Playbook: The Role of AI in the Future of Community Strategy

# Theme: Emerging Tech

# Theme: Leadership & Executive Perspectives

# Theme: Community Building & DevRel

# Theme: GTM Strategy & Trends

# Format: Best Practices & Playbooks

# Challenge: AI Adoption

How executives can use AI to strengthen connection, insight, and decision-making across teams.

December 5, 2025

Brian Oblinger

Joshua Zerkel

Artificial intelligence is transforming how organizations understand and engage with their audiences. For community leaders, AI offers new ways to identify patterns, predict needs, and personalize experiences at scale. For executives, it presents an opportunity to connect community strategy directly to business growth.

As Brian Oblinger shared during Executive Insights with Gradual, AI is not a replacement for human connection. It is a way to enhance it.

“AI should enhance human connection, not replace it. The best use cases make community professionals more effective, not less visible.”

Leaders who approach AI thoughtfully can use it to make their organizations more responsive, data-informed, and aligned around customer needs.

Step 1: Identify where AI can add real value

The first step for executives is to understand where AI can support—not overtake—the work of community teams. It is easy to get distracted by hype or efficiency promises, but meaningful adoption starts with clarity of purpose.

High-impact use cases for community:

Insight generation: Analyze conversation trends to surface emerging themes, sentiment shifts, or recurring questions.

Content curation: Automatically recommend relevant discussions, resources, or events to members.

Member onboarding: Guide new members toward introductions and topics that fit their goals.

Moderator support: Flag duplicate questions, summarize threads, or identify unanswered posts.

Each of these examples uses AI to remove friction and surface value, freeing humans to focus on relationship-building and strategic alignment.

Step 2: Keep humans at the center

AI can make communities smarter, but it cannot replace empathy or judgment. Executives should ensure that community teams remain visible, approachable, and accountable.

Best practices for human-centered AI adoption:

Maintain clear guidelines for when and how AI is used in community spaces.

Give members transparency about when they are interacting with automated systems.

Empower moderators and community managers to review and refine AI outputs.

Encourage teams to use AI for insight generation, not decision-making.

Brian reminded leaders that people participate in communities because they want to be seen and heard. AI should make that easier, not feel like a barrier.

“Technology should serve the community, not the other way around.”

Step 3: Use AI to connect community data across the business

One of AI’s greatest advantages is its ability to process and link information across multiple systems. Executives can use it to bring together data from community platforms, CRM systems, support tools, and product analytics into a unified view of customer experience.

Practical ways to integrate AI-powered insights:

Identify trends that appear simultaneously in community discussions and support tickets.

Highlight signals of churn or advocacy across multiple channels.

Feed aggregated insights into go-to-market planning and customer journey design.

This connected approach helps executives see community not as a standalone platform but as a system of insight that informs the entire organization.

Step 4: Build governance and trust

AI adoption must come with strong governance and clear communication. Leaders should define how community data is used, stored, and shared to maintain member trust.

Elements of responsible governance:

Establish data privacy policies that align with legal standards and community values.

Review AI tools for bias, accuracy, and data security before implementation.

Communicate openly with members about how AI helps improve their experience.

Transparency is critical. When members understand that their data is being used to improve outcomes—not to replace human judgment—they are more likely to stay engaged.

Step 5: Prepare teams for an AI-augmented future

AI’s rapid evolution means community and GTM teams will need new skills. Executives can lead by providing training and creating opportunities for experimentation.

Ways to build AI readiness:

Encourage teams to pilot small AI use cases before scaling.

Offer learning paths focused on prompt design, analysis, and ethical AI use.

Host internal “AI in action” sessions to share lessons across departments.

“The leaders who stay ahead will be the ones who treat AI as a capability to develop, not a tool to buy,” Brian said.

By creating space for learning, executives can help teams stay curious, adaptable, and confident as new technologies emerge.

Bringing it together

AI is reshaping what is possible in community strategy, but its greatest potential lies in how it helps people connect more effectively. The future of community leadership will depend on balance—using technology to scale insight and personalization while protecting the authenticity that makes communities meaningful.

Executives who understand that balance will be the ones who build more resilient, trusted, and intelligent organizations.

▶️ Watch the full replay here.

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