The Board is asking questions nobody can answer
Where are we using AI? What is the risk? What is the return? The answers sit in five different places, or nowhere.
Artificial Intelligence Practice
Fractional Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer
Executive AI leadership for the days you need it.
One accountable owner for AI strategy, governance and delivery, without the cost or the wait of a full-time appointment.
Your side of the fence
Six signs your organisation needs a fractional CAIO
AI rarely arrives as one planned programme. It arrives in pieces, across departments, faster than anyone can govern it. These are the points at which organisations usually call us.
Staff are already using AI you have not approved
Shadow AI is in daily use, and company and client data is going into tools you have never assessed.
Pilots are not progressing to Production state
Proofs of concept have run for months. None has a business owner, a benefits case or a route to go-live.
Someone has asked how you govern AI
A regulator, an auditor, an insurer or a major client wants to see your policy, your controls and who is accountable.
AI spend is growing with no single view of it
Every department is buying licences and every vendor now has an AI story. Nobody is testing those claims against your needs.
You need the leadership, not yet the full-time role
The work is real and urgent, but it does not yet fill a permanent executive seat, and experienced AI leaders are hard to find.
Both sides of the fence
What you need, and what we bring
Each requirement an organisation typically identifies, set against what a Bushey fractional CAIO delivers in the role.
What you need
One accountable owner for AI
AI decisions are spread across IT, risk, legal and the business. Nobody answers to the Board for the whole picture.
What we bring
A named executive at your leadership table
Your fractional CAIO owns AI strategy, risk and reporting, and is accountable to your CEO and Board for the days you engage them.
What you need
An AI strategy tied to business benefit
Investment that follows the organisation's priorities, with a clear case for what each initiative returns.
What we bring
A roadmap that delivers, not just a plan
Use cases prioritised by benefit, then steered through delivery using your own project and change processes, with clear governance and benefits tracked at every stage.
What you need
Governance the Board can rely on
Policies, decision rights and evidence that stand up when a regulator, auditor or client asks to see them.
What we bring
Governance you can evidence
Roles, controls and assurance designed around how your organisation already works, so you can show a regulator, auditor or client exactly how AI is governed.
What you need
Control of shadow AI and data exposure
A clear picture of which AI tools are in use, what data they touch, and rules staff can follow.
What we bring
Shadow AI brought into the light
Your Fractional CAIO leads the discovery of AI tools in use, sets clear acceptable-use rules and works with your security team to protect sensitive data.
What you need
A clear view of vendors and platforms
Someone who can separate what a product does from what the sales deck says, before the contract is signed.
What we bring
Structured evaluation against your requirements
Vendors and tools scored on fit, risk, cost and supportability, so selection decisions are evidence-based and defensible.
What you need
Delivery, not just advice
A leader who has run teams and landed change in large organisations, and who stays to see it through.
What we bring
Leaders who have done it before
Senior practitioners who have led technology teams and delivered major transformation programmes for corporate and government departments.
What you need
Senior capability at a sensible cost
Executive-level judgement now, without a long recruitment search or a permanent salary the workload does not yet justify.
What we bring
An engagement sized to the work
An agreed number of days a month, scaled up or down as the programme demands, with a planned handover if you later appoint a permanent CAIO.
The role
What your fractional CAIO is responsible for
Eight areas of accountability, carried by one named executive. Select any one to see what it covers.
Responsibility 01
AI strategy and roadmap
A plan the executive team has agreed, linked to business outcomes and budget.
Responsibility 02
Governance and policy
Decision rights, acceptable use, approval gates and the artefacts that evidence them.
Responsibility 03
Risk and compliance
AI risk held on your register and managed against your privacy, security and regulatory obligations.
Responsibility 04
Vendor and technology selection
Evaluation, due diligence and commercial input on AI platforms and suppliers.
Responsibility 05
Delivery assurance
Oversight of AI projects from business case to go-live and benefits realisation.
Responsibility 06
People and capability
AI literacy for leaders and staff, and the change management that makes adoption stick.
Responsibility 07
Use case portfolio
One prioritised list of AI initiatives, each with an owner and a benefits case.
Responsibility 08
Board and executive reporting
Regular, plain-language reporting on progress, risk, spend and return.
How it works
From first conversation to embedded leadership
Assess
We baseline where AI is in use today, the risks it carries and how mature your governance is.
Establish
Ownership, governance and an agreed roadmap are put in place, with the Board and executive aligned.
Deliver
Priority initiatives move into delivery through your own project processes, with benefits tracked from day one.
Sustain or hand over
We stay on as your CAIO, or build the internal capability and hand over to a permanent appointment.
Our side of the fence
The kind of leader you get
A fractional CAIO is only as good as the experience behind the title. This is the calibre of person Bushey places in the role.
Barry Lewington
Co-Founder and MD, BusheyBarry has led senior technology teams and delivered high-profile programmes across a long career in IT and technology. He has worked on both sides of the table, running technology functions from the inside and guiding corporate and government departments through major transformation from the outside.
Senior technology leadership
Has held the roles of CTO, Technology Director and Principal Consultant.
High-profile programmes
Has delivered major transformation programmes across more than 40 countries.
A career in technology
More than 25 years across corporate, service provider and public sector environments.
Sector experience
Finance
Manufacturing
Retail
Government
Public Sector
That breadth matters. AI raises different questions in a regulated financial institution, on a factory floor, in a retail chain and in a government department. A fractional CAIO who has worked in all of them recognises the pattern quickly and knows what has to be different in yours.
Get started
Find out what a fractional CAIO would look like in your organisation
Start with a conversation. We will talk through where AI sits in your organisation today, what is worrying your Board, and whether a fractional appointment is the right answer.
