Missing the Forest for the Trees: How AI Makes Communications Smarter 

Eighteen months ago our agency was sitting in a conference room debating the same thing everyone else was: AI in communications. Could AI make the day easier? We listed the usual suspects on the whiteboard: press releases, clip reports, media monitoring, meeting notes. The dream was efficiency. Fewer hours wasted, more boxes ticked. 

The early experiments delivered. A release that used to take three hours now took one. Reports were generated at the click of a button. The team felt lighter. We had proof that AI could smooth the daily grind. 

But something about it felt incomplete. 

 We were moving faster, but were we moving forward? It was like running harder on a treadmill without changing the incline. That was the moment the questions started: Is this all there is? What if AI could do more than shave hours off our calendar? What if it could change the outcomes of our work? 

That shift in perspective opened up the forest we had been missing through the trees. 

The truth is that efficiency is the appetizer, not the entrée. The main course is effectiveness. And effectiveness comes down to two things: precision and predictability. 

Think about precision. For decades, communicators have been broadcasting broadly and hoping messages landed. Now AI can read millions of signals, track the faint tremors of an emerging story, and tell us where our efforts will have the greatest impact. It is not about more content, it is about the right content at the right time, aimed at the right people. 

Then there is predictability. Our industry has lived on hindsight. We launch a campaign, measure coverage, and decide if it worked. AI lets us flip the order. We can model how employees might react to a new policy, test how investors could interpret a CEO’s remarks, and forecast reputational risks before they erupt. It is not certainty, but it is probability. And in communications, probability is power. 

This is not hypothetical. Boston Consulting Group analyzed more than four billion hours of corporate work and found communications is one of the most AI-ready functions in business. Nearly half of our time could be reclaimed and costs cut by 30 percent. Those numbers are impressive, but they are not the headline. The headline is that the same tools that save hours can also give communicators sharper strategies and more reliable outcomes. 

The lesson is clear. If we stop at AI efficiency, we will remain tacticians who write faster press releases. If we pursue AI effectiveness, we become strategists who can forecast and shape outcomes. Finance already has its models. Operations has its forecasts. Communications has the chance to join them at the decision-making table. 

Looking back, that conversation 18 months ago about streamlining the everyday was a useful beginning. But the real story is not about working faster. It is about working smarter. Precision and predictability are how AI makes communications more effective. 

That is the forest. And it is time we stopped staring at the trees.