Do you need a chief AI officer? Here's how the tech is changing boardrooms

Maskot | Digitalvision | Since the debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT in 2022, and the subsequent AI revolution, workers across industries have been hit by sweeping layoffs . A new report published by IBM last week, however, shows that AI is also reshaping boardrooms and how CEOs make decisions. The report says 76% of the more than 2,000 organizations surveyed have established a new executive office — that of the chief AI officer (CAIO) — up from 26% in 2025. Analysts and experts have expressed concerns over the possibility of a labor crisis arising from the proliferation of AI across the corporate sphere. "AI is driving what may be the largest organizational shift since the industrial and digital revolutions," Vivek Lath, partner at McKinsey & Company, told CNBC. The IBM report also found that AI was deepening the influence of one of the C-suite's most established portfolios, with 59% of respondents expecting the influence of the chief human resources officer (CHRO) to grow. Blurred lines As AI has matured, the question of its ownership in the boardroom has led to an increasingly confusing picture. The existing roster of tech-facing roles, like the chief technology officer, chief information officer and chief data officer, has often introduced ambiguity over AI responsibility at the executive level, according to Lian Jye Su, chief analyst from market research firm Omdia. …