The rise of the Chief AI Officer is incredibly fascinating to me. It’s this new role where someone is hired to specifically keep up with everything happening in AI and implement it into certain operations within the company.
For example, this person might:
- Find a ChatGPT prompt that makes the Finance team work 10% faster
- Get the Marketing team using Midjourney to work 25% faster
- Implement AI tools to streamline HR processes and save teams hours a day
Every major org is hiring one.
Just recently, NASA, Dell, LVMH, Morgan Stanley, and the Dubai government hired 22. New opened positions for CAIOs are growing on LinkedIn.
Why? The potential impact of having someone increase the efficiency of an entire department by 10% is pretty unheard of, but totally possible now.
It also makes sure the org is thinking AI-first into the future and doesn’t fall behind.
Why CAIO role?
Everyone talks about AI not just taking jobs, but creating new ones, and this is a perfect example of a role we’ll see a whole lot more of.
But that leads me to a couple of unanswered questions (that many orgs likely struggle with too):
- How does an org find someone to do this role?
- Do they need a technical background, or do they just need to know how to deploy new AI tools effectively?
- Are there any education platforms building certifications for CIAOs?
If you recently were hired as a Chief AI Officer or a similar role, I’d LOVE to ask you a few questions.
FAQs regarding CAIO position
As someone who has been fortunate to work directly with CAIOs for some of the companies listed, here are a few thoughts:
How does an org find someone to do this role?
The person needs to have a deep understanding of the organizations culture, their strategic outlook and general future business priorities and also a early adopter / visionary mindset. These things are all critical to ensure IG the RIGHT AI changes are implemented at the right time and that the orgs culture is aligned to embrace the changes.
Do they need a technical background, or do they just need to know how to deploy new AI tools effectively?
There are different levels of “technical”. Someone who understands systems, someone who understands the engineering behind the company’s products, and someone who can code (or the equivalent in your field). A Chief AI Officer in my opinion doesn’t need to be hands on coding. I think there is benefit from their understanding how to apply moderately advanced prompt engineering or the like to a problem.
Certainly they need to grasp how AI systems work. They cannot be good at just business systems because that leaves a gap in AI understanding. I am not a coder, I have brilliant people that do that for me. But I can identify a problem, build a system, and give guidance to an amazing team to materialize my idea into an AI solution. Chief AI Officers who excel will do the same.
Are there any education platforms building certifications for CIAOs?
I don’t know of any formal ones but I think you have to be innately curious and at the cutting edge of innovation and that pace will exceed what is baked into courses. There are so many new advances happening every single day. X, Archive, and YouTube are the best sources for seeing what is coming next so that a long term strategy can be build around how AI will be implemented in the future.
Enterprises move slowly so it is important that a CAIO is planning years in advance. Cutting edge today will be a standard component in the future. Being at the early adopted stage to plan for what will be successful and avoid the fads requires staying current.
Courses can teach basics but to be great you need more real-time knowledge and a strategic eye for how to implement the best of the best down the road.
Authors: Rowan Cheung, John Byron Hanby, IV
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