AI Communication Lessons From Indiana University

Universities must develop an adaptive and clearly communicated approach to AI. Typically, university decision-making operates through lengthy processes built around committee meetings, deliberation and procedural review. With AI technologies evolving so quickly, such timing often does not work.

As someone passionate about strategic communications and learning, I have been exploring how universities are approaching the challenge of communicating AI initiatives and embedding it into an institution’s culture. In conversations with Sarah Wanger, assistant dean of graduate education, and Brad Wheeler, adviser to the dean for technology and innovation, I gained insight into how the Indiana University Kelley School of Business has navigated AI adoption across a community of roughly 400 faculty members, 400 staff and 13,000 students.

By summer 2025, leaders at the Kelley School concluded that earlier AI guidance was too rigid and policy-heavy for a rapidly evolving environment. Under the leadership of Dean Patrick Hopkins, they decided to take a fundamentally different approach. Eventually, Hopkins and a small group crafted the Kelley AI Playbook, a lean, values-based framework developed by a small team rather than a large committee. Released in July 2025, the playbook is anchored around five principles.

1. AI transparency builds trust
2. Authentically Kelley purpose
3. AI supports, but doesn’t substitute
4. We explore AI together
5. We model AI discernment

Importantly, the playbook was reinforced through action rather than treated as a standalone communications document. Complementing it were major AI professional development efforts for faculty and staff, emphasizing that AI learning and experimentation are relevant across the entire organization. Efforts included working groups, AI learning labs, book clubs, peer sharing sessions and tactical workshops tied directly to day-to-day responsibilities. The broader goal was to create an evolving culture of learning and experimentation around AI.

Among the notable signs of engagement was that 120 instructors recently participated in a seven-hour AI course-development workshop despite the significant time pressures they already face. AI experimentation and innovation eventually spread widely enough across the school to support plans for a dedicated AI innovation showcase and conference.

From my deep dive into how AI initiatives are being communicated at the Kelley School, here are several lessons that other institutions can consider modeling.

1. Forget overused words in higher education like “alignment” and “consensus.” Few issues in higher education today generate as much excitement, anxiety and institutional debate as artificial intelligence. Views run the gamut, from enthusiastic adoption to extreme resistance. In this context, you simply will not align and gain consensus among every stakeholder. Instead, leadership needs to take a clear stance, move forward, gather feedback and iterate as technologies and institutional needs evolve.

Related to this point, don’t target everyone in your communications. Kelley’s strategy was not designed around convincing everyone, but rather around mobilizing the large middle group of faculty and staff who were open to learning and experimentation. In other words, don’t communicate with the converted and don’t argue with the resistant. Instead, equip the movable.

2. Messaging and communications need to reflect the realities of AI. Institutions should emphasize experimentation, curiosity and continuous learning rather than mastery from day one. The AI playbook is revised quarterly to keep pace with technological change and stakeholder feedback. This reflects continuous learning and is somewhat counterintuitive in higher education, where we often reward certainty, expertise and polished answers that appear finalized.
3. Crafting a document is not enough. Communicating AI effectively requires reinforcement from multiple directions across the institution and needs to combine content with experiences. Kelley combined leadership communications, institutional newsletters, faculty and staff working groups, peer learning, workshops, and informal communities to create continuous visibility and engagement around AI adoption.
4. Anchor AI communications strategies around values and identity, not the technology. “Authentically Kelley,” a key principle in the AI playbook, is a long-standing cultural expression within the school. The message served as a reminder that AI adoption should reflect Kelley’s existing culture and values rather than replace them. Instead of positioning AI as a separate technology initiative, the school framed it as an extension of how Kelley already approaches teaching, research, communication and innovation.

5. Leadership is key. Progress accelerated because Hopkins gave faculty and staff clear permission to move quickly, experiment and act rather than remain stuck in endless deliberation. When top leadership isn’t actively involved in such decisions, the result is often a series of lengthy committee meetings and prolonged deliberations.

For higher education marketers and communicators, this creates an important opportunity to serve not just as messengers, but as strategic advisers. Communicators should be uniquely positioned to identify stakeholder concerns, recognize emerging narratives and help institutions make sense of rapidly evolving conversations around AI. It is incumbent upon us to leverage that perspective to help leadership communicate a school or institution’s approach to AI with both clarity and adaptability.