“Brands are having a lot less control over the final presentation of their story. AI becomes the interpreter as well as the review source.”
From content creation to organizational communication to global marketing, today’s communication professionals must keep pace with more than the latest technology. They also have to understand changes in how audiences consume information and the ways brands tell their stories. Often, they might even be making strategic decisions when no one can predict exactly how a sector might evolve in the years ahead.
The ability to navigate new trends is central to the Master of Communication Management (MCM) online program at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. “Artificial intelligence is only accelerating this change,” observes MCM co-director Monica Koyama, so students need to learn how to harness AI effectively — and ethically.
Koyama and fellow co-director Courtney Pade bring complementary perspectives and research expertise to that challenge. Pade’s background bridges communication research and organizational practice, while Koyama brings more than 25 years of experience across sports, entertainment, television and streaming media.
Together with fellow faculty members, they keep the MCM grounded in communication theory and real-world practice, which are especially vital in preparing students — many of whom are working professionals — to properly leverage AI for their careers and clients.
“You can’t simply be a user of AI,” Pade says. “You need to question the outputs and verify accuracy. You also have to question assumptions to know when AI is useful and when it isn’t. That’s a throughline in our program.”
Hands-on Experience
Mastering AI means hands-on projects and not just virtual classroom lectures. In Pade’s Audience Research and Analysis course, for example, students recently worked with the childcare company Brella to explore how it could position its transitional kindergarten program. Classmates conducted surveys, focus groups and content analysis to develop recommendations.
Students then took those findings to AI to see whether the technology could identify an insight they had missed or offer a different way of thinking about the information. The students documented their prompts, their original interpretations and whether AI changed their thinking.
Sometimes AI offered little that was new. Other times, it provided a different perspective that led to a new strategy. But AI remained a tool instead of an authority. “The students — not AI — are the ones running the research,” Pade notes.
That distinction reflects the MCM program’s emphasis on research, analysis and critical thinking. As AI makes it easier to produce information quickly, students need to be able to evaluate what it produces — and recognize when those results are wrong.
Fundamental Shift
Pade and Koyama also explore questions about AI use as head researchers working with the USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations and WE Communications. Their investigations, led by Dr. Matthew Curtis, Clinical Professor of Communication, examines how communication professionals are adapting to AI and the opportunities and challenges it presents.
A study they published in November 2025 examined the major role of generative AI in brand visibility and reputation. Instead of visiting multiple sources to find products, consumers can now simply ask an AI tool, and the outputs go beyond presenting information. AI can now determine which information to spotlight and how to present it.
“Brands are having a lot less control over the final presentation of their story,” Koyama says. “AI becomes the interpreter as well as the review source.”
The research, which included a survey of communication professionals, revealed a significant gap between recognizing that change and knowing how to respond to it. Sixty-two percent of respondents saw optimizing for generative AI as a major opportunity, while 49% said they would not know the first step to take to optimize content for AI visibility. More than a third — 36% — had already encountered misinformation about their brands in AI-generated responses.
“It’s a bit of a black box right now,” Pade notes. “Communication professionals know there is a readiness gap and real-world reputation consequences but they don’t know how to combat that misinformation yet.”
For communication leaders, this raises new questions about credibility, reputation and how information reaches audiences when an algorithm increasingly stands between an organization and the people it hopes to reach.
The Human Advantage
As AI becomes more capable, though, Pade and Koyama believe distinctly human abilities become more important.
“If AI can give the idea, then the idea no longer is the advantage,” Koyama says. “The advantage is really the human insight.”
That understanding is crucial in marketing, media and entertainment, where success can depend on an unexpected idea or perspective.
The creator economy offers a vivid example of how those forces are converging. Creators can simultaneously function as talent, media companies, marketers and brands. They can create content on a phone, distribute it directly to audiences and receive data and feedback almost immediately.
Yet as these technologies become increasingly accessible, Koyama notes that originality and relationships with audiences are more important than ever. “People watch entertainment and content because they want to enjoy a feeling,” she says. “They’re not going because of a formula.”
Pade adds that she frequently discusses the importance of individuality with her students. “I ask them to think about what makes them unique, what their voice sounds like in writing such as a turn of phrase. More and more with AI, everyone sounds the same. Not everything needs to be perfectly polished. Having your personality come through is so much more important now as we read hundreds of AI-generated emails a day.”
Examining Change in Real Time
Koyama has watched entertainment move from an era dominated by a handful of television networks to cable, streaming and today’s seemingly limitless content choices. At the same time, consolidation is reshaping media companies, while technology platforms and traditional entertainment companies compete for something increasingly scarce: audience attention. The result is a field in which today’s assumptions may not hold tomorrow.
For students, that uncertainty can be daunting, particularly as headlines focus on disappearing jobs or work being automated. Koyama acknowledges those disruptions while also emphasizing that change creates new roles and opportunities.
That is one reason the MCM curriculum continually incorporates new case studies, readings, technologies and real-world developments. Rather than preparing students for a static set of jobs, the program builds critical skills they can carry from one environment to another.
“We want our students to walk away knowing how to analyze it, question it and then become leaders in those areas,” Koyama says.
That adaptability also means learning to work effectively with other people. Today’s professionals may move among organizations using different technologies, platforms and workplace structures. They are likely to collaborate with colleagues across countries and time zones or move into new roles created by rapidly evolving industries.
“You need to be tech literate and AI literate, as well as possess human communication skills and the ability to work on a team,” Koyama says.
Preparing for Unpredictability
No curriculum can tell students exactly what communication, marketing, entertainment or media will look like three or five years from now. So the MCM aims to prepare students not simply for the tools and trends of today but for the process of encountering whatever comes next: investigating and experimenting to determine how organizations and audiences can best be served.
Real-world clients are part of that preparation. Students have opportunities to work on communication challenges for companies and engage with executives who bring current industry realities into their learning.
At the same time, AI gives them a testing ground for developing a new kind of professional relationship with technology — one in which they can always know how to ask better questions.
Because no matter how powerful a technology becomes, or how quickly it evolves, success will still depend on people who can think critically, understand audiences, recognize what is original and meaningful, collaborate with others and make sound strategic decisions.
“We’re really adapting to the change quite quickly,” Koyama says. “And we’re actually excited about all the possibilities.”
Learn more about the Master of Communication Management online program.