AI Governance Theatre
20 Apr
Written By Anthony van de Veen
Why most enterprise AI oversight is all costume and no substance, and what the EU is about to do about it.
That is when the EU AI Act's high-risk AI obligations become enforceable. Not proposed. Not pending. Enforceable, with penalties reaching up to €35 million or 7% of global annual revenue for organisations that cannot demonstrate compliant governance of their AI initiatives.
For most enterprises, this date is somewhere on a compliance calendar, flagged but not yet urgent. There are other priorities. There are quarterly targets. There are pilot programmes to run.
But here is what I have observed after three years working inside these organisations: the majority of them are not behind on documentation or missing a few policy sign-offs. They are behind on something far more fundamental. They have been running AI governance theatre, and they do not know it yet.
Anthony van de Veen