Vice Chancellor. Anne has led numerous specialist research and consultancy programmes for public and private sector clients, particularly for the UK Government where her work has led to Government policy documents and capability-building initiatives.  She remains an advisor to UK Government having completed three attachments and is currently working on the Senior Talent Programme for Government which seeks to build capability in the most senior communicators. She is a formal Reviewer of Government Departmental communication and has advised both the South African and New South Wales Governments on capability development. Professor Gregory is the Director of the Global Capabilities Framework research project the results of which were announced in April 2018. The Framework has been adopted by the Global Alliance of Public Relations and Communication Management which is the confederation of the professional bodies worldwide and is being used by them to benchmark capability in the profession internationally.