Welcome to Day 2 of our AI For Communications virtual conference! 

Most communicators use AI to strengthen an idea they have already decided is sound. That leaves one of its most valuable roles largely untapped: challenging the premise itself. In this session, Shel Holtz will demonstrate how communicators can turn an agreeable chatbot into a rigorous strategic red team, one that questions assumptions, exposes weak logic, anticipates stakeholder reactions, and identifies reputational risks before a plan or message reaches the real world. The session will also explore how agents and AI cowork capabilities can turn this approach from an occasional prompting exercise into a repeatable part of communication planning and decision-making. 

Participants will learn how to: 

• Design prompts and role-based challenges that push AI to interrogate a strategy rather than reinforce what the user wants to hear. 

• Use AI agents or cowork workflows to systematically test plans against stakeholder perspectives, evidence, reputational risk, unintended consequences, and likely objections. 

• Build a repeatable human-in-the-loop red-team process for communication planning, message development, executive counsel, crisis preparation, and strategic decision-making. 

As organizations move from simple AI tools to autonomous agents capable of generating content, making decisions, and interacting across workflows, the risks become far more complex. This session explores how communications leaders can build practical guardrails for AI agents that protect brand voice, ensure accountability, reduce risk, and keep human oversight at the center of automated systems. 

You will learn about building:  

• A framework for governing AI agents in communications environments  

• Strategies for maintaining brand consistency, accuracy, and accountability  

• Practical approaches to approvals, escalation paths, and human oversight  

• Key considerations for balancing innovation, efficiency, and risk management 

Your AI is already speaking. The question is whether it sounds like you—or like everyone else. 

Communications teams are experimenting with AI. But when every press statement, LinkedIn post, and executive communications starts to feel eerily similar, something is off. 

AI doesn’t dilute voice. Lack of strategy does. 

In this 25-minute case study, Maggie Miller explores how communications professionals can move beyond generic prompting and start building defined AI teammates. These are role-based systems trained on voice, tone, messaging priorities, and institutional context. 

What if your communications function included: 

• A media strategist that pressure-tests your narrative before a reporter does 

• A crisis advisor that surfaces reputational blind spots in seconds 

• A social editor that adapts corporate messaging across platforms without flattening the voice 

• An executive voice model trained on real interviews to reinforce consistency at scale 

You’ll learn how to: 

• Design AI roles inside a communications team 

• Train AI on voice and guardrails so it reflects your organization—not the internet 

• Chain AI workflows to align media, internal, executive, and social messaging 

• Scale output without surrendering judgment, accountability, or trust 

AI can help you scale your message.
But only humans can protect the voice behind it. 

And in communications, voice is everything. 

Search, enhanced by AI: See how Fresh brings AI-generated answers straight into intranet search, with full transparency into how each answer was built, so employees get instant, trustworthy responses without ever leaving the search bar. 

AI is changing more than workflows—it’s redefining what it means to be a communications professional. This forward-looking panel explores how roles are evolving, which skills are becoming more valuable, and how communicators can stay relevant, strategic, and indispensable in an AI-driven workplace.