CAIO Weeknote #31
A week full of strategy, systems and humanity
Monday
Bank Holiday. Got my dissertation in for my MSc in Applied Positive Psychology, the day before the deadline. Hoorah! I can now have my weekends back - what will I concoct now? A full-on weekend and bank holiday of the final push, but complete.
A London week this week to balance out too many days on the road last week.
Tuesday
Mini AI Programme Team quick catch-up.
AI Programme Strategy. This week I’ve been delving into the governance architecture for AI Test Beds.
Prep for my monthly 121 with my Director, Lorna, and the subsequent hour catch-up. In reality, we do squeeze in more than this a month, as the AI Programme is developing and touching more parts of the Authority.
Monthly AI Working Group Meeting consisting of our AI Programme Team, Lorna, our Director, Digital Services, Office for Public Sector Innovation, Innovation Team and Monitoring and Intelligence Team to drive the agenda forward.
121 with Mischa, supporting me on the AI Summit organisation to set up tasks for the week.
Wednesday
Call with Patrick, who runs our internal Project Manager Pool, discussing urgent resources needed for the AI Programme Team.
Call with our Legal Team to understand what they need to be satisfied with our forthcoming AI Programme pilots. Snagging our DPIA templates for our team for next week.
Team planning on outcomes and activities. Modelling for AI Test Bed.
More progress on AI Summit - venue, contracts, procurement.
Dash into town for an evening event. I miss the mid-week evening event tech chats and community in Liverpool, but can jump into them when back in London midweek.
Great debate at EY on: Attracting and retaining diverse talent in today’s AI era.
Key takeaways for me were:
🎤If we do nothing, we go backwards
🎤Understand the problems you need to solve
🎤Understand how to design a good system: structure and interoperability
🎤Showcase value
Huge thanks to the panellists:
Debbie J. Govt, Defence and Space at NVIDIA
Helen Price, Head of Asset Mgmt Engineering at Fidelity International
Cris Saunders, Head of Digital Customer Products at Legal and General
Divya Kesavan, Head of Data Science at Lloyds Banking Group.
Expertly moderated by Laura Henchoz, Global Alliances Sales Lead - NVIDIA, EY
Thursday
Head down on strategy most of the day: Outcomes, activities, AI Test Bed Governance, and ROI forecasting of AI initiatives.
My head was so down, I was late for a call with my Director and our Head of Procurement for no other reason than I was gripped by the strategic modelling, but mortified all the same, I take pride in being on time.
My role is to innovate, while our procurement processes needs to ensure that we are buying fairly, and our legal team ensures that we are within the law and ethically sound. We are part of the same larger team, but I know that I am going to push boundaries in the way we operate, as new models will be developed for how we operate AI in the region. It’s solved by engaging early, understanding needs from each other’s roles and ensuring we can all move forward together and above all being human (and probably on time!).
AI Summit support call with Georgia, a brilliant Junior Project Manager in our department who is helping me navigate financial and procurement systems.
An online refresher session on raising purchase orders and supplier set-up. Needed, but it’s still fairly fiddly. Will still need Georgia.
More strategy and planning - more to learn and more to do on ROI forecasting and AI Test Bed modelling.
Friday
A morning of navigating expenses and reconciliation for trips and our financial accountability processes. A morning may not be enough.
AI Summit, AI Task Force progression and team steering.
A great discussion with the team of Behind the Algorithm Podcast: AI Tech and Human Philosophy, check them out here: https://behindthealgo.com/
Prep call with Tech UK for my panel next week.
Call with Henry on my team, steering his great work on AI in Education.
Looking forward to my first MSc-free weekend :) Have a good one.
Events that I’m speaking at - coming up
DTX Podcast - Tiffany St James, CAIO on The Blue Print for Responsible AI
13 May: Tech UK, The Smarter State, London
16-17 June: Global AI Cities 2026, Manchester
10 Sept: Connected Britain, London
10 Nov: Brilliant Festival, Liverpool
Tiffany St James
Chief AI Officer, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority