Good morning. The commingling of PR, IR, corporate social media, reputation management, crisis communications and LLM optimization is pushing chief communications officers to the fore, the WSJ Leadership Institute’s Katie Deighton reports.

The role within many organizations has turned into one of a consigliere to presidents and CEOs, many of whom are now highly aware that the smallest of missteps—from hiring the wrong influencer to eating a burger without sufficient gusto—can damage their reputations and their companies’ top lines.

Anheuser-Busch InBev named its first chief communications officer, a military veteran, in November 2023 following the damaging Bud Light boycott over its promotion with a transgender influencer. The role reports to the CEO; communications at the company previously reported up through legal and corporate affairs.

Many other companies still strive to avoid becoming “the next Bud Light.”

“You used to be able to predict when you sent out a message how it could be received,” said Goodyear Chief Communications Officer Travis Parman, who joined the company in April from Philip Morris International. “Now, because audiences can be so polarized, when you send out a message, you’ve really got to think about not only ‘How can this be interpreted?’ but also ‘How can this be misinterpreted?’”

I asked Katie to break down what’s going on.

Why haven't companies historically put more of a premium on chief communications officers near the top of their org charts?

Katie: There wasn’t a huge imperative for them to do so. Not that long ago, it was rare that an executive’s interview gaffe or a bit of misjudged ad copy could tank a company’s stock or sales. Now, thanks to the multiplying effects of online outrage, that’s no longer the case, and CEOs want experts in communications and reputational management close by to help mitigate any mistakes that could snowball into real problems.

On top of all of that, brands are desperate to show up favorably in AI chatbot results right now. Given how much LLMs scrape trusted news sources, communications has found itself at the center of growth campaigns in 2026.

What should communications leaders do to assume a more central place in the C-suite?

Katie: The more—shall I say—elevated of the CCOs I’ve spoken to make a point of being a little annoying. By that I mean showing up to meetings they probably weren’t invited to, offering their candid thoughts to everybody from product designers to the CEO, and generally making it their business to know what is happening at all times.

There’s really a push for leaders to step out from behind the curtain and become more consumer-facing lately too, which offers comms executives an easy opportunity to get face time with their CEOs.

Public service announcement for marketers in New York: The state’s new law requiring businesses to conspicuously disclose the use of “synthetic performers” in their ads takes effect today.

But some advertisers are still seeking clarity on their new responsibilities, according to Gonzalo E. Mon, a partner at law firm Kelley Drye & Warren.

In a blog post on the Kelley Drye site, Mon says the questions include:

And what counts as conspicuous anyway?

Businesses may take a conservative approach until there’s clarity, erring on the side of disclosure, Mon writes.

New York’s new law only applies to synthetic performers who look human, but aren’t recognizable as any specific human, note Po Yi and Tom Feigenbaum at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips in a blog post of their own.

That suggests to me that Garry, the AI “punching bag” from freelance marketplace Fiverr, now requires a disclosure in New York. (Happily his origin is part of the bit.) An AI recreation of Gary Oldman, on the other hand, would not.

And although Progressive included an “Images Generated With AI” note in its recent ad depicting a sloth, a deer and a hyena behind the wheel, that doesn’t seem like it would be required by New York’s new rules—just probably good form.

Meanwhile: ABC pulled the AI-generated portraits from its NBA Finals coverage after a particularly egregious rendering of Spurs great Tony Parker went viral. [Front Office Sports]

Here’s Katie Deighton again, with a report for the newsletter:

Yesterday I attended the opening of the World Cup exhibition at New York City’s Rockefeller Center, or to give it its official title, FIFA Museum presented by Hyundai.

Located in a windowless room nine floors up on West 50th Street, the space is filled with World Cup memorabilia including a Team USA jersey worn at the inaugural 1930 tournament and the old Jules Rimet championship trophy. The displays, part of FIFA’s attempt to drive buzz around the games and give ticketless fans something free to look at, sit in stark contrast with the androids brought in by the exhibition’s presenting sponsor.

Hyundai is on a mission to convey its technology bona fides to the U.S. public. So passersby outside the museum on the sunny Rockefeller concourse at lunchtime could see Spot, Hyundai-owned Boston Dynamics’s faceless, robotic dog, performing tricks. And visitors to the exhibition itself are greeted by its humanoid Atlas robot, which was unveiled earlier this year at CES and stars in Hyundai’s future-focused World Cup ad.

“We want to take the opportunity to make people see us not only as a carmaker but also a brand that really shapes the future, an innovative company,” Hyundai’s global chief marketing officer, Sungwon Jee, said of the brand’s World Cup push. The company has been sponsoring the tournament since 1999, and still sees uplift in brand value and preference during and after each World Cup, Jee told me.

Kicking off on Thursday, the competition neatly coincides with the announcement that Hyundai has broadened its ongoing deal with the chip-making giant Nvidia. Under the leadership of the company’s first non-Korean leader, José Muñoz, Hyundai has been aiming to expand into the high-tech world of flying cars as well as robots, and wants to ramp up the sales of its models in the U.S.

Hyundai still appears to have one brand snag in the West, however: Confusion over how to pronounce the name. Even FIFA President Gianni Infantino attempted three different pronunciations at yesterday’s press conference (it’s meant to rhyme with “Sunday”).

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