7. Action. Map the decisions before they map themselves

One deliverable, not a framework. Most firms already have a framework, and it hasn’t helped.

Ask management for a map of the top 10–20 material AI-supported decisions. One row each. The business owner. What the AI actually does, in the four verbs. The authority limit, as a number. Who approved any exception and when it expires. The main dependency. The fallback, and who performs it. What forces escalation. Where the evidence lives.

Nine columns, two pages. It will take longer to produce than anybody expects. That delay tells you something before you read a word, because a company that fills it in a fortnight is already governing this and one that needs a quarter is still discovering it.

What comes back will show you orphaned decisions, ambiguous authority, stale approvals, exceptions nobody closed, concentration hiding behind a healthy supplier count, and a fallback that exists only on paper.

Boards don’t need to own AI. They do need to know who owns the decisions AI is now allowed to make.

AI can inherit authority. It cannot inherit accountability.