Earning authority in the age of AI: Takeaways from our Open Dialogue panel
Aug 28, 2026
3 min
Can a client shortlist your firm without ever visiting your website? Increasingly, yes. They can ask an AI model to compare architects or engineers, get a synthesised answer in seconds, and form a view of your capability before a single human conversation begins.
That shift was the starting point for Open Dialogue: Earning Authority in the Age of AI, held at Hyde Melbourne Place on July 20, 2026. We brought together four people who see this change from very different seats:
- A CMO
- An AI practitioner
- 2 communications leads from two of Australia’s most respected architecture practices
The conversation kept returning to a paradox. AI is changing the mechanics of how firms get discovered and evaluated, but the things that actually win work are still deeply human:
- Point of view
- Relationships
- Judgement
- Proof
Watch the full panel below, and read on for the ideas that stayed with me.
The panel
- Derek Ries, Chief Marketing Officer, OpenAsset
- Kirsten “KT” Trengove, Communications Lead, ARM Architecture
- Isabella “Izzy” White, National Communications Manager, Architectus
- Rye Smith, Managing Director, FutureDeployed and Community Ambassador for Claude
AI, Authority, and what stayed with me
1. Authority is earned months before the RFP lands
Derek made the case that the firms winning right now aren’t submitting more tenders. They’re hyper-focused on specific sub-industries and buyer committees, and they understand those clients’ problems end to end.
Relationships are moving higher up the funnel. If a client only learns how you’re differentiated at the proposal stage, it’s already too late.
That means account-based thinking matters more than ever, whether that’s one-to-one (a single high-value client) or one-to-few (a specific sub-industry, region or segment).
2. You’re now writing for humans and robots — and generic content fails both
If your public footprint is generic, AI will synthesise a generic profile of your firm.
The panel’s recommendation for standing out in the age of AI was to make expertise visible and provable: author bylines, expert opinion pieces, subject matter expert interviews, and content that clearly connects what you know to what you’ve done.
(It’s a theme we’ve explored before: see how AEC marketing must change for the age of AI.)
Human connection got equal weight. Derek noted that hosted events, sponsorships and activations are becoming more important for building mindshare — not less — and it’s something OpenAsset is investing in more than ever.
3. Individual voices are outperforming corporate channels
Izzy’s perspective on how to balance corporate versus individual voices was one of the most discussed of the afternoon:
- Media consumption is fragmented.
- A single core brand campaign no longer lands the same way for everyone.
- Individual voices build trust because they entertain and inform rather than constantly market.
AI search dynamics reinforce the shift toward elevating individual expertise, rewarding a consensus of expert voices over one branded channel.
For an 800-person practice like Architectus, that changes the communications team’s job: from brand enforcer to curator, orchestrator and teacher.
Rather than scripting people, the opportunity is to find the staff who are naturally comfortable as ambassadors. As Izzy was careful to add, that means platforming a diversity of voices rather than reinforcing existing biases.
What must stay human? A firm’s actual point of view and judgement, which is what Izzy called “refusing to outsource humanity.”
4. Don’t abandon search fundamentals in pursuit of AI hype
Rye grounded the AI conversation in practical discoverability. By his estimate, traditional search still accounts for roughly 85–90% of research, with AI search around 10–12%. SEO fundamentals still matter. This is his immediate to-do list for marketing teams:
- Implement schema markup. Most competitors aren’t doing it.
- Summarise articles and case studies clearly. AI scans and surfaces concise context.
- Publish an llms.txt file which is a page AI agents can crawl for context on your firm, projects and people. Rye sees a first-mover window here before it becomes standard practice.
He also made the case that third-party signals (press coverage, backlinks and especially awards) now carry extra weight because AI actively cites them when answering relevant queries.
5. Wanting to adopt AI is not the same as being ready to
KT brought a perspective on AI adoption that I think the industry needs more of: Brand strategy itself hasn’t changed dramatically but the mechanism for executing it has.
The overlooked barrier is organizational change capacity, which matters most in bid environments where data integrity and client confidence are on the line.
She also pushed the governance conversation beyond IP protection: firms need to understand their own moral position, including on AI’s environmental cost, and operate by it.
ARM’s first impact report began as an internal accountability tool and is now used publicly in bids and business development.
6. AI is a leveller, which makes the human layer the differentiator
The panel broadly agreed that AI raises the floor for smaller and less-resourced firms, compressing the advantage that used to come from simply having more people or budget, which makes the human layer more important, not less.
The recurring idea across all four speakers: automation should free time for higher-value connection and thinking, not just produce more output faster, which is something bid teams under pressure will recognize immediately.
The speed round turned that into homework:
- Analyse your past five to 10 wins to find your repeatable ideal client.
- Test AI-generated answers against that profile.
- Audit your daily workflows for low-hanging automation.
- And start developing your next generation of internal brand ambassadors, especially younger staff who may adapt fastest.
The closing challenge for leveraging AI in built environment marketing
The last word went to the floor, and it was a challenge I’ll pass on here: publish more of your own thinking.
The architecture and engineering firms that will be recommended by clients and by AI are the ones whose expertise is visible, specific, and backed by real project detail that competitors and AI can’t fake.
Watch the full conversation above, and if it sparks a thought, I’d genuinely love to hear it. Better yet, share it with your marketing or bid team and pick one thing from the speed round to try this quarter.
And thank you again to Derek, KT, Izzy and Rye for bringing so much generosity and candour to the room. Follow OpenAsset on LinkedIn to hear about future events.
Caroline Caneva has spent over twenty years inside the architecture, design, and construction industry — working alongside the practitioners, understanding the pressures, and building the kind of marketing that moves things forward in this sector. Her career spans marketing and growth leadership at some of Australasia’s most recognised design practices, including a full rebrand across eleven studios at Plus Studio. Seven years at the Design Institute of Australia gave her a sector-wide view of the professional community, and her contribution to Australian design was awarded with an Honorary Fellowship (FDIA hon).
Caroline’s experience now informs her work as a speaker, writer, and advocate for how technology and AI can practically transform the way built environment firms market themselves and win work.
