If you haven’t met your chief AI officer yet, chances are you soon will

Members of C-suites around the world are making room for a new teammate: the CAIO. In healthcare, some organizations are hiring for the even more specialized position of CHAIO, for chief health AI officer.

The trend seems to have been gaining steam since about last summer. This week the New York Times takes a look, offering anecdotes to support the hypothesis that the executive-level AI job, whatever it’s called, has become “the hottest new role in corporate America and beyond.”

Among the subject-matter experts the newspaper quotes is one from healthcare—Bhavik Patel, MD, MBA, the CAIO of Mayo Clinic Arizona. Patel, a radiologist, has been at his AI leadership duties since last September.

“Modern-day healthcare still has a lot of gaps,” Patel tells the Times. “I think we can smartly use artificial intelligence to bridge those gaps or at least reduce them.”

Here are some other noteworthy quotes on the subject.

1. I think there are two reasons why this position needs to exist [in healthcare]. The first is that you need someone who’s knowledgeable and accountable for how this technology is used. The second is really about needing to have someone in the room when decisions are being made about … what’s coming [in AI] and what might we want to consider using.—Karandeep Singh, MD, CHAIO of UC San Diego Health. Source: The San Diego Union-Tribune

2. I realized that I could do a lot of things that I didn’t think I could do prior to this [as a technologist and a business strategist]. I’ve gained a lot of confidence from this [CAIO] experience, and I feel now that I’ve done this, I can do almost anything.—Parminder Bhatia, CAIO of GE HealthCare. Source: CIO.com

3. [In federal agencies], cross-cutting work such as AI governance and risk management cannot be performed in a vacuum; Chief AI Officers will need to coordinate with other relevant officials, such as agency CIOs, CDOs and CTOs. This is necessary for a number of reasons, but importantly, many existing teams already maintain the authorities, resources and expertise to carry out the responsibilities identified for the Chief AI Officer.—Federal CIO Clare Martorana, et al. Source: U.S. Chief Information Officers Council

4. The first thing for a chief AI officer is to understand technologies, and how are they best applied to solving problems, frictions that exist across an organization.—Daniel Hulme, CAIO of WPP (UK-based advertising/PR agency). Source: CNBC

5. Where [the CAIO] will sit, I don't know. There’s an argument they should still sit under the CIO or the CDO. But everything depends on how quickly AI proliferates. Maybe in 10 or 15 years, there'll be a chief AI officer who sits on the executive board and has a helicopter view across the organization because, by then, AI is likely going to be imperative to every facet of the business.—Lily Haake, head of technology and digital executive search at technology recruiter Harvey Nash. Source: ZDNet

• And a few telling headlines:
   
  • Why Every Company Needs A Chief AI Officer (Forbes)
  • The Urgent Case for a Chief AI Officer (Constellation Research)
  • Every C-Suite Member Is Now a Chief AI Officer (Boston Consulting Group)