AI Governance — Outsourced

How the outsourced CAIO works

A new solution is emerging in AI governance — an outsourced Chief AI Officer who integrates into the organisation's management team and provides AI governance, accountability and strategic direction without a full-time employment relationship. The organisation gains the capacity of an experienced leader in precisely the amount that matches its current stage of AI implementation — without paying for excess capacity, but also without being left without governance capacity in the AI field. The service provider, in turn, has a good opportunity to provide similar services to several organisations at once — thereby building up increasingly significant experience.

Why this model is becoming relevant in Latvia

The Latvian government has committed to approving a National AI Strategy with specific goals for public administration, education and defence. At the same time, the EU Artificial Intelligence Act increasingly clearly provides that the implementation of AI systems must be linked to specific institutional accountability — rather than dispersed among several roles for which AI governance is only one of many duties. At the intersection of these two processes, organisations face growing pressure to build a clear AI governance structure, while at the same time facing a shortage of experienced AI leaders in the labour market and the high cost of full-time hiring.

What an outsourced CAIO provides

• Defining the AI strategy — as a component of the organisation's overall strategy — and steering it toward approval at the management/board/council level
• Development and implementation of an AI governance framework
• Establishment of a risk and compliance monitoring framework
• Oversight and prioritisation of the development of the AI project portfolio
• Strengthening the management team's capacity on AI issues
• Management of external stakeholders and technology partners

A structured engagement model

The appeal of the model rests largely on its structured format: the engagement is defined by a specific mandate, a regular governance rhythm and measurable results, rather than an open-ended consulting contract. From the very start, the organisation clearly knows what it is paying for and what result it expects.

PPPA's role — organiser and technical enablement provider

PPPA, actively working on AI governance within its own Process-as-Code AI system, has developed:

1. an AI governance structure for public and private Latvian organisations — already presented in two webinars with a very high attendance level;
2. an innovative technical solution for AI governance — AI Register — an EU AI Act compliance platform based on a single, continuously updated register of an organisation's AI systems, which identifies and classifies AI systems, determines the organisation's role and applicable obligations, and manages evidence throughout the AI system's life cycle.