Report from Mumbrella’s CommsCon 2024

Events
Written By Guest User
By Kate Hamilton, Change and Communications Leader | IABC member

Mumbrella’s annual CommsCon conference was held on 27 March 2023 in Sydney, and I was fortunate to attend on behalf of IABC NSW. A conference for PR and communications professionals, CommsCon was a jam-packed smorgasbord of current industry insights and trends.

Sessions covered campaign back stories, the 2024 Australian Edelman Trust Barometer, reputation relevance, public transparency, and crisis management. (Hot tip – It’s been a few years since crisis plans were tested during the pandemic – make sure you dust them off and update them!) Of all the sessions, I attended I found three session particularly insightful for IABC members:

Generative AI and how it will impact PR

It was standing room only when Tim Powell, Chief Public Relations Officer, Densu Creative took to the stage to talk about Gen AI and its impact on newsrooms and the PR industry. Tim said that Gen AI will mean job cuts in newsrooms, as grunt work and repetitive tasks are taken over by automation. He referenced that NewsCorp is using AI to produce 3,000 articles a week and that the ABC is trialling aspects of the technology. He said that we need to consider how Gen AI will revolutionise search as in-platform Chatbots answering questions will mean less clicks to news sites.

This will “shake up eyeballs” as users get their answers faster within platforms like Facebook, Instagram or TikTok. And less click throughs to news sites, means less advertising, which means less journos”.

Tim listed the risks of Gen AI as being:

  1. Bias – it reinforces the existing world and content on the web

  2. Accountability – who corrects the record if Gen AI gets it wrong? Who owns the copyright? How are content providers compensated if their work it used?

  3. Egregious mistakes – the impact of bad actors or activism and ‘hallucinations’ – when AI models generate incorrect information.

Tim suggests that rules may be determined by the courts before there are standards established by governments and legislation – especially when it comes to copyright, intellectual property and indemnity. He did point to the benefits of automating tedious reporting, analysis, first drafts of content and building out media contact lists. Also, Gen AI can be used to fact check information like the metadata on photos. But his final point reflected what Gen AI can’t do –

“humans have the power of imagination and power to evoke an emotion or reaction”

and he referenced Nick Cave:

“ As far as I know, algorithms don’t feel. Data doesn’t suffer. ChatGPT has no inner being, it has been nowhere, it has endured nothing, it has not had the audacity to reach beyond its limitations, and hence it doesn’t have the capacity for a shared transcendent experience.”

Go a bit deeper!

Communicating with Gen Z … and their culture

It’s Gen Zee. Not Gen Zed. Says my 14-year old. And as this next generation enters the workforce and has more purchasing power, we need to understand their culture and motivations. According to Rob Lowe, Co-Founder & Managing Partner at Poem, Gen Z culture is having an increasing impact on society and mainstream media. What’s being shared on social channels, what’s driving conversations and engagement and what’s influencing media headlines, isn’t the same now as it was five years ago. Gen Z culture is based on micro trends and new social values. It’s fluid and it’s constantly changing.

In his presentation, Rob outlined the social shifts that have occurred in media and PR. He recaps this in his article on Mumbrella - The public relations seven-year itch.

His key insights were:

  • Gen Z is all about culture first – this is the latest evolution from media first, then consumer first.

  • Brands must be more human

  • PR teams need to be as much in culture as they are media

  • Earned content will increasingly outperform advertising

While of Rob’s focus on external PR, he provided useful insights for those of us focused on corporate and internal communications. How can we capitalise on these insights in our work?

  • What does this means for our workplace cultures

  • How do we make our organisations and leaders ‘more human’, while staying true to our corporate strategy?

  • What elements of Gen Z culture (speed, memes, not too polished) can we use in our programs?

  • How do we support and promote content creation outside corporate comms. For example, the Graduate Engineer wants to create short videos to celebrate his day at work?

Combating burnout in corporate comms

Managing Director of AZK Media, Azadeh Williams, talked about her experience of burnout and the impact of burnout on the profession. She referred to Harvard research that says that

“half of PR pros suffer from severe stress, anxiety and burnout”.

“And eight out of 10 PR professionals felt they were discriminated against when they raised these issues with their employer. Nine out of 10 were dissatisfied with the intervention that was provided.”

These insights are reflected in Gallagher’s State of the Sector 2024 report, where 38% of surveyed internal communication professionals said that their wellbeing had deteriorated in 2023.

According to the report, “communicators are running on fumes while businesses are taking for granted the intrinsic motivation that propels the profession.”

After recovering from severe burnout, Azadeh said maintaining mental wellness means that we must see:

  • flexibility being essential for home and work

  • personal and professional boundaries established and maintained

  • the right to disconnect supported by the sector, and

  • scope creep managed and clients charged for additional work.

Helpful resources on burnout and mental wellness

Thanks to IABC NSW for the opportunity to attend the CommCon Conference. It was such a privilege to wallow in a full day of learning and catch up with former colleagues and meet new people in the profession.

Guest User
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