Key Stakeholders for your AI Task Force

Whether contemplating using Generative AI tools in your organization’s workflows and procedures, or already dabbling with them, now is the time for your organization to form an AI Task Force for the purpose of establishing an AI Governance Policy.

An AI Governance Policy is essential for guiding the selection, implementation, and management of AI tools, and an AI Task Force comprised of key stakeholders can produce a thoughtful, comprehensive policy.

At a minimum, the Task Force should be comprised of an Executive Sponsor and stakeholders from Human Resources, Cybersecurity, Compliance, Project Management, and select Departments/Business Units. Each Task Force member can provide the unique knowledge, insight, and perspective of their roles to guide the drafting of the Policy. Additional considerations for each of these Task Force members include:

Executive Sponsor

Since human responses to AI range between instant thumbs-down and exuberant thumbs-up, clarity of purpose is required from the Task Force’s onset: the work of the Task Force is not to make a go/no-go decision for the organization; it’s to produce a thorough AI Governance Policy that ensures the organization’s selection and use of AI is consistent and addresses real risk.

Human Resources Stakeholder

The HR Stakeholder has a finger on the pulse of the organization’s human stories — stories created through human collaboration, accountability, camaraderie, and inspiration. The HR stakeholder can help the Task Force dialog and brainstorm — maybe even predict — the unintended, detrimental consequences of depleting the human stories through AI replacement.

Cybersecurity Stakeholder

Generative AI is neither friend nor foe. It is a data tool made possible by graphic processing units which are, at this point in time, manufactured (primarily) by one company, which was hacked in 2022 by a real foe — cybercriminals who stole employee credentials and proprietary information. The Cybersecurity Stakeholder can help Task Force members address the sobering reality of the current-state immature relationship between businesses and AI, and that relationship’s intersection with cybercriminals.

Compliance Stakeholder

The unfolding legal landscape of Generative AI requires the keen review of a Compliance Stakeholder who can break down the landscape’s complexities into applicable lessons that can help the Task Force draft effective language governing non-compliance scenarios.

Project Management Stakeholder

A Project Management Stakeholder can help the Task Force dialog about the challenges the organization will face implementing AI as a ‘new way of working’, which will aid Task Force members in defining policy governing AI implementation projects.

Department/Business Unit Stakeholder

Familiar with daily workflow and standard operating procedures, a Department/Business Unit Stakeholder can help the Task Force draft language governing the selection of a task that could be performed by AI.

Effective Continuous Improvement begins with clarity on workflows, procedures, and training plans.

This blog was written and edited by a human!

© 2024 Lori K. Barbeau