Tag: trends

  • 2026 Sharepoint Intranet Benchmarking Report by SWOOP Analytics

    2026 Sharepoint Intranet Benchmarking Report by SWOOP Analytics

    About the paper

    SWOOP Analytics’ 2026 SharePoint Intranet Benchmarking Report analyses how SharePoint intranets are actually used and what drives intranet health, engagement, clutter and AI readiness.

    It is original benchmarking research based on real usage data, not survey responses, covering 410,457 intranet visitors, 253,755 intranet pages and 41 organisations worldwide over 1 October–31 December 2025.

    Length: 98 pages

    More information / download:
    https://sharepoint2026.swoopanalytics.com/

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report’s central argument is that SharePoint intranets have moved beyond the adoption problem. Almost all employees now access the intranet, with 95% of employees using it during the three-month benchmark period. The issue is no longer whether people visit the intranet, but whether the content they find there is useful, current, readable and well governed.

    This creates a major shift in how intranet success should be understood. The report argues that success is not primarily about publishing more content, driving more visits or creating a larger intranet. Instead, the strongest intranets are those that help employees complete tasks, find trusted guidance and navigate content efficiently. In other words, the intranet is becoming less of a broadcast channel and more of a productivity and knowledge infrastructure.

    The report is especially clear that Content pages — policies, how-to guides, reference material and other evergreen pages — are the heart of the intranet. Employees spend 10.4 minutes per workday on Content pages, compared with only 0.9 minutes on News pages. News still matters, but it is consumed lightly, skimmed quickly and performs best when short and highly relevant.

    The broader conclusion is that intranet performance now depends on disciplined governance: clear ownership, content lifecycle management, accessibility, readability, pruning of outdated pages and a stronger distinction between news, reference content and knowledge assets.

    2. What does the data show about how employees actually use intranets?

    The report shows a pattern of near-universal but increasingly selective use. Employees are not abandoning the intranet. On the contrary, access has increased from 86% in 2024 to 93% in 2025 and 95% in 2026. But they are becoming more intentional in how they use it.

    The average employee visits the intranet 3.23 times per working day, slightly down from 3.36 in 2025, while pages viewed per visit have risen modestly to 2.22. Employees also access an average of 39.6 unique pages over the three-month period. This suggests fewer casual check-ins and more purposeful visits.

    The device data is striking. Desktop remains overwhelmingly dominant, accounting for 89% of intranet access, while phone access has fallen sharply to just 1.7%. The report interprets this as evidence that intranets are mainly experienced as desktop productivity environments, not mobile-first communication channels.

    Another important signal is the increase in home-page-only visits, from 3.6% in 2025 to 6% in 2026. The report sees this as strategically significant because it may indicate scanning without engagement, overexposure to generic content or weak prompts for next action. The homepage should therefore function as a hub for tasks and journeys, not as a billboard.

    3. Which content factors most strongly affect intranet engagement?

    The report finds that engagement is driven less by publishing volume and more by content hygiene, readability, accessibility and structure. This is one of its most important findings.

    SWOOP’s Health Score combines three dimensions: Quality, Experience and Engagement. Quality includes ageing content, spelling and grammar, broken links and missing editors. Experience includes readability, heading length, heading-to-paragraph ratio and accessibility. Engagement measures whether users spend an amount of time on a page that is reasonable in relation to its length.

    For both News and Content pages, readability and accessibility are especially important. Pages with poor structure, long sentences, accessibility issues or insufficient headings perform worse. The report also notes that accessibility is not merely a compliance matter; it has a measurable relationship with engagement.

    For News pages, structure and brevity are critical. The strongest-performing news articles are typically 200–400 words, with readership declining after around 400 words and completion rates falling further for longer articles. Very long news articles, especially those over 1,000 words, have the weakest completion rates.

    For Content pages, the picture is slightly different. Broken links matter more because these pages are often used as tools or reference material. Ageing content is more ambiguous: older Content pages may be heavily used because they are mature and valuable, but the report stresses that this only works if they are reviewed periodically. Old does not automatically mean stale, but unmanaged old content becomes a risk.

    4. What does the report say about clutter and AI readiness?

    The report argues that clutter is now one of the central intranet problems, and that it directly affects both human browsing and AI performance. The Clutter Index measures low-value pages, navigation complexity, home-page-only visits, unread News pages and content relevance across departments. In 2026, the Clutter Index rose slightly to 0.33.

    Unread and irrelevant News is identified as the largest contributor to clutter. The practical message is quite direct: organisations should publish less News, apply stricter criteria for what qualifies as News, convert evergreen News into reference pages and remove stale items from prominent news streams.

    The AI Readiness findings are especially relevant. The overall AI Readiness score improved only marginally, from 51.13 in 2025 to 52.38 in 2026. This happened despite a dramatic improvement in search effectiveness, from 34.16 to 66.3. The reason is that search effectiveness only accounts for 10% of the AI Readiness index, while content readiness and engagement readiness account for 90% combined — and both declined slightly.

    The report’s sharpest AI conclusion is that AI readiness is no longer primarily a search problem. The bigger constraint is the quality, currency and governance of the content that AI depends on. If an intranet contains outdated, duplicated, unmanaged or low-value pages, AI tools may retrieve and summarise poor content more efficiently, but not necessarily more accurately or usefully.

    The report therefore warns that AI will not magically fix intranet disorder. It may amplify it.

    5. What are the main implications for communication, intranet and knowledge-management teams?

    The first implication is that intranet teams should shift from publishing management to content stewardship. More content is not the answer. Better governed content is. The report repeatedly points to pruning, lifecycle management, ownership, templates, accessibility checks and review cycles as practical levers.

    The second implication is that Content pages deserve more strategic attention than News. News is visible and often politically important, but Content pages account for the overwhelming majority of time spent. Improving policies, guidance, FAQs, how-to pages and other reference material is likely to deliver more value than increasing the volume of internal news.

    The third implication is that leaders and managers are important intranet users. The report finds that Leadership & Executive and Management roles have the highest engagement intensity. This suggests that intranet content should be designed to support leader-led communication: clear summaries, explicit actions, reusable briefing points and easily cascadeable messages.

    The fourth implication is that organisations need to think of intranets as knowledge-management systems. The report introduces a Knowledge Management Ratio comparing pages with files, distinguishing between balanced, file-dominant, content-led and news-led intranet profiles. The most AI-ready organisations are not those with the most content, but those with the clearest pathways from work artefacts to maintained, authoritative “single source of truth” guidance.

    The final implication is that governance must become supportive rather than punitive. The Boehringer Ingelheim case study shows this well: around 2,000 editors, mandatory training before publishing rights, automated health-score nudges, community support and lifecycle pruning have enabled a very large intranet to remain healthy. The report presents this as evidence that federated governance can work if editors are equipped with standards, data and support rather than simply controlled from the centre.

  • IC Index 2026 by Institute of Internal Communication

    IC Index 2026 by Institute of Internal Communication

    About the paper

    The IC Index 2026 report examines the state of internal communication in UK large organisations, focusing on trust, change, leadership, AI, manager communication and employee attention.

    It is original survey research: Ipsos Karian and Box surveyed a representative quota sample of 5,000 UK workers aged 18–75, all working in organisations with 500+ employees, between 15 and 29 January 2026.

    The geographic scope is the UK; the report also includes practitioner reflections from internal communication experts.

    Length: 37 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.ioic.org.uk/insight-practice/ic-index.html

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the IC Index 2026 report?

    The report argues that internal communication has become more strategically important because employees are facing a tougher, more uncertain work environment, while trust, clarity and confidence are weakening. The subtitle — “The reality check” — is apt: the report presents declining communication ratings, falling trust in leaders, weak change communication, limited AI clarity and rising employee time pressure as warning signs for organisations.

    The authors frame internal communication not as a support function, but as a core mechanism for organisational resilience. They argue that internal communicators need to help leaders communicate with clarity, candour and compassion, build two-way communication systems, surface difficult conversations and connect organisational ambitions to employees’ lived reality.

    The report’s most important claim is that internal communication determines whether organisations can manage change, maintain trust and achieve their goals. The conclusion makes this explicit: organisations with dedicated IC teams have stronger strategic alignment, advocacy, information flow and representation, and the authors present this as evidence that internal communication is more critical when trust and change pressures intensify.

    2. What are the main problems the report identifies in the current employee experience?

    The report identifies six headline problems.

    First, employees are experiencing more organisational change but less clarity. More than half report restructuring in the past year, and over a third report redundancies; both are up 12 points compared with 2024. Yet only 49% agree that the reasons behind changes are clearly communicated, down seven points compared with 2023.

    Second, trust in leadership has fallen. The Trust Index is down seven points compared with 2025 and now sits at 58%. Trust in CEOs or most senior leaders and leadership teams has fallen by nine points each. Only half of employees say they trust their CEO or most senior leader, and only half trust the leadership team.

    Third, leaders appear to be overestimating how well they have communicated strategy and AI. Senior leaders are consistently much more positive than non-managers about strategy clarity, belief in strategy and AI communication. For example, 87% of senior leaders say the organisation has been clear on strategy and business priorities, compared with 57% of non-managers.

    Fourth, many employees feel poorly supported through change. Only 42% agree their organisation is good at helping employees adapt to change, while 31% actively disagree. The report links stronger change support to practical actions such as honesty about impacts, listening to employees, providing skills, and clarifying what people need to do differently.

    Fifth, frontline and digitally disconnected employees are less well served. Employees not frequently connected to a computer are more likely to hear about major changes through word of mouth and are less likely to trust leaders or feel psychologically safe.

    Sixth, employees have very little time for internal communication. Most employees spend ten minutes or less per day reading or viewing organisational news and updates, and just over one in five say they spend no or hardly any time at all.

    3. What does the report say drives employee confidence in the future?

    The report treats confidence as a multi-factor “equation”, not simply a product of optimistic messaging. Just under three in five employees — 57% — say they feel confident about the future of their organisation, while one in five actively disagree.

    The strongest driver of confidence is whether work processes allow employees to work efficiently. This is significant because it means confidence is grounded in employees’ day-to-day experience, not only in leadership narratives. Only half of employees agree that their organisation’s work processes allow them to work efficiently.

    The other major drivers are open and honest communication, clarity about strategy and business priorities, belief that AI is being used to solve the right problems, and feeling connected to people beyond one’s immediate team. The report’s implication is that internal communication can influence confidence, but cannot do so credibly if it ignores operational friction, weak processes or unclear AI adoption.

    This is one of the stronger analytical points in the report: employee confidence depends on whether the organisation feels coherent. Employees need to understand where the organisation is going, believe communication is honest, see that AI has a meaningful purpose, and experience work as efficient enough to make the future feel achievable.

    4. How does the report portray the role of leaders and managers?

    The report presents leaders and managers as central to whether communication lands — but also as part of the problem.

    Senior leaders are portrayed as increasingly disconnected from employee perceptions. They are much more likely than non-managers to believe that strategy and AI have been communicated clearly. On AI, for instance, 67% of senior leaders agree that leaders have explained clearly how AI will be used, compared with just 27% of non-managers.

    Managers are presented as the key sense-making layer. Most managers spend some time communicating with their teams each day, but more than half spend 30 minutes or less, and 14% spend less than 15 minutes. This matters because employees often depend on their direct managers to translate organisational messages into team-level meaning.

    The report also shows that manager support is uneven. More than three quarters of managers feel equipped to lead conversations about what is happening across the business, but this has declined compared with 2025 and 2024. Managers who receive training, preparation time or other structured support feel more equipped, while those receiving no support feel least equipped.

    The strongest practical insight is that managers adapting communication to their team context has a large impact. Employees whose managers do this well are far more likely to find communication relevant, rate communication as excellent and recommend their employer as a great place to work.

    5. What are the report’s most important implications for internal communication practice?

    The report’s main implication is that internal communication needs to move further upstream. It should not merely distribute decisions after they have been made; it should help leaders understand employee reality before, during and after change.

    For change communication, the report suggests that IC teams need to push for early, honest, jargon-free communication; clear rationale; regular updates; routes for questions; and visible listening. The evidence shows that employees are more positive when organisations explain the reasons for change, listen to views and clarify what people need to do differently.

    For leadership communication, the implication is that trust cannot be rebuilt through messaging alone. Leaders need visibility, openness, empathy and evidence that they understand employee challenges. The report connects falling trust especially to CEOs and senior leadership teams, making leadership communication a strategic risk area rather than a stylistic concern.

    For AI communication, the report implies that organisations are under-communicating the purpose and practical expectations of AI adoption. Only 35% believe their organisation is using AI to solve the right problems, and only 32% say their employer has clearly communicated how they are expected to use AI as part of their job.

    For channels and content, the report’s implication is that relevance is now existential. Employees have little time, and 56% say employer communications feel relevant. The report points towards personalisation, segmentation and opt-in/opt-out models, while also warning that these require good audience data and a serious channel strategy.

    Finally, the report argues that representation and good-news communication matter more than many organisations may assume. Only 42% see stories about people like them in internal communications, yet those who do are much more likely to be advocates and to trust the organisation. Similarly, good news is not merely “nice to know”: effective communication of good news has a stronger impact on advocacy and overall communication ratings than effective communication of bad news.

  • 2026 Trends in Communications Budgets by Gartner

    2026 Trends in Communications Budgets by Gartner

    About the paper

    The report analyses 2026 communications budget trends, with a focus on how CCOs are reallocating spend towards PR, AI, technology, analytics and measurement.

    It is primarily original survey research based on Gartner’s 2026 CCO Spend Survey, conducted online from late October to mid-December 2025 among 200 senior communications decision-makers in North America and Europe, all from organisations with at least $1 billion in annual revenue.

    The report also draws on secondary Gartner survey evidence from CFOs, CEOs and CMOs, so it is best understood as a mixed-evidence analyst report rather than a purely standalone survey study.

    Length: 23 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.gartner.com/en/communications/research/cco-budget-2026-ec

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report’s central argument is that communications functions are being forced to transform under constrained budget conditions. Gartner argues that CCOs can no longer rely on incremental budget planning or traditional allocations. Instead, they must actively redirect resources towards AI, communications technology, analytics, measurement, PR, brand and crisis communications.

    The underlying logic is that communications is now expected to support broader business transformation, especially AI-driven transformation, while also managing heightened reputation risk, misinformation, shifting stakeholder expectations and declining trust. The report frames this as a strategic inflection point: communications functions that fail to modernise their capabilities risk further budget cuts, while those that reallocate spending towards measurable, technology-enabled and reputation-focused work will be better positioned to demonstrate business value.

    A key point is that this is not presented as a story of abundant new funding. Gartner emphasises that many CCOs face cuts or constraints: 46% say their current-year communications budget forecast was reduced due to company-wide cost-cutting, and 44% say their function lacks the budget needed to execute its strategy successfully. At the same time, 82% say their communications strategy needs to evolve rapidly to meet changing audience expectations. This creates the report’s core tension: ambition is rising, but capacity is not keeping pace.

    2. How are communications budgets changing, and where are CCOs reallocating spend?

    The report finds that overall budget growth is limited and uneven. Smaller organisations with revenue below $5 billion expect modest increases, while larger organisations face stagnant or declining budgets. Most organisations spend around 0.5% of revenue on communications, with smaller companies spending a higher percentage and very large companies spending a lower percentage, presumably because larger organisations benefit from economies of scale.

    Within constrained budgets, the mix of spending is changing. Communications budgets remain heavily weighted towards traditional areas: labour accounts for 40.3%, agencies and services for 23%, operational costs for 17.3%, and communications technology tools and internal platforms for 16.8%. However, looking ahead, technology is the area most likely to receive increased investment: 35% of communications leaders expect to increase spend on communications technology and internal platforms.

    This implies that CCOs are trying to fund transformation partly by reducing or limiting other areas. Gartner explicitly points to potential trade-offs in events, creative services, translation, operational costs and some agency spending. The report does not say these activities are unimportant, but argues that they must be streamlined, delegated, automated or tightly linked to strategic priorities if communications is to fund AI, data and analytics capabilities.

    3. Why are PR, brand and crisis communications receiving increased budget attention?

    Gartner argues that external reputation management is becoming more important because the risk environment is more volatile. PR and corporate brand command the largest shares of communications budgets, with public relations at 14.3% and corporate brand at 8.8%. Crisis communications has also grown, rising by 2.1 percentage points year on year to 4.8% of the current budget.

    The report links this shift to several forces: AI disruption, misinformation and disinformation, geopolitical uncertainty, regulatory complexity, stakeholder scrutiny and the growing speed with which reputation issues can escalate. It also argues that public large language models are changing how audiences discover and trust information, which means organisations must rethink earned media, owned content and answer engine visibility.

    This is one of the report’s more forward-looking arguments. Gartner suggests that PR is not simply about media coverage; it is becoming part of how organisations maintain discoverability, credibility and influence in AI-mediated information environments. That is why the report recommends prioritising PR and earned media investments that support “answer engine visibility”, reallocating some spending from paid media to owned and earned media, investing in authoritative owned content, and updating the corporate narrative across traditional, social and owned channels.

    4. What does the report say about AI, GenAI, technology and analytics in communications?

    The report presents AI, technology and analytics as the main transformation priorities for communications functions. GenAI investment is rising from 5.7% of total communications budget in the current fiscal year to a forecast 8.8% next year, a 54% year-on-year increase. However, Gartner also notes that current GenAI spend is below the level predicted in the previous year’s research, which suggests adoption is moving more slowly than expected.

    The barriers are not only financial. The report says 86% of communications leaders recognise the need to update team talent strategies and skill sets to capitalise on GenAI opportunities. It also says 57% believe the function must address substantial audience scepticism about GenAI integration in communications work, and 43% report that GenAI investments have not yet delivered the expected value.

    Analytics is another major theme. Thirty-four percent of leaders plan to increase spend on data and analytics, and 35% already have a dedicated communications data scientist or analyst, while another 25% plan to add one within 12 to 18 months. Yet the actual budget allocation for measurement, monitoring and analytics is still only 4.1%, up from 2.9% the year before. Gartner contrasts this with marketing’s 8% allocation and argues that communications still underinvests in the capabilities needed to link its work to organisational outcomes.

    The report’s perspective is therefore cautiously pro-investment. Gartner does not simply say “spend more on AI”. It argues that AI and technology investments must be part of a coherent strategy tied to business and communications outcomes, with proper talent development, measurement and success metrics. Otherwise, CCOs risk cutting human capability too aggressively while buying tools that fail to deliver value.

    5. What are the main implications for CCOs and communications leaders?

    The main implication is that CCOs need to become much more deliberate budget strategists. Gartner’s advice is to stop planning budgets through small adjustments to last year’s numbers and instead redraw allocations around current business priorities, reputation risks and transformation needs. The report repeatedly frames budget planning as a strategic leadership discipline, not an administrative exercise.

    A second implication is that CCOs must be able to defend investment in business terms. The report recommends linking communications outcomes to enterprise priorities such as reputation, engagement, trust and business transformation. It also urges communications leaders to benchmark spending, establish clearer budget targets for analytics and measurement, and build stronger evidence of impact.

    A third implication is that communications leaders must make harder trade-offs. Gartner explicitly recommends cutting low-value work that does not support business objectives, offloading or streamlining activities such as event management, graphics, creative services and translation where appropriate, and reassessing agency spend so it is focused on high-ROI activities or skills not available in-house.

    Finally, the report implies that internal communications should not be neglected. Although external-facing activities receive much of the budget attention, employee communications is the third-largest budget allocation, and Gartner warns that AI transformation creates employee anxiety that could threaten enterprise success. The report says 69% of communications leaders see employee anxiety from changes such as AI transformation as a significant risk over the next two years. That means CCOs must continue investing in employee communications, change communications, manager and leader communications, intranet platforms, employee experience platforms and measurement of internal communications effectiveness.

    Overall, the conclusion is clear: communications leaders are being asked to do more than protect reputation or produce content. Gartner sees the function’s future value in helping organisations navigate AI-enabled transformation, sustain trust, manage reputation risk, and prove impact through data.

  • The Changing Shape and New Economics of News Podcasting by Reuters

    The Changing Shape and New Economics of News Podcasting by Reuters

    About the paper

    The Reuters Institute report examines how news podcasting is shifting from audio-only formats towards video, personality-led “shows”, and hybrid business models.

    It is a mixed-methods report based on qualitative audience research with 50 regular news/current affairs podcast users in the US, UK, and Norway, mini-groups with a subset of those users, semi-structured interviews with 13 publishers plus industry experts and platforms, and selected Digital News Report/IAB quantitative data.

    Length: 39 pages

    More information / download:
    https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/changing-shape-and-new-economics-news-podcasting-listening-watching-podcasts-shows

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central change reshaping news podcasting?

    The report argues that news podcasting is no longer simply an audio medium distributed through open RSS feeds. It is becoming a more fluid, multi-format category that blends audio, video, social clips, newsletters, live events, subscription products, and sometimes television-style shows.

    The key shift is from “podcasts” as discrete audio products to “shows” as broader audience franchises. Video is the most visible driver of this change. Platforms such as YouTube, Spotify, and Apple are increasingly prioritising or enabling video podcasting, encouraging publishers to rethink production, distribution, discovery, and monetisation.

    The report does not claim that audio is disappearing. Instead, it argues that podcasting is becoming dual-format. Audiences often use audio and video in different contexts: audio while commuting, exercising, cooking, or multitasking; video at home, on YouTube, or on connected televisions. This means publishers are not simply replacing audio with video, but trying to work out which formats, shows, and audiences justify investment in video.

    A second major change is the rise of personality-led conversational formats. These are cheaper to produce than heavily edited narrative documentaries, easier to turn into video, and better suited to social clips and host-driven audience relationships. This is pushing parts of the market away from highly produced narrative series and towards recurring, reactive, talent-led shows.

    2. How are audiences using news podcasts, and what do they value about them?

    The report finds that news podcast users are generally a highly engaged subset of the news audience. They are not usually using podcasts as their only source of news. Rather, podcasts supplement other formats by offering depth, explanation, perspective, and a more conversational relationship with journalists or hosts.

    Podcast use is described as complementary to other news habits. Social media may provide fast discovery, websites and apps provide checking and updates, radio may support routine listening, while podcasts are used for deeper understanding. This makes podcasts particularly valuable for “active knowledge-building” rather than simple headline consumption.

    The appeal of video varies by country, context, and content type. US respondents were more open to video podcasting, partly because YouTube plays a larger role in their podcast discovery and consumption. Norwegian respondents were more resistant, with stronger attachment to audio and local public-service audio platforms. UK users sat somewhere between these positions.

    Audiences gave three main reasons for choosing video:

    • personal format preference
    • consumption context
    • and content type.

    Some younger users feel more connected to hosts when they can see facial expressions, body language, and surroundings. Others only want video when the subject benefits from visuals, such as breaking news footage, complex explanations, comedy, lifestyle, or entertainment. For factual news, many still prefer audio because it is flexible, intimate, and easy to use while doing other things.

    3. How are publishers responding to the shift towards video?

    Publishers are taking video seriously, but most are cautious about a full “pivot to video”. The report identifies three main strategic reasons for investing in video: acquisition, retention, and revenue.

    For acquisition, video helps publishers reach audiences through YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube Shorts, Spotify, and connected TVs. Video clips are easier to share and can act as discovery tools for younger audiences who may not actively seek out publisher websites or podcast apps.

    For retention, podcasts deepen audience relationships. The report repeatedly emphasises the human dimension of podcasting: hosts build trust, habit, familiarity, and parasocial connection. For subscription publishers, these relationships can reduce churn and strengthen the broader value of the subscription bundle.

    For revenue, video opens access to larger advertising budgets than audio alone. However, the report is careful to note that the economics remain uncertain. Video production costs more, requires new workflows, and may not pay off in smaller markets where advertising opportunities are limited.

    Publisher strategies differ sharply. The New York Times is selective: shows such as Hard Fork, Popcast, and The Ezra Klein Show have video versions, while The Daily remains audio-first. The Guardian is also hybrid, using video for some conversational and sports formats while protecting narrative audio investigations. Die Zeit treats video mainly as a discovery layer. The Economist is exploring video inside a subscription ecosystem. Nordic publishers such as Bonnier, Schibsted/Podme, and Politiken are more cautious because they already have strong audio habits, subscription models, and smaller advertising markets.

    The report’s table on publisher strategies is especially useful because it shows that video is not one strategy but several: full video versions, short promotional clips, subscriber-only video, TV/documentary extensions, studio models, and selective experiments.

    4. What is changing in the economics of news podcasting?

    The economics are becoming more complex and hybrid. Traditional podcasting has mostly been free and advertising-supported, but publishers are now experimenting with subscriptions, bundles, premium layers, bonus episodes, live events, memberships, merchandise, IP licensing, and brand partnerships.

    The report shows that direct payment remains difficult. Audience research in the US, UK, and Norway found that many listeners value news podcasts but are reluctant to pay because there are so many free alternatives. Some would switch to another show if their favourite podcast went behind a paywall. Others might pay only for genuinely distinctive content, such as exclusive interviews, deep expertise, investigative journalism, archives, or bonus material.

    Several publishers are nevertheless testing paid audio. The Economist put most of its podcasts behind a paywall while keeping The Intelligence free. Die Zeit launched a separate podcast subscription. Politiken launched a stand-alone audio app. The New York Times offers an audio subscription mainly around archives and bonus material, while still using free recent episodes to support the broader bundle. Schibsted/Podme uses a premium podcast subscription model in the Nordics, with some free content and some exclusive paid layers.

    Advertising remains central, but video changes the opportunity. The report notes that US podcast advertising revenue reached $2.4 billion in 2024, while digital video advertising was vastly larger. That creates an incentive for podcast publishers to access video budgets. But the advertising market is still organised around separate audio and video buying teams, and measurement, ad-serving, pricing, and platform standards remain unresolved.

    The report’s broader conclusion is that podcasts are rarely just stand-alone revenue products for traditional publishers. They are often part of a wider funnel: attracting new users, increasing engagement, reducing churn, and adding value to subscriptions.

    5. What are the wider implications for journalism and media organisations?

    The report suggests that the future of news podcasting will be shaped by a tension between journalism-led publishing and creator-led show business.

    For traditional newsrooms, the challenge is organisational as much as technological. Audio, video, social, text, product, and commercial teams can no longer operate as separate silos if one recorded conversation can become a podcast episode, a video episode, social clips, a newsletter, a transcript, a written article, and a subscriber feature. This requires new skills, new production workflows, and potentially new “studio” or “show” structures inside media companies.

    The rise of talent also raises editorial questions. Podcast-first companies such as Goalhanger and Chora Media put hosts, fandoms, communities, and show brands at the centre. Their model looks less like traditional news publishing and more like a blend of creator economy, television, live events, and music-industry-style fandom. Traditional publishers may want some of that audience loyalty, but adopting the model raises questions about editorial control, host power, commercial boundaries, and whether newsrooms are set up to develop and retain talent in the same way.

    The report’s final implication is that “podcasting” itself is becoming harder to define. Some purists still tie the term to RSS distribution or audio. But in practice, audiences increasingly encounter podcasts on YouTube, Spotify, Apple, social feeds, connected TVs, apps, and paywalled publisher products. The boundaries between podcast, video show, radio programme, social franchise, and subscription product are blurring.

    The report concludes that the future is unlikely to be audio versus video. It is more likely to be a hybrid ecosystem where successful publishers combine reach and depth, free and paid layers, journalism and personality, open distribution and owned platforms. The strategic question is how much news organisations are willing to invest in creator-led, show-based formats without losing the editorial qualities that made their audio journalism valuable in the first place.

  • 2026 Work Trend Index by Microsoft

    2026 Work Trend Index by Microsoft

    About the paper

    Microsoft’s 2026 Work Trend Index Annual Report examines how A.I. agents are changing work, arguing that as agents take on more execution, human agency shifts towards intent-setting, judgement, orchestration and accountability.

    It is a mixed-methods report based on Microsoft 365 telemetry, a 20,000-person online survey of A.I.-using knowledge workers across 10 markets, a separate 1,800-person global survey on managers and agentic A.I., and expert perspectives; the main survey covers Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, the UK and the US.

    Length: 29 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/agents-human-agency-and-the-opportunity-for-every-organization

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report’s central argument is that AI and agents are not merely productivity tools; they are forcing a redesign of the operating model of work. Microsoft frames this as a shift in which agents take on more execution, while humans gain more “agency”: more capacity to define intent, direct work, exercise judgement and own outcomes.

    The report is explicit that the key question is no longer simply whether organisations are adopting AI. The larger question is whether they are structurally capable of capturing its value. Its thesis is that many workers are already using AI in advanced and resourceful ways, but their organisations have not yet redesigned the surrounding systems — leadership alignment, incentives, governance, performance evaluation, culture and management practices — to match what AI now makes possible.

    A useful way to express the report’s logic is this: AI raises individual capability, but organisational design determines whether that capability becomes institutional advantage. The report repeatedly contrasts “AI adoption” with “AI absorption”. Adoption means people or teams use tools. Absorption means the organisation changes how work is designed, evaluated, governed, learned from and scaled.

    This is why the report’s three-part structure matters. At the employee level, AI expands what individuals can do. At the leader level, the task becomes rearchitecting work rather than simply deploying tools. At the organisational level, the most advanced firms become “Learning Systems” that capture lessons from AI-enabled work and turn them into repeatable practices.

    2. How does AI change the role and value of individual employees?

    The report argues that AI lifts the ceiling on individual potential by helping people do more complex, higher-value work. In Microsoft’s privacy-preserving analysis of more than 100,000 Microsoft 365 Copilot chats, 49% of classified conversations supported cognitive work such as analysing information, solving problems, evaluating and thinking creatively. The rest were split between working with people, finding information and producing work.

    Survey findings reinforce this. According to the report, 66% of AI users say AI has allowed them to spend more time on high-value work, and 58% say they are producing work they could not have produced a year earlier. Among “Frontier Professionals” — the most advanced AI users in the research — that latter figure rises to 80%.

    However, the report does not present this as simple automation. Its stronger claim is that human value moves. As AI takes on more execution, the employee’s differentiating contribution becomes judgement, quality control, critical thinking, intent-setting and the design of the human-AI workflow. The report says AI users themselves recognise this: 50% name quality control of AI output as an increasingly important human skill, while 46% name critical thinking. A striking 86% say they treat AI output as a starting point, not a final answer, and that they remain responsible for the thinking.

    The report’s page 9 framework is particularly useful. It describes four modes of working with AI: asking, delegation, collaboration and exploration. The key point is not that one mode is superior. The most advanced users know which mode a task requires. Quick factual queries may be “asking”; recurring reports or structured summaries may be “delegation”; proposals and judgement-heavy communication may require “collaboration”; and unfamiliar workflows may call for “exploration”. This is an important conceptual distinction because it moves the discussion beyond “prompting” towards work design.

    3. What is the “Transformation Paradox” identified by the report?

    The “Transformation Paradox” is the report’s term for the gap between workers’ AI readiness and organisations’ ability to support it. Microsoft maps respondents across two dimensions: individual AI capability and organisational readiness. The result is a five-zone model.

    Only 19% of AI users fall into the “Frontier” zone, where both individual capability and organisational readiness are high. Another 10% are in “blocked agency”: they have strong individual AI capability, but their organisations are not ready to support or absorb it. A further 5% represent “unclaimed capacity”, where the organisation is more ready than the individual. Sixteen per cent are “stalled”, with both low individual capability and low organisational readiness. The largest group, 50%, sits in the “emergent” zone, where both individual practice and organisational conditions are still forming.

    The paradox is that the pressure to use AI is rising, but the organisational systems still reward old ways of working. The report says 65% of AI users fear falling behind if they do not adapt quickly with AI, yet 45% say it feels safer to focus on current goals than to redesign work with AI. Only 13% say they are rewarded for reinventing work with AI even when results are not immediately achieved.

    This is one of the report’s most important findings because it reframes AI transformation as a management and systems problem. The obstacle is not simply lack of tools or lack of individual skill. It is the mismatch between what employees are capable of doing and what their organisations measure, encourage, permit and reward.

    4. What role does leadership play in turning AI use into organisational value?

    The report places substantial responsibility on leaders and managers. It argues that the job of every leader is now to “rearchitect work” — not just introduce AI tools, but redesign workflows, roles, incentives, metrics, governance and expectations around what humans and agents should each do.

    Leadership alignment appears to be weak. Only 26% of AI users say their leadership is clearly and consistently aligned on AI. The report also finds a perception gap between leaders and employees: leaders are more likely than employees to say AI-driven reinvention feels safe and rewarded. That suggests that senior leaders may believe the organisation is more supportive of AI transformation than employees experience in practice.

    Managers are presented as especially important because they translate strategy into everyday behaviour. A separate Microsoft-led study of 1,800 employees globally found that when managers actively model AI use, employees report a 17-point lift in AI value, a 22-point lift in critical thinking about AI use and a 30-point lift in trust in agentic AI. When managers create psychological safety around experimentation, employees report higher AI readiness and value, and are more likely to be high-frequency users of agentic AI.

    The report also shows that Frontier Professionals tend to work in stronger managerial environments. Compared with non-Frontier Professionals, they are more likely to say their manager openly uses AI, sets quality standards for AI-assisted work, creates space for experimentation and encourages more ambitious work redesign. This supports the report’s broader argument: individual AI skill matters, but it compounds only when leaders create the right organisational conditions.

    5. What does the report mean by saying every firm must become a “Learning System”?

    The report uses “Learning System” to describe an organisation that captures what AI-enabled work is teaching it and turns those insights into shared, repeatable and improving practices. This is the report’s organisational endgame: the firms that win are not simply those with the most AI tools, but those that learn fastest from their own work.

    The evidence behind this claim comes from Microsoft’s AI Impact Analysis. The report finds that organisational factors — culture, manager support and talent practices — account for more than twice the reported AI impact of individual mindset and behaviour: 67% versus 32%. The top single factor is organisational AI culture, followed by talent practices and manager support. The methodology is careful to state that these are statistical associations, not causal effects, because the variables are self-reported at the same moment.

    The report argues that as agents become more active, they generate valuable signals: what worked, what failed, where quality drifted, which hand-offs broke down and where workflows need redesign. In weaker organisations, these signals stay local. In stronger ones, they are captured, shared and encoded into routines. This is what Microsoft calls “Owned Intelligence”: institutional know-how that compounds over time, is specific to the firm and is difficult for competitors to copy.

    The report identifies three questions every advanced organisation must answer:

    1. who reviews agent performance
    2. who has authority to update agent workflows
    3. and how local wins are captured and scaled.

    It also argues that this requires coordination across four roles: employees who redesign their work around intent and review; leaders who redesign processes around outcomes and agent autonomy; IT teams that manage agents as entities with identities, permissions and lifecycle controls; and security teams that build monitoring, auditability and policy enforcement into the system.

    The implication is clear: AI transformation is not finished when employees start using AI. It becomes strategically meaningful only when the organisation builds the infrastructure to learn from AI-enabled work, codify that learning and continuously improve how humans and agents work together.

  • 2025 PR Performance Report by Prezly

    2025 PR Performance Report by Prezly

    About the paper

    The report argues that effective PR performance depends on combining inbound discovery with outbound outreach, using platform data from Prezly newsrooms and campaign sends in 2025 plus a cited secondary analysis on AI citations.

    It is best described as a mixed-methods data report based mainly on large-scale proprietary behavioural data, but the exact number of campaigns, organisations, users, or countries covered is not clearly specified in the report.

    Its evidence appears to be drawn from Prezly platform activity, with some broader industry context added from external analysis; the geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 10 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.prezly.com/insights

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about how PR performance should be understood?

    The core argument is that PR performance cannot be judged mainly through campaign metrics such as opens and clicks. Prezly argues that PR teams need to see inbound and outbound activity as connected parts of one system: a newsroom that attracts discovery through search and AI, and targeted outreach that drives engagement with the right recipients. The report repeatedly frames this as a shift away from narrow campaign reporting towards a broader understanding of how audiences actually find and use PR content.

    This matters because the report claims that much of PR’s real impact happens outside traditional email performance dashboards. Search visits, AI citations, and delayed direct visits may all reflect communications value, yet they are often omitted from standard reporting. Prezly’s perspective section makes this explicit by saying that teams measuring only opens and clicks are “measuring the smallest part” of the work.

    2. What does the report show about inbound PR and how people discover newsroom content?

    The clearest finding is that search is the dominant driver of newsroom traffic. The report says newsroom traffic grew 62% year on year, with 65% of traffic coming from search, 29% from direct traffic, 5% from social media referrals, and 1% from AI referrals such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. It also notes that direct traffic includes pitch-email clicks because many email clients do not pass referrer data.

    The implication is that newsroom content increasingly serves discovery audiences beyond journalists receiving a pitch. On page 2, the report states that for every tracked click from ChatGPT, roughly 50 more people may have seen the content within an AI response, suggesting that visible referral traffic understates AI exposure. The chart on page 2 reinforces this broader discovery logic by showing Google far ahead of other referral sources.

    The report also argues that owned newsroom content is much more likely than syndicated PR material to appear in AI-generated answers. Citing a BuzzStream analysis via Search Engine Journal, it says 98.6% of relevant AI-cited PR content came from owned newsroom content, compared with 1.2% from wire services and 0.2% from syndicated PR. That is the basis for the report’s “450× more likely” claim. This is important because it supports Prezly’s case that publishing location now affects not only search visibility but also AI discoverability.

    A further practical point is device use. The report says 54.7% of newsroom visits are on mobile, versus 44.8% on desktop and 1.5% on tablet. So even if teams produce good content, the user experience may still fail if newsrooms are designed mainly for desktop behaviour.

    3. What does the report find about outbound outreach and what makes pitches perform better?

    The strongest pattern is that smaller media lists perform much better than large sends. On page 4, the report says pitches sent to lists of 1 contact achieve a 19.3% click-through rate, lists of 2–10 achieve 16.8%, lists of 51–200 achieve 5.8%, and lists of 200+ achieve 3.6%. The chart on that page shows a steady decline in CTR as list size increases. This underpins the report’s repeated argument that relevance beats volume.

    Personalisation helps, but only within a sound targeting strategy. The report states that personalisation lifts CTR by 15%, with the strongest gains in lists of 2–25 recipients. Its interpretation is that personalisation amplifies a good list rather than rescuing a poor one. The chart on page 5 visually supports that point by showing the personalised version outperforming the non-personalised version most clearly in smaller list ranges.

    Pitch length also matters. Prezly argues against the common assumption that shorter is always better, saying the 201–300 word range nearly doubles CTR compared with shorter pitches. The chart on page 6 shows the 201–300 word band as the strongest performer at 6.25% CTR, clearly above other length ranges.

    By contrast, subject line length seems less decisive. The report says open rate “barely moves” with subject line length, while CTR peaks at 20–40 characters and very short subject lines underperform. So the report suggests that teams may spend too much time optimising superficial elements and not enough on list quality, relevance, and body copy.

    4. What assumptions and perspective shape the report?

    The report is clearly written from a platform-company perspective, and that matters to how its argument is framed. Prezly’s viewpoint is that PR teams undervalue the newsroom as a performance asset and over-focus on campaign-level metrics. The document consistently argues for seeing newsrooms, search visibility, AI discovery, and targeted pitching as an integrated workflow. That framing aligns closely with Prezly’s product positioning.

    Its underlying assumptions are that discoverability now matters as much as distribution, that owned content is strategically more important than wire-based distribution, and that behavioural data offers a better view of performance than legacy PR metrics alone. Those assumptions are plausible within the report’s evidence base, but they are still shaped by the lens of a vendor analysing its own ecosystem.

    Methodologically, the report is also selective. It relies heavily on aggregated platform data, but it does not clearly specify sample size, client mix, timeframe boundaries beyond “last year” or “2025”, sector spread, or geography. That does not invalidate the findings, but it does mean the report is more directional than fully transparent academic-style research.

    5. What are the main implications for PR teams and communications leaders?

    The biggest implication is measurement. If teams continue to report mainly on opens and clicks, they may systematically understate communications impact. The report suggests that leaders should expand dashboards to include newsroom traffic, search visibility, AI discoverability, and post-campaign engagement beyond the original send.

    The second implication is strategic. PR teams may need to treat their newsroom as a discoverability engine rather than simply a repository for press releases. Because search is the top traffic source and owned content dominates AI citation patterns, publishing discipline, structure, and content freshness become more important. The report effectively reframes the newsroom as infrastructure for earned, search, and AI exposure.

    Third, the report points towards a more selective outreach model. Smaller, more targeted lists, better personalisation, and stronger pitch construction outperform scale-based blasting. For PR leaders, that implies a capability shift away from volume and towards segmentation, judgement, and relevance.

    Finally, there is a practical user-experience implication: mobile cannot be treated as secondary. With more than half of newsroom visits coming from phones, weak mobile experiences risk undermining otherwise strong content.

    Taken together, the report’s conclusion is that the best PR teams will be those that connect content publishing, discoverability, outreach, and measurement into one coherent operating model rather than treating them as separate tasks.

  • 2026 Global Communication Report by USC Annenberg

    2026 Global Communication Report by USC Annenberg

    About the paper

    This report examines how political and social polarization is reshaping corporate communication and the PR profession, arguing that the industry is undergoing “a quiet shift” from expansive purpose-led speech to a more cautious, situational approach.

    It is a mixed-methods report based on an online survey of 704 PR professionals, a parallel online survey of 1,011 U.S. adults, and qualitative research involving six individual CCO interviews plus a focus group with eight senior communications professionals; the PR sample was global in reach but heavily U.S.-weighted, while the public survey was U.S.-only.

    The methodology is clearly stated, though the PR professional survey used non-probability sampling, which limits how broadly those findings can be generalised.

    Length: 50 pages

    More information / download:
    https://annenberg.usc.edu/research/center-public-relations/global-communication-report

    Core Insights

    1) What is the central argument of the report about polarization and the communications profession?

    The report’s core argument is that polarization has become a persistent condition rather than a temporary phase, and that this is fundamentally reshaping the communications function. Instead of treating polarization as a passing disruption, the report frames it as a structural reality that is changing how companies decide when to speak, what to say, and what risks they are willing to take.

    That is what the title phrase, “a quiet shift,” is meant to capture. The shift is not presented as a dramatic collapse of corporate communication, but as a strategic recalibration. Companies are not necessarily speaking less overall; rather, they are becoming more selective, more conditional, and more defensive in their communications choices. The report suggests that the profession is moving away from broad purpose-driven dialogue and toward a more situational model of corporate speech shaped by risk, scrutiny and backlash.

    Importantly, the report does not portray this as a decline in PR’s relevance. In fact, it makes the opposite case: polarization may be socially harmful, but it has increased the strategic importance of communications inside organisations. PR professionals increasingly see themselves as advisers navigating reputational landmines, internal tensions and stakeholder expectations in a climate where one misstep can trigger immediate consequences. That is why the report repeatedly returns to the tension between PR as “trumpet” and PR as “shield” — between amplifying positive narratives and defending organisations in hostile conditions.

    So the central argument is twofold: polarization is pushing companies towards caution, but that same volatility is making PR more indispensable. The profession is becoming less about confident public positioning and more about judgement, risk management, counsel and selective engagement.

    2) How do PR professionals and the U.S. public differ in how they perceive polarization and its consequences?

    One of the report’s most important findings is that PR professionals perceive polarization as more intense, more damaging and more enduring than the general public does. Among PR professionals, 81% say the current level of political and social polarization in the United States is extremely high or high, compared with 69% of the general public. That gap matters because it helps explain why communicators may act with more caution than many audiences expect.

    The two groups also differ over which issues are seen as most polarizing. Both groups rank immigration highly, and crime is another area where views are relatively aligned. But beyond that, the divergence becomes more pronounced. PR professionals are much more likely than the public to describe issues such as LGBTQ+ rights, abortion and climate change as highly polarizing, while the public places greater emphasis on inflation and affordable housing. In other words, PR professionals appear more attuned to culture-war fault lines, while the general public is somewhat more focused on economic pressures.

    The same pattern shows up in perceptions of impact. PR professionals overwhelmingly believe polarization is harming quality of life, affecting mental health and is unlikely to decrease any time soon. The public agrees on the direction of impact, but less intensely. The report explicitly raises the possibility that communicators may be “oversensitized” to polarization. That does not necessarily mean they are wrong; it means they experience the issue through a professional lens in which reputational risk is more visible, more immediate and more consequential.

    There is also a generational dimension within the PR sample. Gen X and Baby Boomer practitioners are more likely than Gen Z and Millennials to see current polarization levels as severe. Younger professionals, having entered the workforce in a more polarized era, seem more likely to treat these conditions as normal rather than exceptional. That generational difference is significant because it suggests that the profession’s internal culture may continue to evolve as younger cohorts move into leadership roles.

    Overall, the report shows that PR professionals do not merely mirror public sentiment. They interpret polarization through a heightened risk lens, which shapes how they counsel leaders, prioritise issues and recommend communication strategies.

    3) How is polarization changing expectations around corporate speech, corporate purpose, and the role of business in social issues?

    The report shows a marked retreat from the expansive expectations placed on corporate speech in recent years. Since 2020, the USC team has asked whether companies should engage in social issues even when those issues are not directly related to the business. In 2023 and 2024, nearly nine in ten PR professionals said yes. By 2025 that fell to 52%, and in 2026 it stands at 55%. Among the general public, only 42% agree. That is one of the clearest indicators in the report that corporate purpose, at least in its more outward and activist form, has lost momentum.

    The report does not suggest that social responsibility has disappeared. More than half of PR professionals still believe business has some responsibility to advocate or support social issues, and younger practitioners are especially likely to hold that view. But the dominant mood has shifted from confidence to caution. The report links this to increased political scrutiny, a more punitive public environment, and a broader sense that speaking out now carries higher downside risk.

    That change is reinforced by another finding: both PR professionals and the public assign only a limited role to large public companies in reducing national polarization. Just 30% of PR professionals and 29% of the public say large public companies have a great deal of responsibility here. By contrast, most of the responsibility is placed on political parties, elected officials, social media companies and news media. This is a notable re-scaling of corporate expectations. Business is no longer widely seen as a primary agent for solving societal division.

    The report also uses examples and third-party analyses to show how this shift plays out in practice. It contrasts the broad corporate response after George Floyd’s murder in 2020 with the much more muted response to later killings in Minneapolis in 2026. It also presents secondary analyses from Cometrics.io and Meltwater suggesting that corporate and executive communication has shifted away from environmental and purpose-led themes and towards more corporate topics, especially AI. Even when the overall volume of communication remains steady, the content mix has changed substantially.

    In effect, the report argues that business is moving from public moral positioning towards narrower, lower-risk communication. Companies may still engage on issues, but they are increasingly likely to do so only when there is a clear fit with business priorities, stakeholder expectations or operational relevance. The era of broad-based corporate commentary appears to be giving way to a more selective and defensible model.

    4) How is the day-to-day practice of PR changing in response to this environment?

    The report suggests that the everyday practice of PR is becoming more controlled, more tactical and more risk-conscious. This is visible both in the recommended strategies and in how practitioners define their role. The strongest consensus is around restraint and preparation rather than boldness. Large majorities say relationships with influencers and external organisations should be vetted more carefully, scenario planning should happen more often, internal communications should be prioritised, and messages should be more thoroughly pre-tested. Higher approval thresholds for public statements also receive strong support.

    This does not mean the profession has become uniformly silent or passive. On the question of posture, practitioners are split. Nearly half favour the idea that “a good offense is the best defense,” while a substantial minority prefer a more defensive approach. Agency professionals lean more towards proactive communication, whereas in-house professionals are more likely to favour defence. That split makes sense: agencies may be structurally more inclined to push outward-facing strategies, while in-house teams bear more direct responsibility for internal risk, leadership exposure and organisational fallout.

    The report also shows that protecting corporate reputation has become a central responsibility of PR in this environment. Communicating company values, addressing issues important to stakeholders and providing counsel to the C-suite all rank highly. By contrast, acting as the conscience of the organisation and building the business rank lower. That is revealing. It suggests a profession that still sees itself as strategically important, but less in terms of moral leadership and more in terms of judgement, alignment and protection.

    Silence, notably, has become a legitimate tactic. Forty-one percent of PR professionals agree that silence should be employed as a defensive communication strategy in some cases, and the figure rises above half among in-house respondents. That does not mean silence is always preferred, but it does show how much the communicative norm has changed. In a more volatile environment, saying nothing is no longer automatically seen as failure; it can be framed as disciplined judgement.

    The report also points to changes in media strategy. Trust is highest in major newspapers, financial media and trade publications, while influencers, social media, paid media and AI platforms attract much less trust overall. This reinforces the report’s broader argument that communicators are becoming more selective not just about messages, but also about channels and partners. The profession is tightening control: fewer risks, fewer loose affiliations, more testing, more filtering, and more reliance on trusted or controllable environments.

    5) What does the report suggest about the future direction of the profession over the next five years?

    The future described in the report is not one of decline, but of reallocation and adaptation. PR professionals expect resources to move away from DEI, sustainability and purpose-driven initiatives, and towards areas more directly connected to resilience and organisational survival. The highest expected increases are in AI innovation and ethics, crisis communications, government relations/public affairs, influencer engagement, and measurement and evaluation. This is a clear signal that the profession expects its future value to be judged more on operational usefulness than on symbolic positioning.

    AI sits at the top of that list, which is striking. The report treats AI not as a peripheral tool but as a major strategic priority. At the same time, it suggests that communications leaders will need to claim that terrain quickly if they want to shape the transformation rather than have it defined by other functions. That is part of a broader message running through the report: PR’s future influence will depend less on visibility and more on demonstrable business contribution.

    That is why one of the strongest future-facing findings concerns measurement. Asked what would have the strongest impact on addressing the profession’s challenges if polarization continues, respondents put aligning communication measurement with business objectives at the top. Creating stronger partnerships with other C-suite executives also ranks highly. Together, those findings suggest a profession trying to secure its future not mainly by asserting its importance rhetorically, but by proving it in business terms.

    The report also anticipates structural change. More than two-thirds of in-house communicators say their organisations are likely to restructure the communication function in the near future. That implies that PR’s role inside organisations is still unsettled. The profession may gain status, but it will also face pressure to redefine its remit, integrate more closely with other functions and show clearer returns.

    At the same time, the tone is not pessimistic. Personal satisfaction among PR professionals remains high, and 72% say the outlook for future growth of the profession is positive. The concluding argument is that PR will remain essential, but it will become more pragmatic: more focused on trust, risk, business alignment, public policy, finance and AI, and somewhat less driven by idealism, creativity and broad-purpose storytelling. In that sense, the future of the profession is not simply more cautious. It is more hard-edged, more accountable and more explicitly tied to organisational resilience.

  • Global Connectedness Report 2026 by DHL and NYU Stern

    Global Connectedness Report 2026 by DHL and NYU Stern

    About the paper

    The paper is a data-driven globalization report by Steven A. Altman and Caroline R. Bastian of NYU Stern, produced in partnership with DHL.

    It is not survey-based; it is a secondary-analysis and index report using more than 9 million country-to-country data points on trade, capital, information and people flows, ranking 180 countries globally.

    Its geographic scope is worldwide, with country profiles and regional analysis across major world regions.

    Length: 320 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.dhl.com/global-en/microsites/core/global-connectedness/report.html

    Core Insights

    1. Is globalization actually reversing, or is the report arguing that deglobalization is overstated?

    The report’s central argument is that deglobalization is overstated. It does not deny that geopolitical risk, tariffs, war, policy volatility and public scepticism have increased. But it argues that the actual data on cross-border flows do not show a broad retreat from international to domestic activity.

    The DHL Global Connectedness Index reached a record high in 2022 and has remained broadly stable through 2025. The report’s key measure of “depth” — international activity relative to domestic activity — sits at around 25%. That means globalization is historically high, but still limited: the world is far from “hyperglobalized”. Most economic and human activity still happens within countries rather than across borders.

    This distinction is central to the report’s logic. The authors are not saying that globalization is smooth, frictionless or politically uncontested. They are saying that globalization is being reshaped rather than reversed. The world is more volatile, but not meaningfully less connected.

    2. What evidence does the report give that global flows remain resilient?

    The report examines four broad types of flows: trade, capital, information and people.

    On trade, the report finds that goods trade grew faster in 2025 than in any year since 2017, excluding the post-Covid rebound. Part of this was driven by U.S. importers front-loading goods before tariff increases, but China’s exports to non-U.S. markets and AI infrastructure investment also supported growth. AI-related goods reportedly accounted for a large share of goods trade growth in the first three quarters of 2025.

    On capital, the picture is more mixed, but not one of retreat. Foreign direct investment and M&A activity remain broadly in line with historical patterns, even though greenfield FDI announcements weakened in some areas. The report emphasises that companies continue to invest abroad and that multinational firms still conduct close to record shares of activity outside their home markets.

    On information, the report is more cautious. Information flows have been the fastest-growing part of globalization over the past two decades, but some indicators have plateaued or weakened since 2021. International patenting has slowed, scientific collaboration has declined slightly, and cross-border intellectual property flows have eased. The report suggests that geopolitical tensions and data restrictions may now be constraining this part of globalization.

    On people, the report finds that international travel has recovered from the Covid-19 collapse, while international student mobility and migration remain on longer-term rising trends. However, people flows remain the least globalized category: only a small share of the world’s population lives outside its country of birth.

    3. How serious is geopolitical fragmentation, especially between the U.S., China and Russia?

    The report treats geopolitical fragmentation as a real risk, but argues that its global effects remain limited so far.

    The clearest evidence of fragmentation is in U.S.–China ties. Since 2016, the share of U.S. trade, capital, information and people flows involving China has fallen substantially, while China’s share involving the U.S. has also declined. Direct U.S. imports from China fell from a peak of 22% in 2017 to 13% in 2024, and then to 9% during the first three quarters of 2025.

    However, the report adds an important complication: the U.S. has not necessarily reduced its underlying reliance on Chinese content. Goods imported from third countries may still contain Chinese inputs. When looking at direct and indirect China-origin content, the report says there is no clear evidence of a major decline in U.S. reliance on goods from China through 2024.

    Russia is the more dramatic case. Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s flows with the EU have collapsed across trade, investment, information and people flows. Russia’s exports have become less diversified and more dependent on a few destinations such as China, India and Türkiye.

    But the report’s broader conclusion is that these cases do not amount to a global split into rival blocs. Only a small share of global trade and investment has shifted away from geopolitical rivals. Most international business already takes place among friendly or neutral countries, which limits the likely impact of “de-risking” on globalization as a whole.

    4. Is globalization being replaced by regionalization or nearshoring?

    The report’s answer is: not yet, at least not in the data.

    Despite widespread discussion of nearshoring, friendshoring and regional supply chains, the report finds that many international flows are crossing longer, not shorter, distances. The average distance traversed by flows in the DHL Global Connectedness Index reached a record high in 2024. Goods trade and greenfield FDI crossed record average distances in 2025.

    This directly challenges the idea that globalization is giving way to regionalization. If international activity were becoming more regional, the average distance covered by flows should be falling. Instead, the report finds the opposite for several major flow types.

    That said, the report does not dismiss regionalization entirely. It notes that many governments and companies are interested in nearshoring and supply-chain resilience, and that such changes can take years to implement. It also acknowledges that international flows are already highly regionalized: roughly half of global trade, capital, information and people flows occur within major world regions. The report’s point is not that regionalization is irrelevant, but that there is not yet robust evidence of a major new shift from global to regional patterns.

    5. Which countries are most globally connected, and what does that reveal about globalization?

    Singapore ranks as the world’s most globally connected country, followed by Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Ireland, Switzerland, Hong Kong SAR, the United Arab Emirates, Belgium, the United Kingdom and Denmark.

    The report distinguishes between two dimensions of connectedness: depth and breadth. Depth measures the size of international flows relative to domestic activity. Breadth measures how widely a country’s flows are distributed across the world.

    Small, wealthy economies tend to score highly on depth because their domestic markets are limited and they rely heavily on cross-border trade, capital, people and information flows. That explains the strong performance of places such as Singapore, Luxembourg, Hong Kong, Ireland and the UAE.

    Larger economies often score higher on breadth than depth. The United Kingdom ranks first on breadth, followed by the United States, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Israel, France, Italy, Germany, Japan and Australia. These countries have flows that reach widely across the world, but their large domestic economies mean that international activity can still represent a smaller share of total activity.

    This country-level analysis reinforces one of the report’s core themes: globalization is uneven. Some countries are deeply and broadly connected, while others remain peripheral. Wealth, peace and security, openness, regional integration, infrastructure and domestic business conditions all shape how connected a country becomes.

  • State of AI in PR 2026 by Muck Rack

    State of AI in PR 2026 by Muck Rack

    About the paper

    The report is an original research survey about how PR professionals are using, governing and judging generative AI and emerging AI agents in their work.

    It is based on a survey of 564 PR professionals fielded from 5 December to 24 December 2025 and distributed primarily via email; responses were reviewed for low-effort patterns and outliers.

    The geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report, and the methodology is useful but relatively thin on sampling detail beyond distribution method and data cleaning.

    Length: 28 pages

    More information / download:
    https://muckrack.com/resources/research/state-of-ai-in-pr

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about the current state of AI in PR?

      The core argument is that generative AI has moved from novelty to normal practice in PR, but that adoption has now largely plateaued. The report says AI use has “peaked” at around three-quarters of PR professionals, with 76% already using generative AI in their workflow and only modest shares still undecided or resistant. In other words, the market now appears split between a large majority who have already incorporated AI and a smaller minority who are unlikely to change their minds soon.

      The report also argues that this is no longer just an individual experimentation story. Organisations are adapting to AI institutionally: 51% of respondents say their company has an AI use-case policy, and 43% say their workplace offers AI training. That suggests AI in PR is becoming formalised, governed and embedded in workplace practice rather than remaining a purely ad hoc tool used by curious individuals.

      At the same time, the report draws a clear line between generative AI and agentic AI. While text-generation and workflow support are mainstream, AI agents have not yet crossed into broad professional adoption. Only 12% say they use AI agents in their work, and most respondents remain uncomfortable with autonomous action without human review. So the report’s bigger message is not “AI is coming”; it is “AI is here, but autonomy is not yet trusted.”

      2. How are PR professionals actually using AI, and where do they see the most value?

      The report shows that PR professionals are using AI mainly in mainstream knowledge and writing tasks, not in highly specialised or fully automated ways. The most common use case is editing and refinement, cited by 86%, followed by research and insights at 76%, writing and content creation at 74%, and strategy and planning at 68%. Administrative tasks are also significant at 51%, whereas media outreach, measurement and creative asset production remain much less central.

      That distribution matters because it shows where AI currently fits the profession best: it acts primarily as a cognitive and editorial assistant. It helps polish drafts, speed up background work, support ideation and assist with planning. The report says PR pros use AI in an average of four distinct work areas, which reinforces the idea that adoption is broad across tasks even if it is not yet deep in every part of the workflow.

      Perceived value is also very strong. Eighty-two per cent say AI has improved the quality of their work, while 93% say it helps them complete projects more quickly. When asked where the greatest time savings occur, respondents again point to core communication work: editing and refinement, research and insights, and writing and content creation. This suggests AI’s practical value in PR is currently less about replacing judgement and more about compressing routine labour around producing and shaping communication.

      3. What does the report suggest about trust, oversight and the limits of AI in PR practice?

      A key theme running through the report is that PR professionals are using AI extensively, but they do not trust it enough to leave it unsupervised. The clearest sign of this is editing behaviour: 98% say they always or often edit AI-generated text before using it. Although the extent of editing has decreased over time, the human review step remains almost universal. That implies AI is accepted as a draft partner, not as a final author.

      The report also reveals a selective approach to data input. Large majorities say they avoid entering financial data, personally identifiable information and proprietary or strategic material into AI systems. Yet far fewer avoid entering client or brand names and internal communications. This points to a practical but uneven data-risk mindset: many PR professionals recognise serious information-governance risks, but boundaries around what is safe to share with AI are still inconsistent.

      Trust drops even further when the report turns to AI agents. Only 7% say they would be comfortable allowing an AI agent to send messages or publish updates without human review, while about nine in ten are uncomfortable. The main conditions for greater trust are strong evidence of reliability, explicit human approval before publishing or sending, strong privacy and security safeguards, and transparent records of what the agent did. The report therefore implies that the profession is not rejecting automation outright, but it wants clear guardrails, accountability and a human in the loop.

      4. What risks, concerns and professional tensions does the report identify?

      The biggest concern in the report is not that AI will immediately destroy PR jobs, but that it could erode professional formation. Seventy-seven per cent say the main risk is that younger or newer PR professionals will fail to learn the principles of the profession and rely too heavily on tools. That is a profound concern because it goes to capability-building, judgement and the long-term health of the field.

      Other major concerns are also closely tied to quality and professional standards. Sixty-three per cent worry about unscrutinised AI output lowering the quality of communication, while 61% fear content becoming less original or creative and 61% think audiences may be overwhelmed by rising volumes of content. There is also concern that clients or firms may conclude they no longer need content creators. Together, these findings show that respondents fear AI may devalue craft, raise noise levels and weaken the human distinctiveness of communication work.

      Among non-users, the resistance is often principled rather than merely practical. The report notes that the 7% who do not plan to explore generative AI often cite environmental impact, plagiarism and broader ethical concerns. Many of them do not appear persuadable: 80% say they do not see themselves using AI in the future no matter what. That is important because it means non-adoption is not simply a training gap for everyone; for some, it reflects a deeper values-based objection.

      5. What are the report’s main implications for the future of PR work, capability-building and organisational practice?

      The report points towards a future in which the competitive edge in PR will come not from whether someone uses AI, but from how well they use it under proper governance. Since adoption has already stabilised at a high level, the next differentiator is likely to be capability. Respondents say the most important new skills are prompt writing or engineering, ethical decision-making, AI tool evaluation and selection, and data literacy. That suggests the profession is shifting from simple tool familiarity to a broader blend of technical fluency, judgement and governance awareness.

      There is also a strong implication for employers. Training and policy appear to matter. Among those open to AI but not yet using it, 60% say training or proven examples would help them start. At the same time, the growth in workplace policies and training since 2024 suggests companies are beginning to respond to that need. So the report implies that organisational maturity around AI is no longer optional; it is becoming part of professional infrastructure.

      Finally, the report suggests that PR is heading towards a hybrid future rather than a fully automated one. Paid AI use is rising rapidly, and everyday AI-supported work is now common, but agentic AI remains marginal because trust, accountability and reputational risk still demand human control. The underlying conclusion is that PR professionals are prepared to augment their work with AI, but not to surrender authorship, responsibility or final judgement to it. That is probably the report’s most important strategic implication.

    1. A.I. Radar 2026 by BCG

      A.I. Radar 2026 by BCG

      About the paper

      BCG AI Radar 2026 is a survey-based report on corporate AI investment, CEO ownership of AI transformation, and the rise of agentic AI.

      It is based primarily on BCG’s 2026 AI Radar Survey of 2,360 executives, including 640 CEOs, across multiple industries and markets including the US, Europe, India, Japan, Greater China, the Middle East and Africa.

      The methodology is original survey research, supplemented in places by BCG analysis, BCG client experience, and a separate BCG–MIT Sloan Management Review dataset.

      Length: 29 pages

      More information / download:
      https://www.bcg.com/publications/2026/as-ai-investments-surge-ceos-take-the-lead

      Core Insights

      1. What is the central argument of the report?

      The report argues that AI has moved from experimental technology investment to a strategic, CEO-level transformation agenda. BCG’s core claim is that corporate AI investment is not only increasing sharply, but is also becoming more durable: organisations are planning to keep investing even if near-term financial returns disappoint.

      The clearest evidence is that projected AI investment has roughly doubled from 2025 to 2026, rising from around 0.8% to 1.7% of organisational revenue. At the same time, 94% of organisations say they will continue investing even if their AI initiatives do not pay off in 2026. Only 6% say they would pull back.

      The deeper message is that BCG sees AI no longer as a CIO-led technology programme, but as a broad business transformation. This is why the report places so much emphasis on CEOs: 72% of CEOs surveyed say they are now the main decision maker on AI, twice the share reported the previous year.

      2. What evidence does BCG provide that AI investment is becoming more serious and sustained?

      BCG provides three main pieces of evidence.

      First, AI investment as a share of revenue is projected to double in 2026. The report shows AI investment rising from about 0.6% of revenue in 2024, to 0.8% in 2025, and then to 1.7% in 2026. That is a significant escalation, especially because BCG notes that the average base revenue of the underlying companies has remained almost the same.

      Second, the increase is broad-based across industries. The chart on page 7 shows all industries planning higher AI investment in 2026. Technology leads at 2.1% of annual revenue, followed by financial institutions at 2.0%, insurance and energy/utilities at 1.9%, consumer at 1.7%, and healthcare at 1.6%. Industrials and real estate are lower at 0.8%, but still show an increase.

      Third, the commitment appears resilient. On page 5, BCG reports that 70% of respondents would “stay the course” or make strategic changes if AI does not deliver the desired financial impact in the next 12 months, while 24% would ramp up resourcing or invest in outside experts. That means disappointment would not necessarily reduce investment; for many organisations, it could trigger more disciplined or more aggressive implementation.

      3. How is leadership of AI changing inside organisations?

      The report’s second major argument is that AI transformation is becoming CEO-led rather than CIO-led. This is one of the most important shifts in the deck.

      BCG reports that 72% of CEOs say they are the main decision maker on AI in their organisation, twice the level from the previous year. It also reports that 82% of CEOs are more optimistic about AI’s ability to deliver ROI than they were 12 months earlier.

      The report goes further by linking AI success to CEO job security. Half of surveyed CEOs believe their job stability depends on getting AI investments and strategy right by 2026. That is a striking framing: AI is not presented merely as a productivity tool, but as a defining test of executive leadership.

      BCG also shows that CEOs express stronger conviction than other executive groups. On page 13, CEOs are slightly ahead of CIOs/CTOs in saying they are ready to lead an AI transformation, confident AI will pay off, and expecting major role disruption by 2030. The implication is that AI is becoming a top-management issue because it affects operating models, workforce design, competitive advantage, and future business models.

      4. What role does agentic AI play in the report’s argument?

      Agentic AI is presented as the next major mechanism through which organisations expect to see measurable value from AI. BCG reports that around 90% of CEOs believe AI agents will enable their organisations to report measurable ROI in 2026, and that CEOs have committed more than 30% of their organisation’s 2026 AI investment to agentic AI.

      The report describes agentic AI as both an opportunity and a risk. On cybersecurity, for example, 59% of leaders see AI agents as both a threat and an opportunity. The same capabilities that make agents useful — automation, scale, system access, continuous learning — can also make them dangerous if misused, hacked, or poorly governed.

      The report also uses BCG–MIT Sloan Management Review data to show that AI applications are expected to take on broader roles in organisations. Currently, 26% of organisations say AI acts as an assistant; in three years, that rises to 61%. The expected role of AI as colleague, coach, mentor, rival, and even boss also increases substantially. This supports BCG’s point that agentic AI is not just a software upgrade; it changes how companies organise work, decision-making, and governance.

      5. What does BCG believe separates leading CEOs from the rest?

      BCG identifies three CEO archetypes: Followers, Pragmatists, and Trailblazers.

      Followers, around 15% of CEOs, recognise AI’s potential but lack full conviction and make cautious early investments. Pragmatists, around 70%, are excited and confident but invest when they see clear value and lower risk. Trailblazers, around 15%, are the most committed group: they invest more heavily, upskill more of their workforce, spend more time deepening their own AI expertise, and are more confident that AI will deliver ROI.

      The report’s most important distinction is that Trailblazers create a “positive flywheel”. They make AI and agentic AI a top priority, deepen their own AI literacy, commit capital at scale, upskill the organisation, and track measurable ROI. For example, Trailblazers spend around 60% of their AI budget on agentic AI, compared with 25% for Pragmatists and Followers. They also allocate around 60% of their AI budget to upskilling and retraining the current workforce, and report that around 70% of their workforce has been upskilled or reskilled on AI.

      BCG’s practical conclusion is therefore quite direct: CEOs must act decisively. The final recommendation is a five-part agenda:

      1. Make AI a key priority
      2. Deepen AI literacy
      3. Commit investments at scale
      4. Upskill the organisation
      5. Track measurable ROI.

      The report’s underlying assumption is that AI advantage will not come mainly from adopting tools, but from executive commitment, organisational redesign, workforce capability, and disciplined measurement.

    2. State of PR 2026 by Meltwater

      State of PR 2026 by Meltwater

      About the paper

      The paper is a global survey-based industry report on how PR and communications professionals are navigating resourcing pressure, measurement, AI, media relations, collaboration and future skills.

      The report is original survey research based on more than 1,100 international PR professionals, including almost 500 from the United States, 100 from Canada and respondents from across the world, with Europe described as particularly well represented.

      The fieldwork method, sampling approach and timeframe are not clearly specified in the report.

      Length: 56 pages

      More information / download:
      https://www.meltwater.com/en/blog/state-of-pr

      Core Insights

      1. What is the central picture the report paints of the PR industry in 2026?

      The report presents PR as an industry caught between familiar old pressures and a new wave of technological disruption. On the one hand, many of the profession’s core challenges remain highly recognisable: lack of resources, difficulty measuring impact, managing stakeholders, getting journalists to respond and doing more with less. On the other hand, AI, social media, data and changing audience behaviour are reshaping the environment in which those classic challenges now have to be solved.

      The report’s strongest overarching argument is that PR is becoming more strategically important, but still struggles to prove that importance in business terms. It explicitly links this to generative AI: as LLMs increasingly influence how brands are described and discovered, earned media and public narratives may become even more central to brand visibility. In that sense, the report positions PR not as a shrinking discipline, but as one whose relevance could grow if it can modernise its tools, metrics and internal influence.

      At the same time, the report is clear that the profession has not fully made the shift from activity-based communication to business-aligned communication. Many teams are still judged by volume and reach of media placements, while challenges around ROI, business KPIs and leadership understanding remain persistent. The conclusion frames the core issue as one of alignment: between PR and leadership on strategy and metrics, between PR and marketing on execution, and between human creativity and AI in daily workflows.

      2. What are the main operational challenges facing PR professionals?

      The most frequently cited challenge is insufficient resources, named by 24% of respondents. Measurement follows closely, with 21% identifying measuring impact and ROI as a top challenge. Managing stakeholder expectations comes next at 16%, followed by getting responses from journalists at 12% and adopting new technologies at 10%.

      This distribution matters because it shows that the profession’s biggest pressures are not only external. The difficult media environment is part of the story, but the larger picture is organisational: PR teams are under-resourced, expected to prove impact, and often dependent on leaders who may not fully understand the value or mechanics of communications work.

      The report reinforces this with budget data. A majority expect PR budgets to stay flat, while only 21.3% expect an increase and 17.3% expect a decrease. Budget decisions are also often made outside the PR function: 36.7% say the CEO decides PR spending, while 19.2% say a C-level marketing leader does. Only 32.6% say a C-level PR or communications executive makes these decisions.

      Time pressure is another recurring theme. The biggest time sinks are reactive work such as crisis response and urgent requests, cited by 27.9%, and content creation, cited by 27.5%. Measurement and reporting account for another 20.3%. The report’s implied diagnosis is that PR teams are stuck in a reactive operating model, spending too much time on urgent execution and too little on strategic, higher-value work.

      3. How mature is the industry’s approach to measurement and business impact?

      The report suggests that PR measurement remains stuck between aspiration and reality. Many teams understand that they need to connect communication to business outcomes, but their most common metrics still lean heavily towards activity and visibility.

      The most important metrics for evaluating PR success are the number of media placements and reach/impressions, both at 20.9%. Social media engagement follows at 11%, while more business-relevant or interpretive metrics such as website traffic/conversions, message pull-through, share of voice and sentiment analysis rank lower. This supports one of the report’s central criticisms: the industry is still often measuring what is easiest to measure rather than what best demonstrates business value.

      The measurement section makes this even clearer. When asked about challenges, 34.7% cite aligning metrics to business KPIs, and 27.8% cite proving PR’s value to leadership. Another 22.4% point to over-reliance on outdated metrics such as impressions and AVE. Although nearly three quarters say they have at least some of the tools needed to connect PR activity to wider business outcomes, only 32.1% say they fully have those tools; 39% say they only partially do.

      The report’s perspective is therefore not that measurement is impossible, but that PR measurement is underdeveloped and uneven. It implies that the profession needs more sophisticated reporting, closer linkage to business objectives and better executive-facing narratives about what PR contributes.

      4. How is generative AI affecting PR work, and what concerns does it raise?

      Generative AI is presented as both a practical tool and a major strategic disruptor. A majority of respondents say AI is already integrated into communication workflows: 13.3% describe it as highly integrated and 42.1% as somewhat integrated. Only 9.8% say it is not integrated at all.

      Current use is heavily concentrated around content work. The most common applications are external content creation, content optimisation and review, campaign brainstorming, internal content creation, writing press releases and crafting media pitches. Measurement and reporting are much lower at 2.1%, which suggests that many teams still use AI primarily as a production assistant rather than as a strategic analysis or intelligence tool.

      The report also highlights a gap between adoption and governance. While 36.2% say their organisation has a formal AI policy and 26.4% say one is in development, 31.4% say they do not have one. This makes AI governance one of the more practical risks in the report: usage is becoming normal before policies, training and operating models are fully mature.

      The biggest concern about AI is that it may reduce the need for human talent, cited by 28.6%. Other concerns include shrinking communications budgets and reducing PR’s seat at the table. Interestingly, concerns about accuracy and content quality appear very low in the report’s results, which may suggest either that respondents are less worried about quality than job security, or that the survey options did not fully surface deeper concerns around misinformation, ethics and brand risk.

      Looking ahead, AI dominates the future-facing findings. AI integration is the top skill PR professionals believe they will need over the next five years, and navigating new technologies such as AI is seen as the biggest future challenge. AI as a tool for content creation and data analysis is also identified as the emerging trend likely to have the greatest impact on PR.

      5. What are the most important implications for PR leaders and communication teams?

      The report’s main implication is that PR teams need to become more strategically aligned, more data-literate and more operationally efficient. The conclusion explicitly argues that success in 2026 and beyond will depend on using powerful new tools without losing the human skills that make PR valuable: storytelling, relationship-building and creativity.

      For PR leaders, the most immediate implication is the need to speak more directly in business language. Since resources and budgets are major concerns, and since budget decisions often sit with CEOs or marketing leaders, PR teams need to show clearer links between communication activity and organisational outcomes. The report repeatedly suggests that better reporting and business-aligned metrics are essential not only for measurement, but for influence.

      A second implication is that PR needs stronger collaboration across the organisation. Respondents already collaborate most often with executive leadership and marketing, but they want more involvement from leadership, customer experience, marketing and product development in communications strategy. The main barriers are misaligned priorities, departmental politics or silos, and lack of communication. This points to a broader strategic role for PR, but also to the difficulty of securing that role inside complex organisations.

      A third implication is that AI cannot simply be treated as a content shortcut. The report encourages teams to operationalise AI, formalise policies, invest in tools and training, and use AI to reduce time spent on repetitive or low-value tasks. The opportunity is not just faster content production, but freeing up capacity for more rewarding and strategic work.

      Finally, the report implies that the human fundamentals of PR remain durable. Media relevance, timeliness and reporter relationships are still the most important factors in securing coverage. Individual email remains by far the most effective pitching channel. LinkedIn is the most valuable professional social platform. These findings suggest that while the tools are changing rapidly, the profession’s underlying value still depends on judgement, relationships, relevance and trust.

    3. Journalism and Technology Trends and Predictions 2026 by Reuters

      Journalism and Technology Trends and Predictions 2026 by Reuters

      About the paper

      The report examines the strategic pressures, technology shifts, and business-model changes likely to shape journalism in 2026, with a strong focus on generative AI, platform dependency, creators, video, and misinformation.

      It is a mixed-methods industry trends report drawing primarily on a closed survey of 280 senior news leaders from 51 countries and territories, supplemented by background interviews, industry examples, and third-party data such as Chartbeat analytics; the survey is global in scope but not a representative sample of the wider industry.

      Length: 47 pages

      More information / download:
      https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/journalism-media-and-technology-trends-and-predictions-2026

      Core Insights

      1. Why does the report argue that journalism faces a particularly acute strategic squeeze in 2026?

      The report’s central argument is that journalism is being squeezed simultaneously by technological disruption and cultural-platform disruption. On one side, generative AI is changing how people access information, especially through search engines turning into answer engines and AI tools surfacing information directly in chat interfaces rather than sending traffic to publishers. On the other side, creators and influencers are pulling attention towards more personality-led, platform-native content that often feels more direct, relevant, or entertaining than traditional institutional journalism.

      The report frames this as an existential challenge because it affects both economics and legitimacy. Economically, publishers fear a major drop in referral traffic from search and social platforms. Culturally and politically, journalism is also under pressure from declining trust, direct-to-audience communication by politicians and celebrities, and continued attacks on news media as biased or fake. The report suggests that journalism is no longer just competing with rival publishers, but with AI intermediaries, platform algorithms, and creator ecosystems that change how audiences discover and value information.

      This squeeze is reflected in industry sentiment. Only 38% of surveyed leaders say they are confident about journalism’s prospects in the year ahead, which the report says is 22 percentage points lower than in 2022. At the same time, 53% remain confident about their own organisation’s prospects. That contrast matters: the report suggests many executives believe their own brand may survive or adapt, even while the broader health of journalism as a public institution deteriorates.

      2. What evidence does the report provide that AI and platform shifts are already reshaping access to news and publisher traffic?

      One of the report’s most concrete findings is that publishers expect search traffic to decline by 43% on average over the next three years. That expectation is linked to Google AI Overviews, AI mode, and the wider shift from search engines that send users outward to answer engines that satisfy users inside the interface. The report also notes that around a fifth of respondents expect a loss of more than 75% of their company’s search traffic.

      The report backs this up with Chartbeat data. Across a network of more than 2,500 sites, Google Search referrals were down 33% globally year-on-year between November 2024 and November 2025, and down 38% in the United States. Google Discover traffic was also down. By contrast, Facebook and X showed modest year-on-year increases in that specific comparison period, but the longer trend remains negative: over roughly the last two and a half years, Facebook referrals fell by 43% and X referrals by 46%. The point is not that one channel is collapsing overnight, but that publishers are losing stability across several external traffic sources at once.

      The report also shows that AI referral growth is real but still tiny in commercial terms. ChatGPT referrals to publishers are rising quickly, yet they remain a tiny fraction of overall traffic. The report says Google delivers 500 times as many referrals as ChatGPT from search alone, and 1,300 times as many if Google Discover is included. So the immediate issue is not that AI platforms already replace traditional traffic at scale, but that they may erode old discovery systems much faster than they create meaningful new value for publishers.

      This is why the report highlights publisher ambivalence towards AI platforms. Publishers are weighing lawsuits, licensing deals, visibility strategies, and new optimisation practices such as AEO and GEO. The implication is that access to audiences is becoming less about classic SEO and more about negotiating with, supplying, or optimising for AI-mediated distribution systems.

      3. How does the report think publishers will respond editorially and strategically to these pressures?

      The clearest editorial response in the report is a shift towards distinctiveness. Survey respondents say journalism should focus more on original reporting, contextual analysis, community-building, human stories, fact-checking, and opinion or commentary. These are all framed as forms of journalism that are harder for AI systems to commoditise or summarise into generic output. Conversely, publishers expect to pull back from service journalism, evergreen content, and general news, because those formats are more easily absorbed by chatbots and aggregators.

      The report also points to a format shift. Publishers increasingly see video and audio as strategic priorities in response to AI. Seventy-nine per cent say it is important to invest more in video, and 71% say the same for audio. Text is still important, but the report suggests its economic and competitive position is weakening because AI can cheaply generate, remix, and summarise text-based content. Video and audio are seen as more defensible, more engaging, and more suited to platform discovery.

      Distribution strategy is changing too. For 2026, publishers plan to put more effort into YouTube, AI platforms, TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn, while reducing effort on X, Facebook, and old-style Google Search optimisation. This reflects a move away from legacy social and search habits towards video-heavy environments and AI interfaces. It also reflects the report’s broader argument that publishers need to meet audiences where attention is moving, even if that means adjusting tone, format, and production logic.

      The report adds an important nuance: not all publishers will pursue the same path. Some will double down on distinctiveness and direct audience relationships, while others will lean further into automation and scale. The report describes a possible “barbell effect”, with highly distinctive human journalism at one end and highly automated low-cost publishing at the other, leaving mid-market undifferentiated outlets especially vulnerable.

      4. What does the report say about the growing influence of creators, video culture, and personality-led journalism?

      The report treats the creator wave as one of the defining shifts in the media environment. It argues that platform changes have turbo-charged creator economics by favouring viral, personality-led, video-first content over traditional link-sharing and institutional distribution. Publishers are worried primarily about creators taking time and attention away from publisher content: 70% are somewhat or very concerned about that. A smaller, but still significant, 39% are concerned about losing talent to the creator ecosystem.

      Importantly, the report does not present creators purely as a threat. It suggests they have become a model for authenticity, voice, and audience connection, even if much creator content is more opinion-led and partisan than traditional journalism. That duality matters: creators are competitors, but also proof that audiences respond to content that feels human, recognisable, and direct. Publishers, the report suggests, are learning from this without fully embracing its norms.

      That is why 76% of surveyed publishers say they will try to get journalists to behave a bit more like creators in 2026. Half plan to partner with creators for distribution, 31% say they may hire creators, and 28% are considering creator studios or joint ventures. Examples in the report include Wired building writers into platform personalities, CNN Creators, SPIL in the Netherlands, and various creator partnerships or branded ventures at the Independent, Vox Media, and the Washington Post.

      But the report also flags risks. Making journalists more personality-led may create conflicts around editorial standards, reputation, and independence. It may also help staff build their own followings and then leave. More fundamentally, moving too far towards creator logic may undermine some of the things audiences still value in institutional journalism, such as fairness, verification, and a consistent editorial voice. So the report sees creator influence as both necessary stimulus and strategic tension.

      5. What broader conclusions does the report draw about the future of journalism, newsroom AI, and sustainable business models?

      The report’s conclusion is neither apocalyptic nor reassuring. It argues that journalism is still in transition: old models are fading, new ones are emerging, and the eventual settlement is unclear. It suggests the industry will probably get smaller overall, with some audience attention permanently shifting elsewhere, but it rejects the idea that journalism becomes irrelevant. Reliable reporting, human stories, analysis, and trust still matter, especially in a media environment polluted by AI slop, misinformation, and manipulative content.

      On newsroom AI, the report is pragmatic rather than evangelical. AI use is spreading across back-end automation, coding, product development, commercial applications, newsgathering, and content creation with human oversight. Yet the impact so far is mostly described as promising or limited rather than transformational. Only 13% describe newsroom AI initiatives as transformational, while 44% say promising and 42% say limited. Likewise, AI has not yet translated into major labour savings for most organisations: 67% report no job cuts, 16% say they cut only a small number, and 9% say they have actually added jobs.

      On business models, subscriptions and membership remain the main priority, followed by display and native advertising, with events also important. The most notable emerging revenue area is platform payment for content, including AI-related licensing or revenue sharing, though the report makes clear that most publishers expect this to be, at best, a minor contribution rather than a transformative income stream. It also identifies structural barriers to innovation, especially lack of resources, skill shortages, siloed organisations, and weak strategic alignment.

      The final implication is that survival will depend less on chasing every trend and more on strategic clarity. The publishers most likely to thrive, according to the report, are those with a clear sense of their audience, their role, and the value they can create. That means being human where it matters, adaptable where necessary, and organised enough internally to experiment with new formats, products, and business models without losing editorial purpose.

    4. Inside PR 2026: Trends, challenges and what’s next by Cision

      Inside PR 2026: Trends, challenges and what’s next by Cision

      About the paper

      The report examines how PR professionals see the industry’s challenges, priorities, opportunities, skills and AI use heading into 2026.

      It is an original survey-based report drawing on responses from 561 industry professionals collected in September and October 2025 across the U.S. and UK; respondents came from different job levels and organisational settings, including agencies, in-house teams, nonprofits and the public sector.

      The methodology is clearly stated, though the report is based on a self-selected survey distributed through Cision’s customer/subscriber database, newsletters and social channels.

      Length: 40 pages

      More information/download:
      https://www.cision.com/resources/guides-and-reports/2026-inside-pr-report/

      Core Insights

      1. What does the report say are the biggest pressures reshaping PR right now and into 2026?

      The report’s core argument is that PR is being reshaped by a mix of external disruption and internal constraint. Right now, the top challenges are the changing media landscape, cited by 60% of respondents, and resource pressures, cited by 58%, with AI and automation close behind at 50%. That means the profession is being squeezed from several directions at once: media roles are blurring, budgets are tight, and teams are expected to adapt quickly to new technologies.

      Looking specifically ahead to 2026, resource pressures become the single biggest anticipated challenge, selected by 34% of respondents, followed by the changing media landscape at 21% and AI and automation at 18%. So the report suggests that, while media disruption remains highly important, many PR teams believe the more immediate pain point will be practical capacity: doing more with less, with leaner teams and tighter budgets.

      The report also shows that these pressures are experienced differently depending on role and organisational type. Executives are more focused on the media landscape, while managers are more likely to name resource pressures. Agency teams are more likely to emphasise external disruption, especially the changing media landscape and AI, whereas in-house teams are more likely to highlight internal operational strain, especially resource pressures and demands for data-driven strategy. That distinction matters because it shows there is no single PR reality; the sector is fragmented by business model and seniority.

      2. How does the report portray the gap between PR’s ambitions and its operational reality?

      A major theme in the report is that PR teams may think they are agile, but many structural factors prevent them from acting with real speed. Overall, 57% of respondents describe their teams as “very” or “extremely agile”, which sounds positive at first glance. But the report immediately complicates that picture by showing that executives rate their teams as “extremely agile” at roughly twice the rate of other colleagues. In other words, leadership appears more optimistic than those closer to day-to-day execution.

      The underlying barriers are fairly concrete. Sixty-three percent cite team size and structure as an obstacle to agility, and 53% point to slow executive decision-making. The report uses this to argue that agility is not just a cultural aspiration; it depends on organisational design, approval processes and access to timely information. That is an important analytical point, because it reframes agility from a vague buzzword into an operational issue.

      Again, agency and in-house teams diverge. Agency respondents are more likely to see team size and structure as the main barrier, while in-house teams are especially hindered by lack of real-time data. Agency respondents are also much more likely to cite skill diversity and access to the right tools and technology as obstacles. The implication is that PR’s effectiveness increasingly depends on whether organisations remove friction from the system rather than simply asking teams to work faster.

      3. What priorities and opportunities are PR teams focusing on for 2026, and what does that reveal about the direction of the profession?

      The report shows a profession trying to balance traditional communications goals with growing pressure to prove business value. Brand awareness remains the dominant priority, named by 73% of respondents as a top priority and by 36% as the single top priority. But driving sales and revenue through PR is also highly prominent, named by 55% as a top priority and 26% as the single top priority. PR measurement and ROI follows at 50%.

      That combination reveals an important shift. Brand building is still central, but the report suggests that communicators are under stronger pressure to connect PR activity to measurable commercial outcomes. Executives are more concerned than others with driving sales and revenue, while agencies also lean more heavily towards revenue and ROI than in-house teams, which remain more focused on brand awareness. The report interprets this as a possible misalignment between leadership expectations and how practitioners define PR’s core value.

      On the opportunity side, AI and automation lead clearly at 48%, followed by strengthening journalist and creator relationships at 39%, closer alignment with marketing and business strategy at 32%, and data and analytics to demonstrate ROI at 31%. This is one of the report’s most revealing sections, because it shows the future of PR being defined by two simultaneous moves: more technology and more integration with business strategy, without abandoning relationship-building. The direction of travel is not simply “more AI”; it is a more hybrid model where technology supports efficiency and insight, while human connection and strategic alignment remain essential.

      4. Which tools and skills does the report identify as most important, and what does that suggest about what successful PR work will look like?

      The toolset that respondents value most is led by media monitoring and analysis, cited by 60%, followed by content creation tools at 49% and media database or relationship management tools at 44%. Analytics and reporting dashboards and press release distribution both sit at 33%. This indicates that successful PR work is increasingly built on a mix of intelligence gathering, content production and relationship infrastructure.

      The organisational split is telling here as well. Agency teams place much higher value on media database and relationship management tools, while in-house teams place more emphasis on content creation. That makes sense within the report’s logic: agencies need broad contact networks across multiple clients and sectors, while in-house teams are more focused on brand storytelling and owned content.

      On skills, storytelling and content creation come first at 59%, followed by media relations at 44%, strategic planning at 34%, and AI integration at 33%. ROI measurement is lower down at 21%, which is striking given how much the report emphasises pressure to prove impact. That suggests the field still sees core communicative craft as more central than technical evaluation skill, even as accountability expectations rise.

      Overall, the report presents the ideal PR professional of 2026 as someone who combines creative and relational strengths with strategic and analytical capability. The future winner is not just a storyteller, and not just a data person, but someone who can connect narratives to business outcomes while using new tools intelligently.

      5. What does the report conclude about AI’s role in PR, and what broader conclusion does it draw about the future of the profession?

      AI is presented as both a pressure point and a major opportunity. The report says 40% of respondents use AI-powered media monitoring tools and 31% use AI features in analytics and reporting dashboards. When it comes to stand-alone generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude, use is already widespread: 73% use them for brainstorming ideas, 68% for writing or refining press releases, pitches or other content, 55% for research, 36% for drafting or scheduling social posts, and 31% for analysing data or generating reports. Only 8% say they do not use generative AI tools.

      That makes AI a mainstream workflow reality rather than an emerging experiment. But the report is careful not to frame this as a fully automated future. Its repeated position is that human creativity, storytelling and relationships remain indispensable. AI is valuable for efficiency, insight and scale, but it does not replace the human dimensions that make PR effective.

      The broader conclusion is that PR is moving into a more demanding, more hybrid era. The profession must adapt to unstable media dynamics, economic pressure and growing performance expectations, while also absorbing AI into everyday practice. The teams most likely to succeed, according to the report, will be those that align strategy and execution, remove structural barriers to agility, strengthen storytelling and data capabilities, and combine machine efficiency with human authenticity. In that sense, the report’s ultimate message is not that PR is being reinvented from scratch, but that its traditional strengths now have to operate inside a far more data-driven, resource-constrained and technology-enabled environment.

    5. Corporate Affairs Trends for 2026 by FleishmanHillard

      Corporate Affairs Trends for 2026 by FleishmanHillard

      About the paper

      This is a forecast-style corporate affairs report for 2026 from FleishmanHillard, centred on three linked forces shaping the field: fragmentation, declining trust, and a more confrontational geopolitical environment.

      Methodologically, it is best described as a mixed-methods thought-leadership report grounded in the author’s original analysis, observation, discussions with colleagues, contacts and clients, and selective use of external datasets; there is no single disclosed sample, respondent count, or fieldwork design, and the geographic scope is broad but not clearly delimited, drawing on examples from markets including the UK, US, Germany and Japan.

      Length: 32 pages

      More information / download:
      https://fleishmanhillard.co.uk/2025/12/corporate-affairs-trends-for-2026/

      Core Insights

      1. What is the report’s central argument about the corporate affairs landscape in 2026?

      The core argument is that corporate affairs is becoming harder because the environment is simultaneously more fragmented, less trusting, and more geopolitically adversarial. The report says three forces stand out for 2026: fragmentation, decline of trust, and an increasingly confrontational geopolitical landscape. Rather than treating these as separate developments, it presents them as mutually reinforcing pressures that reshape how communicators reach audiences, build credibility and advise leadership.

      The report also makes clear that AI is not a standalone trend in this edition because its effects are now embedded across all the others. In other words, AI is treated as a horizontal force altering research, measurement, publishing, direct engagement and execution, but not replacing the need for human judgement in areas such as geopolitical assessment.

      Taken together, the report argues that the traditional model of corporate affairs, built around broad-reach media, relatively stable trust assumptions and a more predictable global environment, is no longer sufficient. The emerging model requires more precision, more segmentation, more direct publishing capability and greater sophistication in dealing with political risk and stakeholder complexity.

      2. Why does the report say that “everything gets smaller,” and what does that mean in practice?

      “Everything gets smaller” is the report’s shorthand for accelerating fragmentation. Drawing on Nicco Mele’s The End of Big, it argues that media, audiences, brands and institutions are all under pressure from digital atomisation, polarisation and weakening institutional authority. In practical terms, this means audiences are harder to reach at scale, general-interest channels are less dominant, and niche publishers, creators and platforms matter more than before.

      The report says audiences are moving towards specialist, high-value and trusted outlets, including titles such as the FT, Economist and Wall Street Journal, alongside podcasts and subscription platforms such as Substack. On page 13, it also points to the visual evidence that major news sites are seeing steep traffic declines while Substack shows growth, reinforcing the idea that the mass-media centre is weakening.

      A second part of this trend is economic: digital publishing is under pressure. The report argues that advertisers are likely to favour retail media networks and more directly attributable formats over traditional display advertising, while referral traffic from Google is declining as more users get information through AI-driven systems. That combination threatens publishers’ business models and may shrink the overall supply of quality journalism and analysis.

      For corporate affairs leaders, the implication is strategic rather than merely descriptive. The report says they will need to widen relationship-building beyond the “usual suspects”, understand audience channel preferences in greater depth, include niche publishers and influential Substack writers in plans, and adjust measurement frameworks to prioritise relevant reach and business-linked outcomes over broad reputational proxies.

      3. How does the report redefine trust, and why does it argue that “absolute trust” is ending?

      The report argues that trust can no longer be treated as a stable, universal measure of reputation. For years, communicators often used trust as a broad proxy for reputational strength, but the report says that assumption is breaking down because trust is now polarised and audience-relative rather than generalised.

      Its key evidence is that broad trust in institutions and news sources is weakening, while audiences increasingly trust the sources that align with their existing worldview. The report cites the Reuters Institute’s 2025 Digital News Report and notes that in 53 of the 54 countries surveyed there is a gap between trust in news generally and trust in “the news I use”. It also cites falling generalised trust levels in the UK, Germany and Japan, with US trust remaining low and flat.

      This leads to a fundamental strategic shift. A channel cannot simply be labelled “trusted” in the abstract. It may be trusted by one stakeholder segment and distrusted by another. On page 19, the report uses the US example to show how left-leaning and right-leaning audiences consume and trust different sources. That means communicators must think in terms of relative trust within specific audience groups rather than aggregate trust across society.

      The report pushes the logic further with the claim that “sounds true” increasingly beats “is true”. That is one of its strongest interpretive claims: in public debate, authority, emotional resonance and perceived credibility may matter more than factual correctness alone. The implication is not that facts no longer matter, but that institutions can no longer assume facts will persuade by themselves. They must communicate in ways that connect with audiences that do not automatically grant them trust.

      4. What role does AI play in the report’s view of communications strategy and direct audience engagement?

      AI runs through the report as an enabling and disruptive force. Early on, the author says AI is woven through the trends rather than isolated as its own section. The report’s view is that AI can materially improve efficiency, research, measurement and tactical delivery, but that its organisational adoption remains uneven and its limitations still constrain full replacement of human work.

      In the context of fragmentation and trust, AI also changes how audiences discover information. The report argues that communicators now need to think not only about reaching humans through media and owned channels, but also about influencing the GPT-based systems those audiences may consult. On page 23, it says earned media accounts for about half of the sources cited by common GPTs in responses about companies or brands, while owned content contributes roughly another fifth. That makes credible earned and owned content strategic assets in both human and machine-mediated discovery.

      This is one of the report’s more forward-looking ideas: businesses increasingly need to act as publishers, not only to reach stakeholders directly but also to shape the information environment from which AI systems draw. That makes publishing strategy more central to corporate affairs than in older media models. It also ties back to trust, because the report frames credible earned and owned content as “vital levers of influence”.

      At the same time, the report draws a limit around AI. In the geopolitical section, it says AI can help manage the growing complexity of communications execution, but management’s demand for geopolitical intelligence, assessment and advice remains a uniquely human capability. So the report is neither techno-utopian nor dismissive: it sees AI as highly useful, but not as a substitute for senior judgement.

      5. What are the report’s main conclusions for corporate affairs leaders, especially in a more zero-sum geopolitical world?

      The report’s third major conclusion is that geopolitical uncertainty is no longer a background condition; it is becoming a central operating reality for corporate affairs. It describes a world in which governments are more nationalistic, businesses are increasingly treated as instruments of power projection, and economic security is becoming intertwined with national security.

      This produces a “zero-sum” environment in which political actors increasingly think in terms of winners and losers, while global companies are trying to create value across multiple markets and stakeholder groups. The report says this tension makes life harder for multinational firms because supporting one government position can complicate operations elsewhere, and localisation strategies, though increasingly attractive, also multiply stakeholder complexity.

      Its practical conclusion is that corporate affairs teams must become more sophisticated systems operators. They need better geopolitical sensing, more formal scenario planning, stronger risk tracking and more structured use of AI for targeted execution. But they also need deeper human expertise, because navigating cross-currents between governments, markets and audiences is presented as a high-judgement advisory function, not just a communications task.

      So the report’s broader meaning is this: corporate affairs is moving away from broad-message distribution and towards high-complexity influence management. Success in 2026 will depend on understanding fragmented audiences, working with relative rather than universal trust, building stronger direct and AI-visible publishing capabilities, and helping leadership navigate a world where politics, economics and communications are tightly fused.

    6. Internal Communications Trends Report 2026 by Workshop

      Internal Communications Trends Report 2026 by Workshop

      About the paper

      This report examines the state of internal communication heading into 2026, focusing on foundations, channels, manager communication, feedback, strategy, and AI adoption.

      It appears to be a mixed-source report built primarily on a survey of 312 responses, supplemented by open-ended comments and data from Workshop customers; the precise fieldwork method and country list are not clearly specified.

      The data is international in scope, with respondents drawn from a range of locations and industries, but the exact geographic coverage is not clearly specified.

      Length: 69 pages

      More information / download:
      https://useworkshop.com/internal-communications-trends-report/

      Core Insights

      1. What is the report’s central argument about where internal communication stands in 2026?

      The central argument is that internal communication is becoming more strategic, but the function is still under considerable operational strain. The report repeatedly frames the field as moving beyond simple message distribution towards a more intentional role centred on alignment, clarity, employee support, and business contribution. It says teams are getting “more strategic and more intentional”, but that expectations still outpace available resources, with workloads growing faster than team capacity.

      That core tension runs through the whole report. On the one hand, there are signs of maturity: stronger foundations, more deliberate channel use, wider adoption of measurement practices, and AI becoming part of everyday work. On the other hand, communicators still face major structural barriers such as limited time, insufficient staffing, weak budget support, being brought in too late, and difficulty proving impact.

      So the report’s main message is not that internal comms is in crisis, nor that it has fully “arrived”, but that it is in a transitional stage. It is increasingly recognised as a strategic function, yet many teams still operate with the tools, access, and organisational support of a more tactical service role.

      2. What evidence does the report provide that internal communication is strengthening as a function?

      The strongest evidence comes from the combination of improved foundations, perceived employee value, and clearer strategic ambition. The report says 51 percent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that their organisation has a solid foundation for internal communications, and 81 percent believed employees would say internal comms helps them do their jobs better. That is important because it suggests internal communication is not being seen merely as corporate messaging, but as practical operational support.

      There is also evidence of greater strategic clarity. A large majority, 73 percent, said their internal comms strategy needs to adapt for 2026, which implies that teams are actively thinking about strategy rather than simply maintaining existing activity. At the same time, the top goals remain consistent: employee engagement, alignment across the organisation, and support for business goals. That combination suggests a function that is evolving, but around a stable strategic core.

      The report also points to a more sophisticated understanding of channels and content. Email remains dominant and highly effective, but communicators are not just expanding channels for the sake of it. The report argues that teams are becoming more intentional about the role each channel plays, especially by combining push channels such as email with pull channels such as intranets. Similarly, content priorities are shifting from volume towards meaning, with greater emphasis on leadership communication, employee spotlights, values-based content, and change communication.

      Taken together, this suggests internal comms is strengthening not because everything is working perfectly, but because practitioners are becoming more deliberate about how communication supports understanding, connection, and organisational coherence.

      3. What are the report’s main findings about the practical challenges internal communicators still face?

      The report shows very clearly that resource pressure remains one of the defining realities of the profession. Only 44 percent say they have the resources they need to deliver on strategy, and only 18 percent strongly agree that they have a dedicated budget for internal comms in 2026. The accompanying commentary makes the same point in plain language: many teams, including “teams of one”, are trying to meet growing expectations without matching support.

      The operational barriers are also quite specific. The most common broad challenge is getting content from other departments, cited by 61 percent. Measurement comes next at 56 percent, followed by not having enough time in the day at 48 percent and not being “in the loop” early enough at 45 percent. This pattern matters because it shows the problem is not just one of budget. It is also about internal process, governance, stakeholder behaviour, and the positioning of comms within the organisation.

      The report’s qualitative comments deepen this picture. Respondents describe being treated as order takers rather than strategic partners, being forced to accommodate too many stakeholders, and being asked to distribute messages rather than shape them upstream. That implies one of the biggest constraints on internal comms is not simply capacity, but organisational role clarity. Teams may be expected to produce high-quality, strategic communication, while being denied the early access and authority needed to do so.

      In effect, the report suggests that internal communication’s biggest challenge is not a lack of commitment or skill. It is the mismatch between its strategic potential and the conditions under which many teams are still expected to operate.

      4. What does the report reveal about the channels, content, and management systems that seem to matter most in 2026?

      The report presents a fairly clear hierarchy. Email remains the anchor channel: 95 percent use it and 81 percent rate it as one of their most effective tools. Intranet use is also widespread at 74 percent, but it is described as the most challenging channel, even while being the top investment priority for 2026 at 52 percent. This is one of the report’s most interesting tensions: the intranet is frustrating in practice, but still seen as strategically important when it works as a reliable knowledge hub.

      The report’s broader argument is that communicators should stop expecting one channel to do everything. Instead, they should design an ecosystem in which push and pull channels support one another. That is a more mature view of internal communication architecture, and it reflects a concern with actual employee behaviour rather than simply channel ownership.

      On content, leadership updates are the most commonly delivered type today, and leadership communication is also the top content priority for 2026. Employee spotlights, values-based content, change communication, and performance storytelling also rank highly. The report interprets this as a move away from simply sending updates towards creating meaning, context, and connection. In other words, content is becoming less transactional and more interpretive.

      Manager communication stands out as especially important. It is again the number-one trend for 2026, chosen by 56 percent, yet only 4 percent say managers are very effective at cascading communication. That gap is central to the report’s diagnosis. Managers remain the crucial relay point between organisational messaging and employee understanding, but the capability is still weak. Hence the report’s repeated emphasis on leader digests, manager toolkits, cascade templates, and training. It sees better systems for managers not as a side issue, but as one of the main ways internal comms can increase impact.

      5. What does the report say about AI, and what broader implications does that have for the future of internal communication?

      The report treats AI as having moved decisively from novelty to normal workflow tool. It says 42 percent of respondents use AI every day and another 31 percent use it a few times a week. More than half describe themselves as actively experimenting, while 33 percent say AI is already integrated into some workflows. That is a strong sign that AI is no longer peripheral to the field.

      Current use is still concentrated in content production, where 72 percent use AI, followed by strategy or planning, summarising feedback or survey results, and repurposing content. But when respondents look ahead, the biggest priority is automation of repetitive tasks, cited by 68 percent. That matters because it shows communicators do not just want faster drafting. They want relief from low-value repeat work so they can spend more time on strategic judgement, nuance, and relationship work.

      At the same time, the report is careful not to frame AI in purely celebratory terms. The main concerns are accuracy or misinformation, loss of human tone, and privacy or security. These are not fringe objections: they are held by majorities or near-majorities of respondents. The report’s perspective is that these concerns are healthy constraints, not reasons to reject AI outright. Its implied model is human-centred augmentation: use AI for the early lift, then apply human review for trust, tone, and judgement.

      The wider implication is that internal communication may be heading towards a sharper division between work that can be accelerated and work that remains distinctly human. Drafting, summarising, formatting, repurposing, and workflow support will increasingly be automated or AI-assisted. But meaning-making, employee trust, leadership credibility, and organisational judgement will become even more central to the communicator’s value. In that sense, AI does not reduce the strategic importance of internal comms. The report suggests it may actually increase it.