CAIO Weeknote #12
Momentum, meetings, Task Force and teamwork
Monday
Always kick start Monday with my AI Team meeting first thing, our sprint for the week.
Cross-over meeting with our Office of Public Service Innovation Team. It’s brilliant to see all the projects that cross over in the AI space with my team, OPSI and the work of our Digital Services Team. Mapping it all out on digital whiteboards was super useful.
Weekly catch-up with Ste Sharples, who heads up our Digital Services team. Great to understand the work that he is leading with our internal Dev Ops for AI in internal services and the changes to our Customer Contact Centre, which will underpin much of our AI work together.
Interview for my contribution to a report that has been commissioned on our Civic Data Cooperative.
In January, we will be putting out the call to join our AI Task Force, so I’ve been working closely with our Comms Team to design the sign-up process and associated communications.
Tuesday
Up on an early train to London - prep for AI Working Group Monthly Meeting. It’s only when you put it all down that you realise how much you have done in the last month. Highlights include:
AI TaskForce recruitment and comms planned
Transport: AI pilot identified and working group set up
Health and Social Care: Visit to Alder Hey
Education: Procurement and legal navigation to have an independent evaluation of current tech provision up and out for tenders, contracts signed and planning for 2026.
AI Summit: kick off planning for 2026
Capability: AI Team recruitment undertaken, bolstering the team for 2026. Supporting our Business Hub Team on internal training of AI tools. AI project database built
Comms: 7 event speeches and engagement last month from myself and Kayla.
That’s with two of us in the team and supported by a Project Support Officer for 2 days a week. Looking forward to properly motoring next year with a bigger team.
Lunchtime meeting with Paula, part of my directorate on Assurance, understanding the rigour that goes into evaluating and managing £1.6bn grants across 220+ live projects at any one time that she and her team of 18 manage.
End of year in-person catch-up with Kayla, my AI Project Manager on transitions for next year as we bring on new team members.
AI Working Group Monthly Meeting sharing the above and getting input from Digital Transformation, OPSI, Digital Services and Innovation team members.
Quick check in to the hotel and turnaround.
Absolutely delighted to have dinner locally with Camilla Mankabady, our Director of Strategic Communications and Corporate Affairs.
Wednesday
Early morning start before work on my dissertation for my MSc in Applied Positive Psychology. Strongly suspect that my focus is too narrow for my systematic literature review on constructive dissent, and very likely that I’ll need to start it again. Frustrating, but the tight research frame I used has not revealed enough juice to make a great model for the key levers of my principled rebels innovation programme, so back to the drawing board is likely. I have a call with my supervisor this week.
Great meeting with Nigel Jones, Partner - Senior Consultant at another of our great digital businesses, CGI, the largest Canadian IT company, with offices just next to us. It was super useful for me to understand more of our digital ecosystem and spot further opportunities to work together. Nigel and the team at CGI helped us set up our OPSI team, and it’s great to understand the work they do on the West Midlands Transport App and the NHS App built by them for our learning.
I’ll be leaning into what they are doing on their STEM programme and Executive Insight Exchange in the new year. I was THRILLED to understand they have a Cyber Escape Room - we will look at how we can upskill ourselves and others in the region in that environment.
Great to meet Oliver Large, Policy Expert at Tony Blair Institute for Change and update him on our work, our liaisons and integration with GDS Local, DSIT and MHCLG and where else the good policy work of the institute could focus to support us and others.
Back to London and straight to dinner with case and bag for Christmas dinner with friends at Shoreditch House.
I’ll be back up in HQ in the first week of January.
Thursday
It was a pleasure to speak at ‘Innovation and Disruptive Technologies for Future Engineering and Technology’, convened by the IEEE Women in Engineering United Kingdom and Ireland team with Liverpool John Moores University.
Their Mission is to connect, support, and inspire women and girls worldwide, and facilitate their recruitment and retention in STEM fields, fostering technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of humanity.
After an initial address, it was great to hear from Mitra Mirhassani, Director at SHIELD Automotive Cybersecurity Centre of Excellence at the University of Windsor, who shared solid research and clear points of view on:
Trust in AI systems: we must have trust in data, models and deployment.
Identifying AI Engineer constraints: cost, latency and energy now drive design, reliability matters more than demos, and you can demonstrate sustainability leading efficiency at scale.
Using Digital Twins as decision systems.
Challenge the bias in AI systems.
I shared my remit as Chief AI Officer and the programme of activity for the region.
As I had the day off on Friday and many of my colleagues are off over the Christmas period, there was a flurry of end of year admin for procurement, recruitment, team updates, comms, AI Task Force planning.
Uni Supervision for my dissertation: As I suspected, back to the drawing board. Incredibly frustrating, but the end product will be so much better. I’m leaning in hard to devise how corporate innovation can be strengthened with constructive dissent, critical and divergent thinking. It is so needed, more than ever, in AI-assisted workplaces.
Friday
Day off - probably rewriting my systematic literature review protocol now [where is the scream emoji when you need it?!]
In other news
techUK future gazing local government write up
Two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of joining techUK for a podcast on future gazing – where next for local government tech in 2026?
The panel were:
Lorna Ingwell - Senior Researcher, Tussell
Tiffany St James - Chief AI Officer, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority
Ben Unsworth, Director Digital and Technology, Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames
Helen Stevenson, Programme Manager for Digital Capabilities, Local Government Association
The full write-up is now available here on techUK.
SFTC Hartree December News
Great share from Kayla on SFTC Hartree Round-up, including interesting moves in Quantum in the region.
Oh, and Kayla from my team won the Christmas Jumper competition last week, which raises the stakes for next year.
Tiffany St James
Chief AI Officer, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority
It's interesting how you're approaching the education sector; the focus on an independent evaluation of current tech provision really highlights a smart and forward-thinking strategy for true impact, which is crucal for us teachers.
Great read once again, Tiffany. How you fit it all in is a wonder!?! If I may offer something that may help - please could you sometimes break down the acronyms? 🙏 I am off to try to understand what constructive dissent is 😁 Have a lovely Christmas and try to relax!