IABC Master Class: A Quiet Shift: How Polarization Is Reshaping Corporate Communication
Presenter: Fred Cook
Price: $199 for members, $279 for Member Lite and nonmembers
Dates:
- 26 October 2026 at 11:00 am - 12:30 pm CT
- 2 November 2026 at 11:00 am - 12:30 pm CT
The presentation and discussion will explore the impact of polarization on corporate communication. Over the past year, many of the world’s largest companies have remained silent on issues important to their stakeholders—raising important questions for communication professionals.
Who Should Attend
This Master Class is ideal for communication professionals responsible for corporate reputation, stakeholder engagement, and organizational messaging. Participants will explore how polarization is shaping communication strategies, and gain practical insights for navigating complex issues with confidence.
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Meet Fred Cook
Fred Cook is the director of the USC Center for Public Relations, a professor of professional practice at the University of Southern California (USC), and chairman emeritus of the global PR firm Golin. During his 35-plus years at Golin, he has had the privilege to work with a variety of high-profile CEOs, including Herb Kelleher, Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs, and to manage clients including Nintendo, Toyota, and Disney.
His book, "Improvise: Unconventional Career Advice from an Unlikely CEO," shares the wisdom he gained as a cabin boy on a Norwegian tanker, doorman at a 5-star hotel, and chauffeur for drunks. The book serves as the foundation for his popular USC honors class on Improvisational Leadership. As director of the USC Center for Public Relations, Fred leads its mission to connect corporations, agencies, academics, and students to define the future of the PR industry and to develop those who will shape it. He has connected a board of more than 70 corporate communications and agency leaders — including representatives from eight of the top 20 U.S. PR firms and 25 Fortune 500 or comparable-size private companies — who mentor students, shape curriculum, and help prepare the next generation of communications leaders.
IABC Master Class: Plan for Impact: AI Proficiency for Communication Professionals
Presenter: Sia Papageorgiou FRSA, FCCSE, IABC Fellow, SCMP
Price: $199 for members, $279 for Member Lite and nonmembers
Dates: 9 & 11 November | 9-10:45 a.m. CT
AI proficiency is no longer just about knowing how to use the latest tools. Communication professionals need to know where AI can genuinely add value, how to use it responsibly, and when communication expertise needs to influence wider organizational decisions.
In this practical 3.5-hour masterclass, IABC Fellow Sia Papageorgiou will take you from strategic use of AI in your own work through to responsible practice within the communication function and a stronger role in organizational AI adoption and governance.
Drawing on the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence’s Responsible AI Leadership Framework for Communication, you will explore how to use AI purposefully, navigate ethical and professional issues, establish practical safeguards, and contribute confidently when AI affects people, communication, trust, and reputation.
Who Should Attend
This Master Class is designed for communication professionals who are already using AI, exploring how it could support their work, or contributing to conversations about its use within an organization or client environment. It will be particularly valuable for professionals who want to move beyond basic AI tool use, make more considered decisions about where and how AI should be used, strengthen responsible practice within their team or function, and contribute more confidently to wider organizational AI conversations.
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Meet Sia Papageorgiou
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Sia Papageorgiou is internationally recognized as one of the communication profession’s leading strategic practitioners and thought leaders. With more than three decades of experience spanning journalism, public relations, corporate communication, and strategic advisory roles across government, business, and the not-for-profit sector, she has helped organizations strengthen communication capability, improve business outcomes, and elevate the role of communication as a trusted leadership function.
One of the world’s most awarded communication strategists, Sia has received more than 60 accolades for excellence in strategic communication, leadership, and professional contribution. She is the co-founder of the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence (CSCE), a global professional development and insights organization that works with organizations around the world to build strategic communication capability and advance professional standards. Sia is recognized internationally for her contribution to advancing the communication profession. Her work has influenced professional standards, certification, capability development, and strategic communication practice through the development of frameworks, learning systems, and thought leadership that continue to shape how strategic communication is understood and applied around the world.
A long-standing member of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC), Sia has served as a board director of IABC Asia Pacific, president of the IABC Victoria chapter, and chair of the Global Communication Certification Council (GCCC), where she helped advance global communication certification aligned with internationally recognized ISO standards and strengthened professional practice worldwide. Her contribution to the profession has been recognized through its highest honors. In 2021, she was named IABC Asia Pacific Communicator of the Year. In 2022, she received the prestigious IABC Rae Hamlin Award for advancing the Global Standard of the Communication Profession. In 2026, she was inducted as an IABC Fellow — the association’s highest honor, recognizing an outstanding career and exceptional contribution to the global communication profession. The GovComms Institute has described Sia as "one of the superstars of the communication profession."
Today, Sia works with organizations to strengthen strategic communication capability, governance, and leadership. Her work continues to focus on raising professional standards, helping communication functions become more strategic, measurable, and influential, and equipping communication professionals to operate with the credibility, discipline, and business acumen the profession demands.
IABC Master Class: From Shared Clarity to Coherent Action: What Senior Leaders Told Us About Communication's Role in Strategic Alignment
Presenters: Zora Artis, GAICD, IABC Fellow, SCMP, ACC, FAMI, CPM and Wayne Aspland
Price: $199 for members, $279 for Member Lite and nonmembers
Dates: 1 and 8 December 2026, 1:00-2:30 p.m. CT (2 and 9 December 6-7:30 a.m. AEDT)
To execute a strategy, someone needs to connect it with the people who carry out the work. That means helping them reach a shared understanding of the direction, then keeping their decisions, trade-offs, and course corrections coherent as the strategy moves (a constant reality today). Senior leaders in our research see communication professionals as well placed to play that role. They also see a function too often stuck at the tactical end, asked to announce strategy only after it's set. The gap between the role comms could play, and the one it is usually asked to fill is the opportunity this masterclass explores.
IABC is proud to have partnered with Zora Artis and Wayne Aspland on their third global study on strategic alignment. This study draws on 55 interviews with CEOs, Chiefs of Staff and senior leaders across five continents. Those leaders were candid about where communication falls short today, and equally clear about what it could become.
Session 1 (1 December): What the research found and the four shifts organisations need to make: from a group of leaders to a leadership group, from proxies to proof, from cascade to conversations, and from annual to agile. We finish with the first step: making the case that earns executive backing for the work.
Session 2 (8 December): A strategy refresh or announcement is one of the moments when communication professionals are most visible, and most likely to be asked for a launch plan or campaign. We use it as the working case for this session. What does your role look like in each of the four shifts, from early planning through to the months after the announcement? Where does it start and stop, and who do you need alongside you? We explore how to help leaders tell a consistent story, give executives evidence they take seriously, equip people leaders for the conversations that matter, and keep the strategy coherent when it needs to pivot.
Both sessions are interactive. If you have a strategy refresh or announcement on the horizon, bring it with you: you’ll have time to test the ideas against your own situation and compare notes with peers from around the world.
You'll walk away with greater clarity about the role you can play, more confidence to step into it, and strategic and practical steps on what to do and how to do the work.
Who should attend:
This masterclass is designed for senior and mid-level communication professionals, from Chief Communications Officers and Corporate Affairs Directors to the managers and advisers who lead or advise on strategic, executive, internal and change communication. It is for people who know their organisation's strategy depends on people understanding it and acting on it, and who want to play a stronger part in making that happen.
It will be particularly valuable for those who recognise that strategy depends on alignment, know they have a role in enabling it, and want to do that work well and with the influence their role should carry. Leaders who attend with members of their team will leave with a shared understanding of that role and a common starting point for the work.
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Meet Zora Artis
Zora Artis, GAICD, IABC Fellow, SCMP, ACC, FAMI, CPM, helps leaders and their teams do the hard work of alignment when the stakes are high and the path is not obvious. As CEO of Artis Advisory and co-founder of Clear Leaders, her research collaboration with Wayne Aspland, she coaches, advises and facilitates C-suite and senior teams through change and complexity, turning competing priorities into clear decisions, stronger cohesion and coordinated action.
Over more than three decades spanning executive leadership, brand, consulting and strategic communication, Zora has worked with organisations across the public, private and for-purpose sectors on their strategic foundations: purpose, brand, culture and strategy, and how they connect to the way work actually gets done.
Zora has long been a leader within IABC. She has served as Chair of IABC Asia Pacific and as a Director on the IABC International Executive Board, and she currently chairs the IABC Change Management Special Interest Group. She is an IABC Fellow and a Strategic Communication Management Professional (SCMP). Her recognition includes multiple Gold Quill awards for communication excellence, the IABC Chair's Award (twice) and IABC Regional Leader of the Year.
With Wayne, Zora has completed three global studies on strategic alignment over seven years. The latest, From Groupthink to Governance, was produced in partnership with IABC and draws on interviews with 55 CEOs, Chiefs of Staff and senior leaders across five continents. She presented its findings at the 2026 IABC World Conference in Toronto.
Zora is an ICF-credentialed coach trained with the NeuroLeadership Institute, a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a Fellow and Certified Practising Marketer of the Australian Marketing Institute. She brings a director's view of governance and a coach's ear for what goes unsaid in the room. Based in Melbourne, Australia, she works with organisations globally.
Meet Wayne Aspland
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Wayne Aspland helps organisations and teams realise their potential in today’s new world of work. A world where the opportunities created by AI are balanced against the strain of accelerating change and uncertainty. He achieves this with a focus on enabling AI strategy and capability, strategic alignment and communication and change capacity.
Wayne’s background is in senior leadership, strategy and change communication, as well as investor and industry relations. He has advised boards, executives and senior leaders on strategy and alignment, transformation, thought leadership, employee enablement, technology adoption and behavioural change.
A particular area of interest for Wayne is strategic alignment. He has published three groundbreaking global studies on the subject with Zora Artis and helped senior leaders at many organisations design, launch and embed their strategy.
Wayne is also one of Australia's leading experts on AI in communications. He is an AI strategist at Red Marble AI, a member of the Claude Partner Network and a co-host of the monthly AI Discovery Forum from the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence. He has also provided AI enablement training to almost 4,000 people and written four research papers on AI and comms… the first in 2017.
Wayne is a Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a Fellow of the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence.