Want to Maintain Trust? Start Early.

A crisis of trust rarely begins with the crisis itself

Last week, New York City Public Schools announced a one-year moratorium on student-facing generative AI through eighth grade. Los Angeles Unified followed with similar restrictions.

There will be plenty of debate about whether those are the right decisions.

What interests me, as someone who works in crisis and reputation, is how differently an institution and its stakeholders can experience the same change.

An institution may think:

"We’ve identified a promising tool. We’ve evaluated it. We’ll establish guardrails as we learn."

A parent may think:

"This affects my child. What is it doing? Who decided this? Who was consulted? Why am I only learning about it now?"

This kind of disconnect can quickly erode hard-won trust.

Organizations often treat stakeholder communication as the final step: make the decision, then explain it. But on issues involving children, safety, technology, or community values, communication needs to begin earlier.

People don’t have to agree with every decision to retain trust, and most don’t expect to. But they do need to understand the evidence, who had a voice, and whether leadership listened.

When organizations introduce consequential change, they should invest as much in communication and stakeholder engagement at the front end as they do in explaining it afterward. That small step will help preserve the trust they’ve worked so hard to earn.

#CrisisCommunications #Education #StakeholderEngagement #ArtificialIntelligence