The real skill gap in PR isn’t AI — it’s alignment

Will Hodges is U.S. cross-commercial communications leader at PwC.

Everyone is racing to learn new tools, build new workflows and generate more content faster than ever. But many teams are discovering that simply adding AI doesn’t fix misalignment — it tends to multiply it.

Before communicators can truly accelerate their work, they often have to reconcile something more fundamental:
• Leaders making decisions at different speeds.
• Teams interpreting priorities in different ways.
• Organizations transforming faster than people can absorb it.

In that environment, the real differentiator isn’t who prompts better — it’s who creates coherence. High-performing communications teams aren’t just creators. Increasingly, they’re acting as integrators, aligning leaders, messages and decisions so organizations can move with clarity instead of noise. This is a skill gap that’s under-discussed, and one PR professionals will need to close as we head into 2026.

The misdiagnosis: ’We just need better AI skills’

Many communications teams may be solving the wrong problem.

A common assumption is that speed or AI fluency is the constraint — that if teams could generate content faster or prompt more effectively, alignment would follow. But in practice, the opposite happens. AI dramatically increases output. But when priorities aren’t clear and decisions aren’t settled, increased output only accelerates confusion. AI doesn’t resolve misalignment — it exposes it.

This is often why communicators experience whiplash: messages contradict what another leader said days earlier, teams are asked to announce decisions that haven’t fully landed and different parts of the organization interpret the same strategy in incompatible ways.

These aren’t tooling issues. They’re coherence issues.

Why alignment has become a strategic function of PR

Organizations are operating in a state of near-constant change and transforming faster than people can absorb. Strategy cycles are shorter. Expectations are higher. Stakeholders expect clarity and credibility immediately, even when decisions are still evolving. At the same time, leaders are operating at different altitudes. Some are focused on long-term direction, others on near-term execution. Without alignment, those signals collide.

This is one reason communications has become one of the few functions capable of integrating strategy, leadership intent and real-time execution. Many modern communicators are no longer just storytellers or messengers. They are increasingly acting as integrators — translating strategy, reconciling intent and shaping narratives people can actually act on.

When alignment is strong, communication accelerates change. When it’s weak, communication becomes noise, no matter how advanced the tools are.

3 alignment breakdowns every PR practitioner recognizes

Misalignment rarely shows up as a single failure. It usually appears across three familiar fault lines.

1. Leadership misalignment
   Communicators are often asked to message decisions before leaders are fully aligned.

Leaders may agree on the goal but not the rationale. Or they may support an outcome while disagreeing on its implications. When that happens, communications teams are often left translating ambiguity into certainty — a nearly impossible task.

The result is predictable: mixed signals, last-minute rewrites and leaders inadvertently undermining one another.

2. Narrative drift
   Even when leaders are aligned, messages often drift across teams, regions and channels.

What starts as a clear narrative becomes diluted through handoffs, local interpretation or competing priorities. Employees hear different versions of the “why,” and external audiences sense inconsistency.

This isn’t a writing problem. It’s an alignment problem.

3. Decision ambiguity
   In fast-moving environments, decisions are often made incrementally — and sometimes invisibly.

Communicators are asked to explain outcomes without full context, clear timing or an understanding of tradeoffs. When decisions don’t align with stated values or prior messages, credibility takes the hit.

Communications teams often feel this tension first because they’re closest to where words and actions diverge.

What high-performing comms teams do differently

Alignment rarely happens by accident. And to help drive alignment, high-performing teams approach it with discipline.

1. They build an alignment scaffold before messaging. They start with context and intent — not headlines or deliverables. A simple progression (context → intent → narrative → actions → channels) prevents misalignment from spreading downstream.
2. They establish narrative anchors. Strong teams define a small set of nonnegotiable truths that guide every communication. These anchors create consistency without slowing momentum.
3. They socialize alignment early. Instead of chasing approvals after content is drafted, they convene leaders upfront to align on what’s true, what’s decided and what matters most.
4. And they use AI to scale clarity — not create it in the first place. AI excels at distribution, variation and speed. But clarity, judgment and coherence remain human work. When alignment comes first, AI becomes a force multiplier rather than a risk amplifier.

High-performing teams aren’t only focused on content creation. They’re equally focused on coherence creation.

A practical framework: The alignment ladder

For communicators looking to operationalize alignment, this five-step model can serve as a starting point:

1. Clarify decision rights: Who is deciding what — and by when?
2. Align leader intent: What outcome are we trying to drive? Why now?
3. Establish narrative anchors: What truths must show up in every communication?
4. Build integrated messaging: How do messages connect and build momentum rather than fragment attention?
5. Use AI as the multiplier: Once alignment is clear, use AI to scale clarity across audiences and channels.

This is where AI delivers its greatest value — not by fixing misalignment, but by amplifying it.

The path forward for PR in 2026

Communicators can’t wait for perfect clarity anymore. Instead, they help create it — by aligning leaders, decisions and narratives into a coherent whole that organizations can trust. AI will continue to reshape how communications teams work. But alignment will determine how effective that work actually is.

The future of PR will belong to professionals who can bring clarity to complexity — and help their organizations move with conviction instead of noise.