Embrace AI to stay competitive

The AICD’s inaugural Tech Governance Forum in Brisbane underscored an urgent call to action for boards — embrace AI or risk losing critical strategic ground.

Directors recognised that seizing AI’s transformative potential can deliver a decisive competitive edge, drive rapid innovation and position their organisations for accelerated growth in an increasingly AI-native market.

Directors must lean into the transformative opportunities presented by AI or watch themselves and their companies be overtaken, speakers at AICD’s Tech Governance Forum 2025 have warned.

Adam Driussi, CEO of Quantium, said directors who sought to oversee the use of AI to grow their organisations needed to lead by example and insist their executives do the same. “As a board member, the number-one question you should ask management would be to ask the CEO how much they use AI personally in their job,” he said. “If they don’t use AI in everything they do, how will you expect that to permeate through the organisation?”

Featuring 17 speakers, AICD’s inaugural Tech Governance Forum canvassed some of the new territory and terminology trickling into boardrooms — from “hallucinations” and “hyperpowers” to “digital twins”, “synthetic beings”, “singularity” and “passwordlessness”.

The forum opened with a keynote address by author and technologist Dr Catriona Wallace, who highlighted the moral, strategic and governance imperatives of AI. She also stressed the potential for “singularity” — the theory AI may no longer require its human masters — within a decade, meaning it was imperative to have frameworks and legislation in place to manage its rollout. “This is not a tool, it’s a power,” said Wallace. “It’s a force and we need to get our arms around it.”

Deployed with an eye to striking the right balance between risk and reward, great governance had the potential to be “a true innovation enabler”, said Microsoft ANZ CTO Sarah Carney.

Guardrails provided the clarity that allowed companies to progress, but timing was all-important. “Do you put those governance barriers in front of the innovation so people have to jump over hurdles before they can innovate?” she asked. “Or do you put it behind the innovation, so they get to innovate for a certain period of time before the handbrake comes on?”

Charging ahead

Many of the speakers were enthusiastic about the opportunities emerging technologies can bring.

Driussi said Quantium employees are expected to default to using AI “for every single thing they do, every day”. Through using AI technology to capture his leadership style and other critical data, he has even created a “digital twin”.

“People can get their work reviewed by a digital version of me, as though they’re meeting me,” he said, observing that putting a digital twin to work is boosting his efficiency while providing staff with greater access and opportunities for timely feedback. “I want them to be able to ask questions in a safe environment and I think people will take advice and coaching from AI better than they do from other humans.”

Driussi argued that attempts to manage risk by banning the use of AI tools was counterproductive. Recently, Quantium was consulting with “a major company” that had banned the use of AI due to security risk concerns. However, it emerged that many within the organisation were already using ChatGPT. Hundreds had signed up using their company email address, which gave the game away.

“If you think you’re banning a tool [so it’s] not being used, you’re in Disneyland, because… the tools are too powerful for people not to be tempted to use them [as a] support in their jobs,” he said. “It’s a red flag if you think you’re managing risk by saying, don’t use it.”

However, Sharon Doyle FAICD, a non-executive director with TechnologyOne, noted organisations still needed to start by considering their risk appetite and their purpose. She referred to Halliburton’s defence contracting activities, where the use of AI has been ruled out, at least for the present.

“They were unclear on the risks associated with AI and therefore, given their risk profile and the complexities with defence contracting and electronic warfare, they wouldn’t adopt it yet,” said Doyle. By comparison, Budget Direct (Doyle is on the board of its licensee, Auto & General Insurance)  had a strong focus on driving operational efficiency to deliver high-quality, low-cost insurance to customers, which made early adoption of AI a better fit, she added.

However, Doyle cautioned that emerging technologies were shifting so fast, directors needed to ensure they didn’t miss valuable opportunities and “become laggards”.

“If you wait, it could be a bigger risk for the business than starting early,” she said.

Directors must balance the need to innovate against the responsible use of emerging technologies, according to Kee Wong FAICDLife. “AI is here and the risk of not using AI is higher than the risk if things don’t go right,” he said.

Companies that sought to flourish thus needed to view each new problem, product or service, through the lens of AI.

“It’s not a question of when you will start using AI for it,” he said. “The question everyone… should be asking is, where does AI fit into this? It’s a mindset, it’s thinking about AI at the centre.”

Another important consideration was how to compete in the age of AI. “How do you differentiate between the competitor using [AI tool] Claude and you using Claude?” asked Wong. 

This article first appeared under the headline 'Transformation or hallucination?' in the July 2025 issue of Company Director magazine.