Boards rarely debate whether a company’s Chief Financial Officer should have deep financial expertise. Nor do they appoint a General Counsel without rigorous legal training or having passed a bar exam. In these roles, functional mastery is assumed, because the risks of getting it wrong are obvious and immediate.

Communications leadership, however, is often treated differently.

Senior communications leadership roles — whether titled Chief Communications Officer, Head of Communications, Vice President of Communications or similar — are still, too often, filled based on seniority, proximity to the CEO or a perception of good instincts, rather than demonstrated functional expertise.

In more mature markets, functional expertise in communications leadership is customary. In many emerging markets and companies, however, the role is still defined and appointed with varying levels of rigor. This approach may have been workable when communications was largely about messaging. In today’s environment, it is increasingly difficult to justify.

Communications is a core risk function

The role of communications has fundamentally changed. It now sits at the intersection of reputation, regulation, technology and trust.

Companies operate in an environment defined by geopolitical volatility, activist stakeholders, AI-driven misinformation and intense scrutiny. A single misjudged response can escalate within minutes, erode trust across audiences and trigger regulatory, legal or financial consequences.

In this context, communications is a strategic risk function.

Senior communications leaders are increasingly expected to advise CEOs and boards in moments of uncertainty, balancing transparency with restraint, speed with accuracy and principle with pragmatism. These decisions impact not only how a company is perceived, but whether it maintains credibility with employees, customers, investors and policymakers.

Put simply, this responsibility demands experienced judgment.

Functional expertise requires functional parity

Even the most experienced communications leader cannot fulfill their mandate if the function itself is structurally marginalized.

In many companies, communications remains embedded within layers of corporate bureaucracy — reporting through Marketing, HR or Strategy — despite carrying responsibilities comparable to legal, finance or compliance. This creates a structural mismatch between risk exposure and decision authority.

When communications leaders lack direct access to executive decision making, their involvement becomes reactive rather than preventative. Counsel arrives after strategies are set, positions are announced or issues have escalated, precisely when influence is least effective.

Positioning communications as a peer function helps ensure reputational, stakeholder and trust-related risks are evaluated alongside legal, financial and operational considerations, not after them.

Boards and CEOs expecting communications leaders to exercise enterprise judgment must also ensure the function is positioned to do so.

Addressing the certification question

One reason communications leadership appointments are sometimes treated differently may be structural. Unlike legal or accounting roles, communications does not have a single, globally recognized licensing mechanism equivalent to the bar or a CPA.

This reality is worth acknowledging, but it should not lower expectations for leadership. If anything, it raises them.

The absence of a formal credential means boards and CEOs must rely even more heavily on judgment, experience and demonstrated functional mastery when appointing enterprise-level communications leaders. The stakes of the role have grown faster than the mechanisms used to assess capability.

In many ways, communications now carries risks comparable to those managed by finance or legal functions, even if the pathways into the profession are more varied. Treating this casually represents a growing governance blind spot.

What functional mastery in communications actually looks like

Functional expertise in communications combines experience, technical skill and enterprise judgment, particularly when decisions must be made under conditions of uncertainty.

At its core, communications leadership requires the ability to see the company as its stakeholders do — to anticipate how decisions, behaviors and silence will be interpreted, and to counsel leaders accordingly. In many ways, it’s consequence management.

Functional mastery in the role includes the ability to:

• Advise leaders in moments of ambiguity, before decisions are finalized, rather than manage messaging after outcomes are set
• Weigh reputational, legal, regulatory and cultural implications simultaneously, recognizing communications choices often shape risk exposure
• Counsel CEOs on visibility, credibility and personal accountability in an era where leadership itself is increasingly public
• Integrate internal, external, digital, investor and policy communications into a coherent enterprise narrative aligned with strategy and values
• Exercise restraint, knowing when communication may inflame rather than reassure, and when silence, explanation or apology is the more responsible course — and vice versa

This judgment is developed over time through exposure to complex, high-stakes situations and close partnership with senior leadership. It requires discipline and the confidence to challenge assumptions, including those of the CEO. It is not a capability that can be assumed at appointment, but one that must be deliberately developed, supported and expected.

Why boards must rethink how they appoint communications leaders

Boards increasingly recognize trust and reputation as among a company’s most fragile assets. Once lost, they are difficult and expensive to rebuild. The World Economic Forum has estimated at least 25% of a company’s market value is tied to its reputation.

Communications leaders are stewards of trust. Their counsel influences how companies show up in moments of scrutiny, how leaders are perceived as credible or evasive, and how stakeholders interpret intent.

Yet many boards and CEOs still apply a lower standard of rigor to communications leadership appointments than they would to other executive roles. This gap exposes companies to avoidable risk.

Professionalizing the appointment of senior communications leaders means acknowledging the role now demands the same seriousness of evaluation applied to finance, legal or operational leadership.

A call for maturity, not protectionism

This reflects a recognition of how the communications leadership role, and the risks attached to it, have evolved over time.

Many communications leaders built successful careers under very different expectations. The issue is not past pathways, but whether today’s appointment practices reflect today’s realities.

In some companies, senior communications roles are still filled through familiar networks — based on trust, proximity to leadership or prior exposure — rather than through rigorous assessment of enterprise-level communications judgment. While such appointments may feel safe, they often underestimate the complexity of the role as it exists today.

As trust becomes more volatile and leadership more visible, communications decisions increasingly impact outcomes at the highest level. In this environment, treating communications leadership as an extension of personal confidence rather than a discipline requiring expertise introduces avoidable risk.

Companies that treat communications as a discipline requiring judgment, rigor and accountability are better positioned to sustain credibility and manage risk. The responsibility now sits with boards and CEOs to appoint and empower leaders with that capability.