✅ In an age of AI, public relations needs more humanity, not less
As we race to adopt AI, we’re at risk of leaving people behind. Real people, with real experiences, many of whom face daily barriers because of who they are.
The promise of AI is efficiency and effectiveness. But what we urgently need is empathy.
In today’s Summer guest editorial, Ishtar Schneider issues a call to action to help the public relations industry build an evidence base of human understanding that no algorithm can deliver.
Ishtar is a proud global citizen and Taiwanese-American, having worked in public relations across the US, UK and Australia in global agency (and now in-house) roles advising large multinational companies on strategic communications to drive societal impact and business growth.
She’s Chair of the PRCA Equity & Inclusion Advisory Board and Women in PR Mentoring and Shadow Board Lead.
By Ishtar Schneider
I’ve always been someone who thrives on connection. There’s a much-told family story about me as a toddler, barely able to walk, yet somehow finding my way on stage at the New Mexico State Fair.
No mic, no agenda, just a two-year-old extrovert swaying with the band.
That same drive for connection is why I chose a career in communications. For more than 15 years, I’ve worked across teams, clients, media, policymakers, patients and communities, drawn in by the complexity of human experience and the challenge of making meaning through language.
The energy comes from people.
Here’s the tension: as our industry races to integrate AI tools, from content generation to campaign planning, we risk sidelining the one thing AI can’t replicate, real human understanding.
Why inclusion matters more than ever
This is about ensuring that, as we automate tasks, we don’t automate out empathy, creativity or inclusion. These are not soft skills. They're foundational to strategic communications. And they’re what builds trust.
The PRCA Equity & Inclusion Advisory Board’s (EIAB) latest research programme, “Understanding Inclusion,” is a response to this moment.
We’ve partnered with Opinium to surface lived experiences from practitioners across our sector who are too often excluded: people with visible and invisible disabilities, neurodivergent practitioners, and those with different religious beliefs.
The 2024 PRCA Census paints a confronting picture:
16% of professionals identify as having a physical disability; two-thirds of them say it significantly affects their working lives.
1 in 5 identify as neurodivergent; 65% report a negative impact at work.
Nearly half of all respondents have experienced discrimination based on age, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability or faith.
Let that land: one in two public relations practitioners have faced some form of discrimination in their careers in the last year alone.
The opportunity and the responsibility
We need better data. We need deeper insight. But most importantly, we need to act.
Understanding inclusion goes beyond tick-box metrics. It seeks to understand how identity intersects with factors such as gender, socio-economic background, caregiving responsibilities and more.
Our goal is to use this insight to build a new inclusion framework for the PRCA. A framework grounded in evidence, shaped by lived experience and designed for practical use.
We’re not doing this alone. We’re drawing on work from the Black Communications Network’s 2024 One Step Forward, Two Steps Black report, Global Women in PR Annual Index, Women in PR’s Ageism research and the recent Missing Women and Break the Silence reports, among others.
Together, this evidence base can shift the industry from good intentions to structural change.
Here’s how you can help and take action today
We want you involved, because inclusion can’t be advisory-board-only work.
Please share your story: We’re conducting anonymised 30 to 45-minute interviews with practitioners from underrepresented groups throughout August. Please sign up here.
Whether you identify as neurodivergent, live with a disability, practise a faith, or care about creating a fairer, more inclusive industry, we need your voice and your allyship.
AI can do many things, but it can’t understand what it means to be marginalised. It can’t design truly inclusive workplaces. And it certainly can’t build trust in a sector that still has work to do.
The most powerful thing we have in this industry isn’t a shiny new AI tool. It’s each other.
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If you’ve got a story to share with our readers, please contact me.
Well said Ishtar 🫶