AI for PR Conference 2026

Come collect your lanyard and programme. 
Breakfast and drinks will be served upon arrival.

Shaheen Sayed is the UK Government’s AI Champion for the professional and business services sector and global chief commercial officer for reinvention services at Accenture. Appointed by the chancellor to accelerate AI adoption across one of the UK’s key growth sectors, she sits at the intersection of government policy, industry transformation and real-world implementation.

We start the day by confronting the defining question facing contemporary corporate communications and public relations practice: is AI a strategic management opportunity that elevates public relations to the boardroom, enabling practice to work more effectively and efficiently, or an existential threat that hollows out the talent pipeline and erodes public trust?

AI presents a minefield of technical, operational and systemic risks that land squarely at the public relations function’s door, from hallucinations and algorithmic bias to cognitive offloading and environmental issues.

This panel explores how practitioners can step up as ethical guardians and governance advisors to help organisations navigate the complex terrain where innovation meets accountability.

Every PR team, agency and in-house, is wrestling with AI. But as we move from experimentation to enterprise-wide integration, how do we ensure AI use enhances, rather than erodes, confidence and reputation?

Burson’s Allison Spray, EMEA chief data and intelligence officer, cuts through the noise to reveal strategies for human-centric AI enablement. She’ll share learnings from Burson’s own ‘FutureWork’ programme, as well as considerations for others looking to build operational intelligence, drive AI use in workflows and shift from experiments to advantage.

Amy Mollett, Serena Mitchell and Tom Kirkup, come together for a practical, real-world exploration of how organisations are implementing and governing AI.

 When it comes to embedding AI in a public sector environment, implementation is fraught with challenges and risks. In this panel, speakers bring clarity to the opaque, from what belongs in AI policy to how to embed guidance that teams will genuinely adopt. Expect a timely discussion about introducing AI in high-pressure sectors, and practical advice for in-house teams making sense of a new technology.

 The session concludes with a moderated panel discussion, offering attendees the opportunity to explore the challenges, opportunities and implications of embedding AI responsibly across their organisations.

Beverages and snacks served.

Submit your AI policy dilemmas and watch our expert panel tackle them live. Whether you’re wrestling with how granular your disclosure requirements should be, what to do when suppliers won’t reveal their AI use, how to balance productivity gains against the talent pipeline, or how to reconcile your organisation’s environmental commitments with the realities of AI infrastructure, this interactive session offers practical, real-world guidance that you can take back to your team.

AI is transforming how journalists filter pitches, research stories, and manage their inboxes – and PR professionals are deploying the same tools to automate outreach at scale. But does more automation mean better communication? Chris Stokel-Walker draws on his own experience as an early AI adopter, and author of the book How AI Ate the World, to explore where AI helps, where it hinders, and why the human element matters more than ever in the relationship between journalists and PRs.

As generative AI transforms how communications teams create and share stories, Gay Flashman will be joined by industry voices from leading creative agencies at the forefront of AI-powered content, sharing insights into what’s working now – and what’s next.

The panel will explore how AI can spark ideas, experiment with formats and accelerate production, while human expertise ensures stories remain authentic, engaging and strategically compelling. Rather than positioning AI as a replacement for creative judgment, this panel reframes it as an augmentative partner – one that accelerates production while heightening the need for strategic thinking, ethical oversight and authentic storytelling.

We’ll be announcing the other panellists joining Gay very shortly, so stay tuned.

Lunch will be served to all guests. If you have purchased a ticket with the AI for PR book, there will be book signing taking place. 

With 89% of B2B buyers and 77% of B2C consumers using generative AI to inform their purchase decisions, brand visibility has fundamentally changed. In this new landscape, earned media now drives over 90% of the AI-powered answers your audience sees.

Learn how to benchmark your AI visibility against competitors, build a Tier 1 GenAI media list, optimise owned, earned and social channels, and understand the growing importance of press releases and platforms like Reddit. Most importantly, discover how to protect your brand’s narrative before competitors shape it for you.

Every day you wait, someone else tells your story. Start now.

With new AI tools launching weekly and vendors making increasingly bold claims about what their platforms can deliver, practitioners face a bewildering landscape of choice and risk. This discussion will cut through the noise to help you map tools to tasks, assess solutions with rigour, and build vendor relationships that actually serve your team’s needs.

Artificial intelligence is changing how communications teams plan, deliver and evaluate their work, but it’s not a silver bullet. In this session, you’ll explore how AI is being used in real-world PR and communications practice, and where its limitations still lie.
Drawing on practical experience, the session will examine the opportunities and risks of using AI to inform communications planning and measurement, helping communicators understand when automated tools add genuine value and when human judgement remains essential. It will challenge the idea of AI as a universal solution, offering guidance on how to select the right technologies and approaches for specific objectives.
Attendees will also gain insight into the critical questions they should be asking of their media intelligence and measurement tools, and how rapidly evolving technologies are shaping industry best practice, including the ongoing development of the AMEC Barcelona Principles.

Data Malarkey is the podcast about using data – and now AI – smarter. Hosted by Master Data Storyteller, Sam Knowles, the show explores how leaders and leading thinkers are applying data, AI, and emerging technologies to sharpen decision-making, strengthen communications, and drive marketing effectiveness.

After interviewing VW’s Director of CX, Nick Ratcliffe, live at DataComms 2025, Sam returns to the stage for another live recording at this year’s conference, this time with Pete Markey, an award-winning marketing lead at the forefront of AI for PR & comms.

Three battles. Six contenders. No hiding behind PowerPoint.

This is not a panel.

This is not a polite fireside chat.

This is AI Fight Club.

Six senior figures. Three head-to-head debates. One central question in each round. No slides. No notes. No hedging.

Each battle pits two sharply opposed viewpoints against each other – governance vs growth, automation vs creativity, transparency vs competitive advantage.

Think Fight Club meets 8 Mile but with AI leaders arguing over the future of communications

Public relations practice stands at a crossroads, with junior roles disappearing, the talent pipeline under threat, and the very nature of expertise being renegotiated. This closing session challenges delegates to move beyond tactical tool adoption and embrace capability transformation, ethical leadership and a renewed focus on what makes us irreplaceably human. The practitioners who thrive will be those who start planning for the strategic, creative and advisory roles that only humans can fill.